Hasta La Ideas

All Unitasker Wednesday posts are jokes — we don’t want you to buy these items, we want you to laugh at their ridiculousness. Enjoy!

I have many super powers (e.g. I can grab poison ivy with my bare hands and not have a reaction), but my kryptonite are balloons. For starters, I’m allergic to latex, so touching them causes me to break out in a rash. Secondly, the squeaking sound they make when you rub your finger across them drives me batty. Thirdly, tying them off is tedious. And finally, the anticipation of someone about to pop a balloon makes me incredibly anxious.

Noting all of the reasons I hate balloons, you might think the Tie-Not would be something I’d use. It ties water balloons so you don’t have to fuss with them! But, you know what, even the Queen of Hating Balloons can tie a water balloon if she needs to. (She can also talk about herself in the third person.)

Unless you’re a professional water balloon maker, I’m not really sure the average person needs the Tie-Not. For those rare times you decide to throw a water balloon party (are there such things?), I’m certain you can handle the stress of tying the balloons. Also, having to tie all those balloons might give you pause to throwing a water balloon party in the future. Because, really, who enjoys being smacked with a water balloon? Sure, it’s fun to clobber other people, but getting hit by one is never a joy. Water balloon attacks always end with someone getting a pitcher of water and just pouring the water on their competitors — so why not start with those? Pitchers are also reusable. And don’t hurt. And don’t leave little balloon particles in your yard. And don’t cause rashes. And aren’t balloons.

To close, I feel the need to point out that the name of the product is “Tie-Not.” In my understanding of the English language, the word NOT implies the negative. In this case, it would mean that the device doesn’t tie. I think this is brilliantly absurd, and commend the makers of the Tie-Not for not false advertising (check out the 1-star reviews on Amazon for examples of the device not working).

Thanks to reader Steph for introducing us to this soggy, summer unitasker.

Like this site? Buy Erin Rooney Doland’s Unclutter Your Life in One Week from Amazon.com today.

Something that has always amazed me is that factories antedated electricity. Early machines could be made to run from steam power, but there was no such thing as electric lighting; the sole source of illumination came from outside, through big-ass windows and skylights.

The “Daylight” entry in the James Dyson Award competition submitted by an anonymous German architecture student recognizes that it’s not practical to widen existing windows, nor add skylights to the 30th story of a 42-story office building, but proposes a solution to better channel natural light into the office spaces of today. Carefully-shaped aluminum reflectors would be attached to the outside of existing windows, shunting light towards additional ceiling-mounted reflectors inside, providing a one-time cost for permanently-free magnified and adjustable daylight.

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The latest power-packed sound machine from wireless streaming experts Sonos

We’ve been rocking out with a variety of Sonos products in the Cool Hunting office for years, gaining a great appreciation for the functionality of the comprehensive wireless streaming products in the process. Debuting today is the next step forward for at-home or at-work networked music playing with the release of Sonos Play:3. The device, designed as an all-in-one unit, promises bigger sound quality in a compact package, perfect for any room in need of bumpin’ tunes

The Play:3 gets its name from its three integrated speakers, three dedicated class-D digital amplifiers and three drivers. With an overall goal to crank up the quality, each unit also has a passive rear-firing bass radiator to keep the sound rich. As with all Sonos products the Play: 3 will integrate seamlessly into an existing Sonos system and can be controlled with the Sonos desktop app, the multi-platform mobile app or a dedicated Sonos controller.

Another clever feature of the Play:3 is the option to use the speaker in a vertical or horizontal position. This makes it easier to fit the system exactly where you want it and internal motion sensors detect the speaker’s orientation, adjusting the output accordingly to deliver ideal sound distribution. With two Play:3 units you can experience “Stereo Pairing,” which allows you to dedicate one speaker to the left or right channel. But be warned: two Play:3s paired up for stereo enjoyment the office makes for an internal struggle to stay seated.

If, like us, your Sonos system was in need of an overall upgrade, we recommend the updated controller ($350); it’s compact, slick and has a intuitive touchscreen UI for super-easy navigation.

Head over to Sonos’ online store to grab one of the new versatile Play:3s, available today for $300.

Also on Cool Hunting: Latest from Sonos: iPhone App, Free Pandora, Better Internet Radio

These dresses by Montreal fashion designer Ying Gao move as if they’re breathing.

Watch this movie on Dezeen Screen »

Called Walking City, the garments incorporate hidden pneumatic pumps that fill origami-style folds in the fabric with air.

Watch this movie on Dezeen Screen »

The pumps in one dress are activated by movement sensors that detect approaching spectators, while a second version reacts to sounds picked up through a dangling microphone.

Watch this movie on Dezeen Screen »

The project is on show at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec in Canada, entitled Ying Gao: Art, Fashion and Technology.

The exhibition continues until 28 August.

Photographs are by Dominique Lafond.

Here are some more details from Ying Gao:

Ying Gao: Art, Fashion and Technology
June 9 to August 28, 2011

Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Canada

In summer 2011, art and fashion meet at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec through works by the designer Ying Gao. The exhibition Ying Gao: Art, Fashion and Technology presents a dozen pieces that include three series of interactive garments which move and change in response to noise, sound, motion or light.

These garments represent state-of-the-art research on textiles with integrated technologies but still have an amazingly poetic dimension. They draw the viewer’s eye, inflating, unfolding, transforming while protecting the virtual body they cover. A couture experience like no other. For Gao, apparel art serves as a means to investigate the various ways people relate to their environment as well as contemporary complex social and technological issues.

Walking City – three interactive dresses. Cotton, nylon and electronic devices.

Air. A fascinating element at the intersection of colour, light and vibration, it’s also one of the materials used in the project Walking City. These interactive pieces play with the public’s perception: the fluid movement of breathing is simulated using sensors and a pneumatic mechanism that’s sown directly onto nylon and cotton.

These unconventional garments then take on a playful dimension through their inflatable capacity. The pleated fabric in the Walking City pieces take numerous shapes, much like Japanese origami. These pieces are harder to understand than traditional garments, almost fooling the public into seeing them unlike they really are.

If the pneumatic technology featured in Walking City would fit right in if placed in the context of performing arts, it could also be applicable in the ready-to-wear industry.

Light, immaterial, changing and poetic, this concept of inflatable pieces gives life to the garments, with their mechanical movements giving the impression that they are controlled by a body.

The clothes in this project have been created as an homage to British architecture collective Archigram which, in the 1960s, imagined mobile and inflatable habitable structures.

The Walking City dress 1 is hypersensitive to its immediate environment. It reacts to the viewer’s presence by means of a motion detector connected to a pneumatic system. When the piece is filled with air, the fabric origami contract and expand, like a fragile form of protection.

The Walking City dress 2: when the visitor breathes into a microphone hanging nearby, the dress inflates, as if being worn by a body, causing the wide pleat on the front to “breathe”. With this work, I have given aesthetic form to the immaterial—air—while at the same time experimenting with incorporating pneumatic technologies into dressmaking.

See also:

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Wear Out by Carolina Reis	Shell by Julia Krantz	B-side by Hussein Chalayan