Hasta La Ideas

Flowers, the American flag, a zooming eyeball, a boombox-toting geisha. There’s something for everyone in Gap’s new (PRODUCT) RED Artist Edition t-shirt collection. This season, the retailer has moved from blue-chip art stars such as Chuck Close and Jeff Koons to spotlight a range of graphic artists, designers, and typographers. The front of each t-shirt features original artwork by the likes of Geoff McFetridge (one of his designs features a group of people signing on to the mantra “What we collectively choose to buy or not to buy can change the course of this planet”), Deanne Cheuk, James Jean, and nomoco, while the backs are screened with a brief bio of the artist below the Gap (RED) logo. Half of the profits from each $28 t-shirt go to the global fund to fight AIDS.

On Saturday, Gap’s ever-changing New York City concept shop on Fifth Avenue will open as a pop-up art gallery featuring drawings, paintings, and sculptures by ten of the artists alongside the new t-shirt collection, which also includes designs by Kjell Ekhorn and Jon Forss (of Non-Format), Keiko Itakura, Kari Moden, James Joyce, Stephen Kelleher (that’s his forward-looking eyeball at left), Stina Persson, David Hollier, and Celia Calle. The gallery will be open through August 10. The shirts are also available at Gap stores nationwide, with select styles available at gap.com and the Whitney Museum Store.

What’s half joystick, half telephone, and all fun? The Ericofon! Designed in the 1950s by Ericsson, the one-piece phone (The Dial in the Base ‘Comes to You‘!) initially struggled to succeed in the United States, then firmly in the grips of Bell Telephone’s monopoly, but steadily gained acceptance in the 1960s, when an Ohio company offered the spage-age contraption in a whopping 18 colors. Swayed by the promise of “Elegance…for eloquence,” consumers could choose from hues such as Nordic Blue, Candle Glow (not to be confused with the sunnier Golden Glow), the grape jellyish Royal Dubonnet, and Taj Mahal, which sounds a lot more exotic than “white.” An additional charge equipped one’s Ericofon with the “World’s First Electronic Tone Signal,” billed as “The Sound of the Future.” Sadly, Ericofons were out of production by the mid-1970s, but now, dear UnBeige readers, they are back—complete with push-button dialing (introduced in 1967). These days, they’re known as ScandiPhones and available in an abbreviated—and more conventionally named—selection of colors. Pick one up at the Conran Shop for $65. We use ours to pretend we’re Larry Tate summoning a flummoxed Darrin Stevens into the office to discuss how we’re going to land the Bixby account.

And you can tell everybody this is your flavor. A deluge of positive feedback has prompted Ben & Jerry’s to bring back the limited-edition ice cream flavor that it created last year to recognize Elton John‘s first trip to Vermont and to raise money for the Elton John AIDS Foundation (EJAF). “It’s been one of the most amazing things,” said co-founder Jerry Greenfield in a press release. “We’ve seen fans who’ve been excited before about a flavor and cool partnerships, but this has been something else.” Originally available in Ben & Jerry’s shops for one week last July, the “Goodbye Yellow Brickle Road” batch is back and will also be available at grocery stores nationwide through the summer. Watch out tiny dancers, because the company describes the flavor as “an outrageous symphony of decadent chocolate ice cream, peanut butter cookie dough, butter brickle, and white chocolate chunks.” The expanded partnership will focus on enhancing awareness of EJAF’s work, including a membership drive for the foundation. We imagine that Ben & Jerry’s list of rejected Elton John flavor concepts includes Berry and the Jets, Levon, and Honky Cat Chunk.

You knew that it was only a matter of time before Dutch-born designer Tord Boontje brought his whimsical garlands down from the ceiling (as light fixtures), off of the floor (as carpets and chairs), and onto people’s bodies. The Eindhoven grad, who founded his eponymous studio in 1996, has created “Charming,” a nature-inspired jewelry collection for Artecnica. The 14-karat gold and silver-plated metal charms, which come tucked inside a vellum envelope, adapt Boontje’s signature mix of playful graphics (here assorted flora and forest-flavored fauna), fluid layering, and technological savvy to a more intimate, human scale. Look for the collection to debut next month in Artecnica’s online store, where you’ll be able to snap up sets of three for around $30. Charming, indeed.

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