Call me a fool, but I have never been very invested in a speaker. My focus would be on the lyrics of the song and as long as I got to hum along with the lyrics I was a happy soul. This cocoon of mine shattered after I took an interest in product design and joined Yanko! The sheer variety and functionality of the speaker designs we showcase have made me a fan of these designs, with a special focus on interactive speakers. The process of manually changing a speaker’s controls now feels like an almost meditative process to me and now that I have a better collection of speakers with me, I still find myself in awe when a designer mixes this essentially physical product with a physical interaction that helps us feel the melody. This is the collection curated here today – speakers that attune themselves to your needs – be it associating color to music, using non-traditional interfaces or adding a new digital element to the design, each speaker will inspire you to look at this humble everyday object in a whole new light!

The motive for Ben Lorimore’s Sound Tool was to have a speaker whose operation relies upon physical intuition, leading it to be emotionally stimulating! The main source of inspiration comes from the eccentric movement of a Conductor; as the volume of the orchestra increases, as too does the Conductors physical presence. This has been beautifully translated into Sound Tool by encouraging the user to increase the volume of the music by grabbing each end of the speaker and pulling them apart! To increase the volume of Sound Tool, grab it and make it bigger. To decrease the volume, compress it. Fully collapse it to pause, Sound Tool will not play at 0% volume. It’s welcoming to see a product that encourages tangible interactions!

“Atelier” is a hybrid entertainment system that marries high-end audio and television into one elegant unit. According to designer Kwanjun Ryu, it’s first and foremost a speaker to appeal to younger generations less concerned with TV. Created to rest close to the floor, it’s capable of delivering multidirectional, high-def sound that will envelop the user in their favorite tunes or talk radio. With the press of a button, a 32″ screen automatically raises to reveal a full HD color screen. This means, when it’s not in TV mode there’s no blank, black box cramping your room’s style!

The Layered, at first glance, won’t give you even the slightest idea of what it is. So I’ll help you out. Designed by X-Factor, the Layered is a Bluetooth speaker, with the equalizer turned into an interactive tactile element on the top. Taking bands of frequencies and dedicating different controls to them, the Layered contains six transparent discs lit from the bottom. These discs correspond to different frequency bands (calibrated to help control the presence of a particular instrument) and can be rolled up and down the Layered’s surface to work as an equalizer, allowing you to amplify or attenuate the effect of instruments in your music.

The Sound Project, by Pascal Grangier, offers a new way of interacting with music using color tones. Colour and emotion are directly linked to one another, from subtle, pastel blues which are associated with calmness and a state of relaxation, through to vibrant reds which symbolize excitement and energy. Protruding out of the top of the speaker is a polycarbonate layer, where the mood and information are elegantly displayed. The music is controlled via a separate device that resides on the top of the module; by physically moving the device, the music levels alter.

You’ve heard of 2.1 audio, 5.1 audio, even perhaps 7.1 audio… but have you ever heard of 12.1 surround sound? That’s what Lingsong Jin’s Actinia speaker is about. Inspired by the tree-shaped sea anemone, the Actinia Speaker has 12 tweeters on its radially symmetric top, and a woofer right at the base. With a gradient-tinted glass body, the Actinia is virtually see-through, bringing an element of transparency to the uniquely shaped organic speaker body, almost reminiscent of how curvy Harman Kardon’s Soundsticks were, back in the day.

The Waving Multifunctional Speaker by RuiWang Xiang is a perfect example of how form and function can help redefine a product’s design. Given that wireless speakers are almost always used with smartphones, the Waving Multifunctional Speaker even doubles as a dock/stand for your mobile, allowing you to watch videos on it while the three mid-range audio drivers on the front pump sound out. The Waving Multifunctional Speaker even comes with a distinct wave-texture on its top which serves as a nifty area to rest stationery. Aware of the fact that most speakers find themselves placed on work desks, the Waving Multifunctional Speaker integrates clever and convenient solution, allowing you to rest your pens and pencils on it while you work. The Waving Multifunctional Speaker is also a winner of the A’ Design Award for the year 2020!

Mindaugas Petrikas’ Hevi speaker comes crafted from a mixture of rough concrete and wood, Hevi is a 360-degree modular speaker, with a warm and rustic aesthetic. With a glossy plastic plate stuck right in the middle of it, a surreal modern contrast is created to the otherwise homely materials, that are wood and concrete. What makes Hevi even more interesting is that it dissociates into two speakers! The top portion of Hevi consists of a mid-high frequency speaker, whereas the lower portion is a mid-low frequency speaker. The two can be detached, allowing you to carry either of the speakers wherever you wish. The compact upper speaker is, of course, the more portable option, something you could even carry for your outdoor adventures! When combined, both the speakers create a resounding high-quality sound.

Designed to be like an Amazon Echo Show but in the shape of an Amazon Echo, Royole’s new Mirage smart speaker tries to integrate flexible displays into smart speakers. The Mirage is a cylindrically shaped smart-speaker (with a floating halo) that responds to Amazon’s Alexa, but the most noticeable element about it is the screen that envelops nearly half the device, wrapping around from side to side. Royole’s always been an advocate of flexible electronics, with a folding tablet, phone, and even keyboard in its catalog of products. The Mirage adds itself to that list with the flexible display, which provides a new way of showcasing information that your smart speaker relays to you.

The Saturn hybrid speaker-light by Angie Kim & Heejae Choi begs the question: why shouldn’t our devices also be works of art?! The obvious answer is that everyone has largely different aesthetic tastes, but there’s no denying that Saturn’s sculptural form is better looking than plenty of other standalone Bluetooth speaker designs. Aside from providing high-quality audio streaming and stylish accent lighting on its rings, it also features a spinning feature that captivates with motion. Depending on the music tempo, its centered orb will turn to the timing of your favorite tunes!

Portable speakers don’t usually have intriguing aesthetics, so Arvin Maleki’s Seda was created with the intention of blending both visuals and technology to make it stand out. Its physical form radiates a zen feeling while also having a multifunctional appeal. Seda isn’t just smart, it was made to be intelligent. Seda has a pen holder in the center which also acts as a small space organizer. It features an embedded light bar in its external body which works as a desk light and it also has a dim ambient light – to be honest, this speaker is more lit than the playlist I made for it. It almost looks like an accent interior piece for your home than a portable speaker.

With an aesthetic that melds Japanese and French aesthetics together, the iFi Aurora by Julien Haziza is a hi-fi speaker that literally looks like it’s levitating off the surface of the table or mantelpiece it’s kept on. The audio unit is clad in a casing made of bamboo, with slatted strips around its periphery, adding contrast while also creating what one would perceive to be the grill for the speaker’s 8 drivers. The speaker’s semi-vintage look comes with a reason. It opts for analog signal processing over digital, delivering a sound that’s grand, lossless, and well balanced. Its in-built PureEmotion amplifying technology delivers room-filling, rich audio that engages you with music in its purest, hi-definition format. The speaker comes with Wi-Fi connectivity and Bluetooth 5.0, but even has more than its fair share of wired cable inputs, ranging from optical and coaxial to USB and even Ethernet.

Now that you are set with a speaker design, check out these innovative keyboard and mouse designs to help you create that dream desk setup!

The smartphone camera is a great tool for capturing photos of things you like. It could be as direct as photos of friends, family, animals, landscapes, but it could also be photos of things that inspire you. Pantone’s latest product wants to extend your smartphone’s ability to capture items of inspiration by allowing it to turn into a real-life eye-dropper tool that can pick and identify colors with incredible, Pantone-backed accuracy!

Meet the Color Match Card… an innocuous-looking card with a grid of colored swatches and a hollow cutout in the middle. All you do is place the card on an object who’s color you want to scan and point your camera at it. The Pantone Connect app does the rest, automatically analyzing the color within the hollow cutout and giving you matching Pantone color values that you can either document or save within the Pantone Connect app or even send directly to a palette that you can access using Adobe’s suite of creative tools. The tech behind the Color Match card is pretty simple. The colorful swatches (and the tracking markers around it) help the Pantone app calibrate the way it captures colors, allowing you to accurately grab hues in all sorts of lighting conditions with great accuracy. The color swatches help the Pantone app understand what sort of lighting (warm, cool, or neutral) you’re in and white-balance the image on its own as a calibration measure. The app then scans the hue within the cutout at the center of the card, matching it with Pantone’s vast color library to give you a list of Pantone values you can easily use for your next project!

Designer: Pantone

Mississippi has voted to redesign its flag to remove the Confederate battle emblem, making it the last US state to remove the controversial symbol that was used by southern states during the American Civil War.

Mississippi legislature passed a bill on Sunday 28 June to remove the blue saltire cross with white stars from its state flag.

A commission will now be established to design a new state flag that will include the words “In God We Trust”,  the official motto of the US that is used on all paper bills.

Public to vote on new flag design in November

The new flag design will be presented to legislature by 14 September and a colour picture or drawing will be placed on a ballot in a special election held on 3 November.

The design will be approved and enacted into law if a majority votes for it. If not, the design will be revised.

“If a majority of the qualified electors vote against the new design, then the commission shall reconvene to recommend another new design for the Mississippi state flag to be presented to the legislature during the 2021 regular session,” the bill said.

The bill also commits the state to removing the current flag from all public buildings within 15 days.

The redesign comes amid a call to end the use of symbols of the Confederacy, which was established by seven slave-holding states – South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas – in 1861.

The succession of these states led to the American Civil War, which was won by the northern states leading to the abolition of slavery in 1865 – emancipating millions of black slaves.

Confederacy symbols were adopted by white supremacists during the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 60s and the use of the battle flag is now highly controversial.

Previous attempts to remove battle flag unsuccessful

The decision to remove the emblem marks the changing attitude towards the Confederate battle flag following several unsuccessful previous attempts to remove the emblem.

In 2001, a referendum held to replace the state’s flag with a design created by an independent commission was defeated, with 64 per cent voting to retain the existing flag.

A move to remove the symbol from the Mississippi state flag was also pushed in 2015 after the racially motivated Charleston church shooting but was also unsuccessful.

Mississippi is the last US state to remove a Confederate emblem from its flag, with Georgia adopting a new flag in 2003 to replace a 1956 design that included the Confederate battle flag.

Its decision was made following the killing of African-American George Floyd in police custody, which caused anti-racist protests in every US state.

The movement, led by Black Lives Matter, has spread across the world and resulted in the tearing down of other symbols of racism, including the statue of a slave owner in Bristol, England, which Dezeen editor Tom Ravenscroft argued was “long overdue”.

Earlier this month, the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) announced that it will now prohibit people from flying the Confederate battle flag at its events.

The post Mississippi to redesign state flag to remove Confederacy emblem appeared first on Dezeen.

Designed to be your go-to for any cooking measurements, the Kitchen Cube integrates all measuring vessels into its singular, yellow, cube-shaped body. With over 19+ measuring units designed into its 6-sided shape, the Kitchen Cube can be used to measure anything from teaspoons and tablespoons to even cups, working with both wet and dry ingredients alike. The cube comes with both metric and US measuring units molded into its unique design, allowing you to even measure out your ingredients in milliliters if the recipe calls for it. Molded from food-grade plastic, the cube is dishwasher-friendly and even safe to use in the microwave, so you can swiftly heat up or melt your ingredients once you measure them out! Besides, its singular design helps instantly de-clutter your kitchen drawer or counter, but most importantly, it integrates all your measuring instruments into one cube so you don’t accidentally ever lose small measuring spoons!

Designer: The Kitchen Cube

Click Here to Buy Now

Click Here to Buy Now

I’ll be honest… we’re wearing these opaque fabric face masks that prevent us from smiling at people or talking to them (we aren’t hugging or hi-fiving anyone either), but all this is in the interest of coming together as a community and species to stay safe. Sounds like a very weird trade-off. These masks can often be the difference between life and death, but here’s the caveat – they absolutely erode the very social fabric that makes our species such a socially strong bunch. Masks end up shrouding your identity, your emotions, and your intentions… and the Civility mask wants to usher a change in mask design that helps you breathe healthy, clean air while retaining our social micro-behaviors to help us be better, kinder, friendlier humans. The Civility mask, named after the very aspect of human behavior, it’s trying to help portray, comes with a uniquely innovative transparent design that shifts the air-filters from the front to the side in a bid to deliver clean air to you, but without concealing your face.

Designed in France, the Civility mask sports a design that embraces safety without compromising on aesthetics. Its defining feature is its transparent shield on the front, made from a lightweight, resistant glass that provides a crystal-clear view of your face. Air filters on each side help deliver 98% pure air directly to your mouth and nose, while also allowing exhaled air to pass through so that your mask doesn’t fog up. An innovative TPE ring around the mask ensures an air-tight seal that works universally across multiple face-shapes and even on people with beards.

On the aesthetic front, the Civility mask comes in a variety of styles with color combos, options for tinted glass shields, and even patterned face-straps. The face-straps come with adjustable buckles that allow you to tighten or loosen the mask based on your comfort, and their wraparound design ensures a secure fit while allowing you to wear a mask for long without facing any strain or fatigue with prolonged wearing. Its desirable aesthetic is also environmentally conscious, by design. Created as a mask you’d want to own, wear, and show off everywhere you go, the Civility mask is designed to be infinitely reusable, with a disposable filter system that allows you to retain the mask body and simply switch out the filtration sheets every 12 hours (the mask comes with a 1 month pack or a 3 months pack for the Air Premium one). The two circular valves on each side of the mask unscrew off to reveal the swappable EN 14683 / ASTM F2100-19 standard filters that help trap 98% of particles as small as 0.3 microns, helping form a line of defense against pollutants, microorganisms, and even microparticles like pollen, keeping you safe from dust, diseases, and allergies. The disposable filters help drastically cut down on the amount of environmental waste generated by PPE every month as a result of the pandemic, and the masks themselves can easily be sanitized with any 70° alcohol solution (the glass shield is non-reactive, so it shouldn’t be a problem)… conversely, the mask can be placed in a dishwasher for thorough cleaning too.

The shift to transparent masks, a feat being kickstarted and propagated by Civility, could have a noticeable positive on our society. Aside from providing us with healthy, clean air, the masks could help us socialize and bond with humans better, allowing us to smile at people, or communicate effectively by allowing them to read our lips as we speak, all being done from a safe distance! Besides, the fact that I can use face-unlock on my phone while wearing my transparent mask is also a pretty nifty added benefit!

Designer: Civility

Click Here to Buy Now: $39 $44 (10% off). Hurry, for a limited time only! Raised over $50,000.

Civility – Next Gen Transparent Mask

A French startup launches Civility, a transparent face mask that helps you breathe clean air while retaining our social micro-behaviors to help us be better, kinder, friendlier humans.

Founder Pierre Blondon combined the efforts of an international team of 14 designers (including France, Italy, Russia, Senegal, Mexico…) and 15 French engineers to produce a 100%-Made-in-France product. The result is the Civility Mask, a lightweight, easy to use, comfortable transparent face mask for family members, care-givers, sportspeople, hospitality and tourism workers.

First Prototypes

These are the first functional prototype. The design, the materials and the finishes will be upgraded.

Secure & Futureproof

Airtight – The Thermo-Plastic Elastomer (TPE) seal suits any type of faces giving you an optimal airtight of 98%: there is almost no inputs and outputs between the outside and the inside of your mask. This particularity limits the probability to breathe and expire unfiltered air in order to protect you and the others.

Filteration – Their high-performance filters are governed by the standard: EN 14683 / ASTM F2100-19: they filter 98% of 0,3 microns particles. Breathability: less 40 Pa/cm².

Replaceable Filters – Features an easily-interchangeable filter, each of which has a 12-hour lifespan.  The mask is eco-friendly: a wipe with a 70-percent alcohol solution (hand sanitizer) does the job; no need to put it in the dishwasher. And, the Civility Mask can last for years.

Lightweight – It is adjustable to fit any head size and weighs half as much as a smartphone, thus making it comfortable and easy to wear all-day.

Click Here to Buy Now: $39 $44 (10% off). Hurry, for a limited time only! Raised over $50,000.