Oh! Gizmo

By Andrew Liszewski

Urban living is just another way to say you live in a small, cramped apartment in a big city. But if you furnish your pad correctly, you can actually make it seem a lot bigger than it really is. The Little Lamp designed by Sam Hurt and Jude Biddulph looks like a classic table lamp and comes complete with a clip-on shade and a pull-chain to turn it on or off. But the base of the lamp is actually a single D-cell battery, which of course also powers the LED bulb.

So not only is it saving you precious space, but it also won’t add anything to your monthly power bill. Just couple this with a 2-inch Sony Watchman TV in the living room, and an Easy Bake Oven in the kitchen and I guarantee your small apartment will seem like a spacious penthouse. (Note: Guarantee not guaranteed.)

You can find the Little Lamp at the MoMA Store for $19.95, and the LED bulb and battery are included.

[ Little Lamp ] VIA [ Cribcandy ]

By Andrew Liszewski

The cubicle where I used to work was always the place to be since people loved hearing my stories about epic space battles, amazing bank heists and other exciting things I did on the weekends. But with all those people stopping by, I never got much work done. If you have a similar problem I think this Duck Lamp created by Sebastian Errazuriz would serve as a pretty effective ’scarecrow’ for your office. But instead of scaring off crows, it would simply frighten your co-workers to the point where they would never disturb you.

Sadly the lamp isn’t for sale, but as an added bonus if you feel like making one yourself I’m sure working on the project in your kitchen would also serve to scare off your friends and family too.

[ Sebastian Errazuriz Duck Lamp ] VIA [ Productdose ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If there’s a space exploration buff on your gift list, this Satellite LED Lamp will serve as a unique reminder of those early days, and designs. The lamp bears a passing resemblance to the Russian Sputnik satellite as well as the United State’s own Project Vanguard satellites.

Of course I’m pretty sure Sputnik didn’t have a single LED on board, given the fact that it just celebrated its 50 year anniversary. However this satellite lamp has 24 of them in red, green and blue that flash on and off in one of 8 “dazzling display options.” It apparently also includes a realistic red “engage” button to cycle through the different patterns.

It’s currently available from the Discovery Channel Store for $39.95.

[ Satellite Lamp ]

By Andrew Liszewski

The MultiBook is from the same people who originally brought us the MultiPot charging station a few years back, but this new version adds a bit more functionality. Instead of a pot, the MultiBook is designed to look like an ordinary book sitting on your bedside table, that is until you turn it on.

Hidden on the spine of the MultiBook is a red LED clock and calendar that allows it to function as a bedside alarm clock. In addition the ‘pages’ of the book will actually glow with a diffuse white light thanks to 74 LEDs hidden inside. And finally, the lid of the MultiBook opens to reveal spots for three different chargers that allows you to keep the mess of cables hidden when they’re not in use.

It’s currently available from Questo Design for about $222 but only comes in a 220 volt configuration at this time.

[ Rotaliana MultiBook ] VIA [ technabob ]

By Andrew Liszewski

I realized it’s been quite a while since I’ve posted an over-priced designer lamp, so here you go. The Marie Louise was created by Buro Vormkrijgers and is made of PMMA (aka polymethyl methacrylate or ‘acrylic’) sheets cut out in the silhouette of a traditional lamp. A number of these sheets are then arranged together to form a 3D version. Kind of like those paper Christmas trees you used to make as a kid.

The lamp is illuminated with a special 14-watt fluorescent bulb running down the center that can be customized with a series of colored filters including amber, yellow, orange, purple, blue, pink, red and green. There’s also an engraved version of the lamp available that includes intricate etchings on the ’shade’ portion.

And the over-priced part? How does $999 for the standard version, and $1299 for the engraved version sound? Both are available from Generate with your choice of colored filter.

[ Marie Louise Lamp ] VIA [ Better Living Through Design ]

By Evan Ackerman

Designed by Yuko Taguchi, the Wind Up Lamp is one of those concepts with layers upon layers of usefulness. Kinda like lasagna, albeit less tasty. The lamp is powered entirely by a spring driven generator; the more you wind the key, the longer the lamp will stay on. It’s obviously eco-friendly and great in a power outage, but there’s more to it than that… Since it’s wind-up, you don’t have to remember to turn out the light before going to bed. Want the light off anyway? Just unwind it. It also functions as a timer, since there’s a linear relationship between winds of the key and time lit. I’d love to know how exactly much light you get per wind, and then where I can buy one, but there don’t seem to be answers to either of those things quite yet.

[ Wind-Up Lamp ] VIA [ RFJ ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Designed by David Graas the ‘Not A Lamp’ and ‘Not A Box’ lights take the IKEA idea of flat-packed furniture and apply it to lighting instead. The ‘Not A Lamp’ is designed to sit on a table and has the silhouette of a lamp cut into a simple cardboard box while the ‘Not A Box’ is designed to hang from the ceiling and uses the outline of a light bulb with a simple shade instead.

While I like the negative image effect of both lights I suspect the ‘Not A Box’ is a bit more useful since it has a large hole on the bottom that allows the light from the bulb to shine down onto a table. The intricate pattern of the ‘Not A Lamp’ on the other hand looks like it gives off very little light. So in this case I guess form just edges out functionality.

And from what I can tell both lights come with ’some assembly required’ not to mention supplying your own bulb but I can’t imagine the instructions for putting it together are that hard to follow. The ‘Not A Lamp’ also comes in your choice of brown, orange, green or blue colors.

[ Not A Lamp & Not A Box ] VIA [ Cribcandy ]