Hasta La Ideas

Here’s what we looked at this week:

LEGO maestro Warren Elsmore’s “Brick City,” an exhibition of international iconic urban architecture rendered in bricks, opens at the National Building Museum this week.

Will plastic be premium? After providing the winning design for Milan Design Week’s Best Packaging contest, SIPA Packaging has announced their plastic sparkling wine bottle is coming to market.

Bookman Urban Visibility has designed a variety of form factors for lightweight, rechargeable visibility safety lights for pedestrians and cyclists.

Japanese “Balloon Funerals” are a convenient, low-cost way to send cremated ashes into the stratosphere.

Dutch housewares brand Mepal’s Ellipse is an insulated hot/cold dual-compartment lunch container. For those who frequently bring soup along, it looks easier to clean than a thermos.

Differing designs for automatic pot stirrers. It’s fun to see object categories where manufacturers do not agree on what the form factor should be.

This alternative, compact design for a jar opener doesn’t rely on grip, force or leverage. It also takes up less space than the incumbent designs.

The Arch, by Front Design, is a modern-day clothes valet with a Thonet connection.

Designregio Kortrijk, a design-promoting organization in Belgium, is seeking applicants for a three-month Designers in Residence program that will question the nature of reality.

The Hammer Fist is a baffling tool design that seems to remove all of the advantages of a standard hammer. We asked if you could think of any benefits.

Design Overkill Object of the Week: This $45 cast iron and walnut coffee scoop.

Japanese brand New Craft House uses a filament-splicing technique, and this measuring gizmo, to 3D print their two-tone lamps in one shot.

This beautiful SYT chair was done by Theda Vollert, as an ID student at BURG. Fantastic presentation.

Egg skelters, vending machines and warehouses are examples of FIFO (first in, first out) design.

Image: Estera on Unsplash

User Inyerface is a series of intentionally terrible UI/UX designs, presented as a game.