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Tha Business Self Defense Kit

Tha Business is a self defense kit designed for those who find themselves in sticky situations. “I thought it’d be pretty knarly to design a deck of self defense cards. Things such as brass knuckles, pepper spray, pocket knives & whistles to name a few,” says the designers. All this from a few inspiring trips thru San Francisco’s sketchier neighborhoods. I don’t advocate violence even in self defense (ahem – brass knuckles) but these are slick and unassuming self defense weapons.

Designers: Hoang Nguyen and Anh Nguyen for CreativeSession

Simplicity at It’s Finest

The Nixon Minimalist watch was designed to showcase pure simplicity and the name couldn’t capture it more. The designers’ intention was to rid the user of the anxiety of minutes, and allow the watch focus purely on the hour at hand. No annoying graphics, no overbearing branding… just simple, honest time. We love it!

Designers: Hoang M Nguyen & Anh Nguyen

Put Your Power On A Timer

I’m sure all of you know plugged-in appliances slowly run up your electric bill. The annoyance of having to unplug/plug devices is enough to just ignore the whole problem altogether. The Belkin TimeOutlet concept is a modular, stackable surge protector divided into 4 quadrants. Each section corresponds to a time of day. When that time is over, power is cut from everything in that quadrant and power turns on in the next.

Designers: Hoang M Nguyen, Anh Nguyen & Sam Staar

Music By The Window

Eclipse is a media player that uses the photovoltaic cells on its backside to draw in solar power and sticks onto the window via a suction cup. As expected of any “good media player”, this one too features Bluetooth connectivity to steam in music from your MP3 player or catch weather updates, podcasts & radio. The speakers are built-in but the cutest aspect to the design is the compartment to hold your music device. It resembles the compartment used in cassette tape players from yester-years; the evident “eject” button et all!

Designers: Hoang M Nguyen & Anh Nguyen

Sight And Sound Satisfaction

A bulb that somehow manages to include a speaker as well, does this sound farfetched to you? Does to me, but considering the possibilities available to us in the future, maybe we will have something like this in our living rooms and pubs. Wireless speakers are there as are light bulbs, so you basically put them together in a rather sophisticated way, citing technological advances as your friend.

Designers: Hoang M Nguyen, Poom Puttorngul & Anh Nguyen

Serendipity in Social Networking

Inspiration can come from the most unexpected places. For designer Hoang Nguyen, it came from Orwell’s “1984″. He noticed similarities with modern social networking. Abstractly, we can use a social network like Facebook in a “big brother” type of way. Question is, is there a way for surveillancing to be experienced equally? Would we all be jaded and freely living socially? Hit the jump and watch the video. Thoughts?

Designer: Hoang M Nguyen

Rockin Socket

Earlier today I was tearing apart my office looking for an extension cord (unsuccessfully). If only I had this wall socket design by Nguyen Tuan Anh. The primary feature is an integrated extension cord that allows the user to easily pull and return the plug to the wall. This unique universal socket caters to travelers, gadget-lovers, and home owners alike, making power conversion easier, intuitive and definitely more convenient. This is thinking outside the box at its best!

Designer: Nguyen Tuan Anh

Sony PSi aka Playstation Interactive

Sony unveiled their motion control intentions at this year’s E3 game expo so designer Anh Nguyen must be riding the same wavelength because his PSi concept also features wand-like motion controllers. The console leaves a little something to be desired but the wands are very interesting. You can stack the wands for various games like tug-o-war or add weights if you insist on the video game fitness craze going on right now. If Anh wants to really impress, he better come up with renders showing the wands as light sabers and disrupters. PEW PEW!

Designer: Anh Nguyen

Handlebar Bike Lock

Well lookie-here, isn’t this clever? Handlebars is a bike lock built into… you guessed it, the handlebars. Push the handlebars down and pull out to engage the steel cable wires. Although clever, the system doesn’t address the theft of individual bike components when not properly locked down, e.g. wheels.

Designer: Bach Nguyen

Best of January 2009

Every month we take a look around and select some of the most interesting designs that was showcased here. Below you’ll find the most popular designs we’ve tracked over the last 30 days – an overview of designs you shouldn’t have missed in January 2009.

Enchanting Doorlight

There is something very instinctive about finding your way to the door of a room during blackouts. Based on this instinct, it will be so clever to integrate a flashlight into the handle, so that you have an emergency light handy, wherever you need it. I love the LEDoorHandle, which is based on this simple idea! It doubles up as light sensor mood lights for those who like to indulge in fancy fittings. And the system uses the locking-motion of the handle to harness and charge the lithium batteries of the flashlight.

Designers: Kun-hee Kim, Kei Shimizu & Nguyen-vu Dang

Cutting Up in Style!

The ORCA Saw looks complicated but I’m sure it’s ergonomically comfortable to hold. One of the unique features is a thumb scroll switch instead of your typical trigger and its distinctive curved blade guard allows more working angle. Not that I own any saws, but if I were to get one, this would be it! It’s even gorgeous on display.

Designer: Jon Nguyen

Ten Creative Re-Invention Of The Light Bulb

History suggests that over twenty inventors worked toward the creation and design of the light bulb. Of these, Thomas Edison’s version was the most efficient. We are not here to dispute any claims but to appreciate the various forms and representations it has taken. Coming to the present times (and a bit into the future), let’s look at ten creative re-inventions of this light source.

Designers: Various