Audi
Tags: Design, General, Technology,
‘The SHED Project’
Tags: General
Property management company Lowe Guardians has teamed up with architecture firm Studio Bark for ‘The SHED Project’. This involves designing self-contained micro homes for installation inside vacant buildings across London.
These low-cost, flexible housing options are going up in empty warehouses and office blocks to protect such buildings from trespassers, vandals, and deterioration. They serve as alternatives to property guardianship, where people pay very little rent to stay in deserted buildings.
Lowe Guardians’ founder Tim Lowe thought up the idea after witnessing the squalid living conditions of these places. He said, “The reality has always been that turning vast, open spaces into private rooms for guardians has always been both tricky and time-consuming.”
These micro homes can be quickly assembled in a day using only a mallet and a drill. Similarly, they can be easily disassembled, transported and reassembled.
Kodak
Tags: General, Photography, Typography,
Kodak is the latest company to undergo a retro rebranding, reverting to its symbol of 34 years. The Kodak “K” is back, originally designed by Peter J. Oestreich in 1971 and used by the photography brand until 2006, though the new iteration by Work-Order uses stacked capitalised type for the word Kodak inside the letterform.
Capitalising the type is “the clearest departure from the past” says Work-Order, as Kodak has always used lower case. “The symmetry of the capital letterforms creates a molecular flexibility that allows the wordmark to be stacked,” says the design studio. “It is reminiscent of film perforations and street signage. It acts as a manufacturer’s stamp: the logo is the first read and the name is the supporting mark. When small, the name is removed leaving just the icon.”
The rebrand uses Kodak’s trademarked yellow and red, bringing a strong colour palette and unified branding across every aspect of the company’s packaging and visual identity.
Kodak joins Co-op and NatWest in a swathe of brands to recently return to a vintage graphic identity.
McDonalds
Tags: Art, Design, General, Technology,
To celebrate the 22nd birthday of the Mcflurry, McDonalds Canada has partnered with the University of Waterloo’s Audio Research Group and industrial designers Stacklab to develop the McDonalds Boombox. The portable speaker was available for one day at an event in Toronto and turned drinks trays into a portable, disposable speaker compatible with smartphones.
The 100% recyclable boombox can reach a decibel level of 70.4 dB using double-cone polygon speakers. The ten-sided cones are foil lined, reflecting the materiality and performance of brass instruments.
“When we changed the shape of the cones of the McBoombox, the difference in sound levels was 50 percent,” says Janelle Resch, a PhD candidate at the University of Waterloo who developed the project. “When we used the reflective material, you increase the sound level by 43 percent. Inserting your phone increases the sound level by 101 percent.”
The launch of the McDonald’s Boombox coincided with KFC India announcing that it had developed a bluetooth enabled games controller combined with its famous chicken box.
Rechargeable Electric Wheels
Tags: Design, General, Technology,
An Argentinian team has created a quickly folding electric bike with full-size wheels—one that pretty much knocks out every excuse you’ve had for not biking to work. The weatherproof rechargeable bike is made from lightweight aircraft grade aluminum (weighing a total of 17 kg) and offers 40 miles of electric assistance on a single charge, meaning you can effortlessly pedal straight to that afterparty atop a hill, without breaking a sweat. Additional features include a pedal-powered smartphone charger, lights that automatically turn on when your phone detects darkness plus integrated rear lights.
Carlsberg
Tags: Advertising, General, Technology,
Carlsberg Creates A Poster That Dispenses Free Beer To Passers-By.
How would you create the best poster in the world? For Carlsberg UK, it decided to turn it into a working beer tap that dispenses actual booze to passers-by.
According to The Guardian, people were limited to one beer each, and there were “plain-clothes security guards” to keep order.
This awesome, beer-dispensing poster was created with the help of advertising agency Fold7 and digital agency Mission Media.
Volvo Lifepaint
Tags: General, Technology,
Volvo Cars presents LifePaint. The best way to survive a crash, is not to crash. Life paint is a unique reflective safety spray. Invisible by daylight, it shines brightly in the glare of car headlights. Making the invisible, visible.
Apple Automotive
Tags: Design, General, Technology,
Apple has several hundred employees secretly working on creating an electric vehicle, reported the Wall Street Journal on Friday, citing people familiar with the company’s plans. Code-named Titan, the project currently sports the design of a minivan.
According to the Journal, Apple CEO Tim Cook approved the project about a year ago, putting product design Vice President Steve Zadesky in charge. A former Ford engineer, Zadesky has been a long time Apple employee who helped create the iPod and later the iPhone.
Zadesky is said to have created a team strong of 1,000 people, which tends to prove that Apple is serious about the project, rather than considering this electric car a hobby.
But of course, until we get an official confirmation from Apple, project Titan remains just this: a project that may or may not see the light of day. Besides, the technology developed for the project could very well be used for other products (think batteries, a technology in real need of a breakthrough). Either way, if Apple decided to go ahead with Project Titan, it would probably take years for an actual car to go into production.
This report comes a few hours after the Financial Times published a similar story earlier today, claiming that Apple had hired former President and CEO of Mercedes-Benz Research & Development Johann Jungwirth, a report that has now been corroborated by the Wall Street Journal.
The rumors of Apple working on a car project started last week when mysterious vans equipped with cameras spotted around the country had Apple’s name attached to them. Two days later, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said in an interview Apple was trying really hard to hire employees away from his company. It’s now easier to connect the dots.
Note the image attached is a concept and doesn’t reflect Apple’s design, if the company is indeed working on such a project.