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When Skinny Appliances are Cool

The trend with appliances these days is to get slimmer and sleeker so that you don’t hide them in closed cupboards but proudly show them off as a part of your kitchen décor. Consider Slim Toaster to be a part of this concept. Wall-mounted and with a very practical approach towards functionality, I’d use this over my current Philips Toaster, any day.

Designers: Muzaffer KOÇER & Ayca Guven

The Microbial Home

The Microbial Home is viewed as a cyclical biological machine where wastes like sewage, effluent, garbage, wastewater are filtered, processed and recycled to be used as inputs for the various home functions. The project includes various aspects like a Bio Digester Island and Larder in the kitchen, Urban Beehive, Bio-light, Apothecary, Filtering Squatting Toilet and Paternoster Plastic Waste Up-cycler.

Designer: Philips Design

Our Picks from the 2011 red dot awards!

Nearly 4500 entries were submitted for the 2011 red dot judges to review! After a meticulous, hands-on study of each submitted product they finally narrowed it down to 793 winners of the “red dot” award, 154 “honourable mention” award winners, as well as 59 “best of the best” awards reserved for well… the best of the best! We’re impressed that the judges tackled 4500 original entries when we could barely keep our hands off all 900+ winning designs! We did, however, manage to narrow it down to 10 that we just couldn’t keep our eyes off of…

Ironing with Ceramic

The precepts of ironing hasn’t changed much. Take a hot flat surface and apply it to textiles to relax the fibers. Sometimes you use steam to crease and set them but if you step back, there’s still room for improvement. The “Easy Ironing” concept lets you define how much ironing you want to do and in turns tells you how much water to use; no waste. It also uses a ceramic glass panel which has superior thermal stability and makes it easier to clean. One of the top 25 finalists in this year’s Philips Award.

Designer: Mohsen Ahi Andy

A New Grip, A New Steam

What many beginning designers, especially those with big dreams and aspirations, don’t realize that it’s the little things, the littlest parts of things, that matter the most. When you take a tiny piece of something and improve it immeasurably, that’s when you’ve made a magnificent difference in the world. If you’re able to work inside the system and change it from the inside out, you’ve just created a pathway. That’s what this Steam Machine has done with its handle.

Designer: Yuree S Lim

Super Iron

The Easyglider is an innovative steam iron concept developed for Philips by Studio NAMIC. It is super light weight, ergonomically correct and is accompanied by an ultra sleek base, which is easier to operate, easier to carry and easier to use anywhere. The iron itself has a new gripping method, which prevents Repetitive strain injury (RSI). This new gripping method allows for ambidextrous use and the central button placed behind the fingers is the steam controller which is activated by squeezing it against the core of the iron like a trigger.

Designer: David Gonçalves for Studio NAMIC

Déjà vu LED?

The prolific design hub Art Lebedev is out with another of its creation and design-wise it’s got a major Philips hangover! I’m talking about the Optogan LED Lamp. To quote the studios, “the lamp combines classic ideas with advancements in microelectronics.” Anyways, the lamp features a radiator encasing that is designed as a set of ridges, which help in dissipating heat. These energy saving bulbs come as 40 & 60 watts. Simply love their organic form!

Designer: Art Lebedev Studio

Why Do So Many Designs or Products Look The Same?

Ever wonder why so many products look the same? On the surface, it may appear designers have found the ideal form factor so there’s no need to change anything, but there’s more than meets the eye. The reasons are deeply rooted and the key to breaking the mold is to first understand why. Hit the jump!

Contributing Editor: Brian Ling

Visualizing Light Controller

The To Be Touched Range is a series of intuitive light controllers for the LivingColors series by Philips Design. The models in this range from a simple on/off switch to one that includes a dimmer. The beauty in these switches is the visual color effect that they imbibe. The color saturation and intensity are directly proportionate to the lighting settings chosen. So a deep color ring suggests that the lights are at their brightest.

Designers: Philips Lighting & Philips Design

Disco Lights For USB

Getting back to his roots, Designer Mac Funamizu takes inspiration from the Japanese Soma-Toh or a revolving lantern for this gimmicky Funny USB Memory Stick! Involved here is a transparent USB memory stick with alluring lights to represent facts. Example: no lights = empty stick; pink light = images stored; blue = documents & green = movies. And when the lights fill up the tube, it simply means memory is full. A delightful design, which is a tangent from the Swarosvki and gilded ones presently in the market.

Designer: Mac Funamizu

Food For Thought

There’s a paradigm shift in the science of food. Fifteen ago proper nutrition meant augmenting the kind of foods you ate. Buzz words like low-carb, low-cal, non-fat, low-glycemic, organic, and natural made their way into our vocabulary and yet we’re becoming fatter and unhealthier. Philips Design envisions a range of products that not only identify the true contents of food, but also how it affects your individual body.

Designers: Philips Design

Printing My Food By The Molecule

Molecular gastronomy studies the physical and chemical processes that occur while cooking. It basically tries to investigate and explain the chemical reasons behind the transformation of ingredients. We saw reference to this stream a while ago and now inspired by the so-called ‘molecular gastronomists’ who take pride in completely deconstructing food only to re assemble them bizarre modern ways, Philips Design presents the Food Creation Concept.

Designer: Philips Design