You’ve got a garage for your business. It’s down there. It’s below street level. Dangit! It seemed like a great idea until you realized you were in Fargo. It’s gonna flood! Ya! It’s gonna! You can’t avoid it! Unless of course you do, and how are you going to be doing that then? Use the “Floodbreak.” It’s spiffy. It comes up from the ground and it stops that water cold! I don’t know if it’s gonna do much against the snow though.
Designer: Floodbreak, LLC
Power up! While you’re jamming on down 1st Avenue, swinging from the bus poles on those hangers they’ve got there, what kind of power are you generating? I mean other than your body heat (everyone knows this is a whole lot of energy due to The Matrix, of course.) But what about that swing power? What about your whole body weight pulling down on that pole? We’ll whatddya know, here’s a project dealing with just that. It’s the “More+” bus handle and it’s going to power you up to Crazy Town.
Designer: Junjie Zhang
Cheaper, Better, Greener. No, that’s not the studio notes for the new Shrek movie. It’s Ford’s latest directive for their new START concept that brings back their keep-it-simple design roots. The Beijing International Auto Show was the stage for Ford’s unveiling of what promises to be a healthy exercise in green dreaming. Built from a combination of hybrid aluminum/high strength steel, the START keeps weight down without sacrificing safety. The body panels are made from deformable, pre-colored recyclable composites, eliminating the need for Earth damaging paints.
Motorized wheelchairs are a great invention, giving millions of disabled people mobility and independence but they’re still prohibitively expensive. Even with insurance, it can take families years to save up the cash to buy one. An alternative is the NEWS (New Electric Wheelchairs) by Ju Hyun Lee. The contraption attaches to any standard wheelchair giving you instant motorized power. Great for hospitals, nursing homes, physical therapy centers, and a future episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion.
Designer: Ju Hyun Lee
Love me some sushi y’all. Good sushi is already editable art but designer Arthur Xin takes it to the next step in the literal sense by packaging all the traditional condiments in gouache paint tubes. The entire serving tray looks like an artist’s palette he calls the, wait for it… Sushi Palette. Mmm yum yum I gotta get me some! Is there a place for artful eating in people’s busy lives?
Designer: Arthur Xin
Update: Now Closed!
LG, Autodesk, and crowdSPRING in the same breath can mean only one thing: Time to participate in LG’s Design The Future Competition. This year there is a certain twist in the tale, so do you consider yourself a designer up for a real-world challenge? There is little room for speculation because you need to design a revolutionary mobile device that will appeal to the cellphone-generation of United States, 2-3 years down the line.
Cracked nipples and the agony of nursing a hungry baby at the same time is quite a severe situation that only moms will understand. Breast pumps are a solution and even if we use it for convenience purposes, the whole idea of an artificial nipple squeezer is quite alien to a lactating mother. The goal of the IUNO Breast Pump is not to offer a quick pumping session, but to offer a comforting, more intimate and less intimidating experience. The bowl is shaped more like a baby’s head than a bottle tube for that sake.
Designer: Dan Almagor
Traveling by train, metro, subway, monorail, bullet train or whatever you call it, can be harrowing at times. No worries, design house Prechteck has saved you a great seat for all the action. Like plucking fruit from a tree, fruit that you sit on as you pretend to not notice the creepy man next to you “reading” a porn magazine. This railway seating design won second place out of 5,000 submissions to the Bombardier/YouRail design competition.
Designer: Chris Precht
This one’s for those of you who have low or no visibility with the eyes. Blind, sometimes people say. This is what’s known as the “DROP” GPS system, and it’s all hand-held. It uses the 3D dots you might be used to calling braille, here known more as Tactile Display technology, and it all works in conjunction with things such as a cane or seeing eye dog sometimes used by the blind. Smooth sailing on an abstract device.
Designer: Allan Sejer Madsen and Lukasz Natkaniec
For books to sit on, that is. Not to be. Although when you think about it, all real books are made of dead wood pulp. Unless it’s… LIVING DEAD PULP! Ahhh! But that’s not what we’re here about today. Today right here now we’re talking about the “Zen Bench.” This bench / bookshelf amalgamation is the tops when it comes to looking amazing while holding either books or butts. Designed by an intensely named Latvian, Raimonds Cirulis.
Designer: Raimonds Cirulis for Studio Maffam
Allow me to get cold hearted with you for a moment. Let me warm your brain up with some lovely Industrial Design of the conceptual sort. This might also be called architecture, if you be so inclined to be specific. An ice-tastic structure designed by the 2-B-2 crew, one by the name of “Arctic Mobile Unit.” It is a solution to the problem of existing in such a climate, a climate not suitable for human beings, an environment that will freeze your tootsies off.
Designer: Andrey Bondarenko for 2-B-2 Architecture
I swear if any city builds street lamps like the LED Galaxy – I’m there. Designer Sungkuk Park has a well thought out idea here guys. Using advance LEDs, carbon fibers, reverberators, and bio-resin coatings, he’s created a street lamp that casts a carpet of lights, showering the streets with glittery specks like stars. Space enough of these bad boys apart and you could literally blanket an entire street with far less energy than traditional lamps. Twinkle Twinkle y’all!
Designer: Sungkuk Park
Explore the best of YD. Our Archives are full of wonderful concepts from all over the world. Go ahead, don't be shy!
Asthmatics should regularly monitor their airways to determine if there’s any deterioration, but checking in to see a doctor that frequently is time consuming so designer Felix (love that name) created Blue Flow. The system combines a peak flow monitor with mobile phone software. Information is wirelessly transmitted to the phone for your doctor to monitor. The information gathered can be used to determine the best course of action since the condition is finicky and changes based on a number of health and environmental variables.
Designer: Felix Steinhardt
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