King of the World.

Immensely amused (perhaps I shouldn't be...) by TEA.Tanic, a stainless steel tea bag holder designed by Gordon Adler that is made to look like... well, you can guess.

Inside.

I love this print campaign for the Berlin Philharmonic orchestra. It showcases macro photographs taken inside of a cello, flute, and pipe organ to highlight their inner workings. The retired flautist in me finds this to be beautifully done - I love how vast the spaces feel. Art directed by photographer Bjoern Ewers.



Dodged.

Let the weekend games begin, friends!!

For the third time in as many years the University of Alberta set a world record last week for the largest dodgeball game, pitting 4,979 ball-hurling competitors against one another in a chaotic, hour-long hailstorm of giant, spongy red balls.

(I feel like I'm in the middle of this crazy game right now, Friday has come after me with a vengence!)
Photos by Gateway Photography.

Music to My Ears.

I am very, very much looking forward to seeing The National perform tonight in San Francisco! We saw them at Coachella earlier this year, and they absolutely blew me away. The show easily made my Top 3 concert experiences list, without a doubt (and if you really pressed me to name the others, it might just take #1!)...

So in the spirit of all things music, I'm digging these retro ads for Oui FM by Paris based Leg Agency.  (They also remind me of the Dear Photograph project, which I find endlessly amusing)

 

Click.

LOVE.  I would kill for a large print of this; it's the perfect combination of my interests.
Via Observando.

Incepted.

This ought to perk up those dull Monday morning senses!  Check out Vivian Chiu's Inception Chair. Like the movie, the chair has layers of itself within itself within itself.... what witty design!

Vivian is a recent graduate from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), and focuses on sculpture and furniture design.

Found via Apartment Therapy. Post dedicated to my chair loving mother.

The Future of Play.

Swing and be free! Pop Up City on bringing PLAY back:

“71% of adults used to play on the streets when they were young. 21% of children do so now. Are we designing children and play out of the public realm?” Having considered this, Bruno Taylor of Swing & Be Free decided to install swings bus stops in London.

“This project is a study into different ways of bringing play back into public space. It focuses on ways of incorporating incidental play in the public realm by not so much as having separate play equipment that dictates the users but by using existing furniture and architectural elements that indicate playful behaviour for all.”

Swing & Be Happy. In San Francisco, do-gooders hang swings to spread joy in the Bay Area Rapid Train and unexpected outdoor locations. Jeffrey Waldman believes in this pure sense of joy so much that he raised funds to bring swings to Bolivia. Bolivia has the second highest poverty level in South America. One in four Bolivians are between the ages of 10 and 19 and out of every 1,000 teenage girls, 88 are pregnant. Waldman hopes the swings will bring a little bit of childhood back to Bolivia’s urban areas and “not just spread joy, but spread the desire to create it.”

Swing & Let Go. The Red Swing project has used this basic playset to transform under-utilized public spaces into amusement areas for children, adults, poor, rich people… What has started as a University Architecture assignment in 2007, in Austin, Texas, has grown internationally. All around the world, more than 100 red swings are hung in public spaces and just wait for anyone to sit and to create a personal moment. While the project was expanding, the Red Swing project started to wonder about the differences of public reaction from place to place. I did not manage to get access to their official website or find the results of their analysis, but if you found anything, please leave us a comment! A documentary about the Red Swings Project is available here.

Swing & Create. Melissa Mongiat and Mouna Andraos designed the awesome ’21 balançoires’ for the quartiers des spectacles in Montreal.

“A giant collective instrument made of 21 musical swings; each swing in motion triggers different notes, all the swings together compose a piece, but some sounds only emerge from cooperation. The project stimulates ownership of the new space, bringing together people of all ages and backgrounds, and creating a place for playing and hanging out in the middle of the city centre.”

Another participatory work of art is the swing pavilion conceived by the Dutch Studio Elmo Vermijs. It consists of 50 swings with different heights inviting adults and children to enjoy this joyful moment together. “A composition of moving people might arise.” Revigorating, isn’t it?

(Original work by Pop Up City)

Late?

This amazing. There aren't even words. What an incredible urban installation.

"It’s officially called a ‘transfer accelerator’ by Dutch railway maintenance company ProRail, but everyone else would say it’s a slide. Installed next to a stairway at the newly renovated railway station Overvecht in the city of Utrecht, the slide offers travellers the opportunity to quickly reach the railway tracks when they’re in a hurry. But above all, the slide is a great instrument to make the city more playful. The ‘transfer accelerator’ was designed by Utrecht-based firm HIK Ontwerpers, and installed as the final piece of the renovation of the Overvecht railway station.

The designers explain that their slide is meant to be a nice gesture to the travellers. They brilliantly foresaw that such a playful urban intervention can generate large-scale positive spin-off for a disadvantaged neighborhood like Overvecht, and that’s exactly what happened."

"I'm late! For a very important date! no time to say hello, goodbye! I'm late! I'm late! I'm late!" Ringing a bell? Anyone? Anyone?

Found via The Pop Up City.

Uraputki.

As part of the Flux Aura and Artist as Neighbor project, Candy Chang created this fantastic public installation for a community in Turku, Finland, European Capital of Culture 2011. In transforming a pedestrian path that leads to a local university, she hoped to share the ideas and thoughts of citizens - their memories, wished and choices. Nicknamed, "Uraputki" or Career Path, she asked passersby to fill in the blanks with colored chalk: "When I was little I wanted to be ____. Today I want to be ____." 

The project’s aim is to reflect on our lives and how much we’ve changed (or not) — comparing our youth with our present and, at the same time, share all these thoughts with the members of our community.

Given the week I've had (yes, I realize it's only Tuesday), this project made a huge impression on me.  How would you answer these questions?

Via Pop Up City

Hidden Away.

Off for a long weekend away at Lake Huntington this afternoon!

I'm presently captivated by the Treehotel in the forests of Harads, Sweden. Who wouldn't want to stay nestled away a one of a kind treehouse, like the The Mirrorcube nestled in the forests' canopy? (Swoon)

Zip It.

Constructed entirely out of zip ties, this massimal - or 1:1 design object - serves as a prototype to examine how physical form can engage the public realm. These constructs are mass abstractions of animal forms fabricated in sysemic fashion from one material.

This polar bear was an installation in the 2011 Beaux Arts Ball, developed by D.O.T.S. and is comprised of over 20,000 zip ties!

Aside from being impressed by this stunning form, I initially found it to be quite the political commentary before reading more about the intended design concept; the material iteself read to me as a symbol of globalization, capitalism and waste, while the form - a polar bear - suggested the affect we are having on other species as they slowly slip away off this earth... Thoughts?

Photographs by GLINTstudios...

Creatively Minded.

As a dominant right brain, I am naturally drawn to this ad. It's beautifully executed! 

Happy Monday.

Tattly "designy" temporary tattoo fun.

Tree of Life.

I love arboretums (and... woods, I suppose). There's something magical about walking through a grove of trees, completely enveloped by its canopy. When I was a kid, we would walk through the CSUS arboretum and spend time examining a large crossection of a redwood from the area, dated with important events in our history (Hello, dendrochronology! yes, I'm a nerd). I still find myself engrossed by these types of exhibits in our parks.

This is a beautifully executed print of a tree ring, and when viewed up close, the rings in the print reveal themselves to be composed of hundreds of tiny animals! Flora and fauna become one. Brilliant.

The print is available online from Degree.
Found via Anthology Magazine.

Geek Out.

I am a sucker for globes and maps, so when I saw this typographic map by Chicago designer, Nancy McCabe, on Fast Co. Design, I was instantly smitten.

 

Off to Boston today... 

Babushka.

I had quite a matryoshka - or nesting doll - collection when I was young, that I adored. I find this babushka's mug shot endlessly entertaining, by Emma at Home.

Dry the River.

Finding innovative approaches to print campaigns amusing lately (see Become Someone Else).  Here, artist Xavier Barrade and FOAM agency created these large format posters to promote the band Dry the River in London.

Found on It’s Nice That

Burning Houses.

The Burning House Project almost attempts to condense an interview into one question. If your house was burning, what would you take with you? It's a conflict between what's practical, valuable and sentimental. What you would take reflects your interests, background and priorities.


I've become completely enthralled peering into the lives of contributors, and it's made me think quite a bit about my most precious possessions (ok, well, maybe I've already thought it through since I live in earthquake country...), and I might be inspired to share my own. 

....Clearly there are some photographers in the bunch, eh?