Archive for June, 2010
While they are a million and one options out there for protecting your iPhone 4, only Portland, Oregon-based design collective Grove offers cases carved — meticulously and with a furniture maker’s touch — from bamboo. The company, led by Joe Mansfield of Engrave and Ken Tomita of TomitaDesigns, does extensive shaping of the cases by hand before putting each through a cutting edge laser machine. The product is then sanded and coated four times with a special oil and wax finish. The result is the sleek and beautiful case shown above. Another neat aspect of Grove’s process is that they recycle the extra scraps of bamboo and turn them into boxes for each case. Once the case is on your phone, the box turns into a usable picture frame. Grove sells their cases either plain or with a variety of artist-designed laser engravings on the back, and they even allow customers to personalize their own design. Buying one will put you back between 1/4 to 2/4 the price of the iPhone itself ($49.00 plain/$89.00 engraved), but c’mon, it’s worth it. Pre-order yours here. Check out a few more photos below. [Update: Now with a selection of the just-released artist series iPhone 4 cases]
Computer broken? Fail Whale dominating the screen? Needing to communicate with someone who doesn’t know a tweet from a twat? You’re in the clear! A company called Knock Knock has produced this Paper Tweet notebook ($4.50), which is, let’s face it, a silly product that doesn’t require too much further discussion. Twitter is hot right now. Facebook is even hotter. Which, by my best assumption, means we are going to be seeing an onslaught of these social network-inspired products going forward. This trend could be fine, as long as future releases are inherently different than a blank piece of paper.
At his first gallery show, a pseudo-retrospective that opened over the weekend at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, Connecticut, the artist KAWS unveiled two upcoming products, the Medicom/Disney produced designer toy versions of Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket. High Snobiety scored the scoop, announcing that the toys will be released sometime later in 2010. We’ll keep you updated! [Photo via Arrested Motion]
The “@” symbol is the most widely used computer character around. You can thank Twitter for this the next time you see him in a bar, although Email is probably equally responsible. In fact, the symbol is so popular that it has ditched its digital existence in favor of a front-row seat in your kitchen cabinet. That’s right, the Atmark 2.0 Coffee Mug ($12.00) from Art Ledbedev brings all the excitement of getting @replies to tea time. Fun Fact: While in America we simply call it the “at sign or at symbol,” it turns out other countries have far cooler names for it. In Italian it’s called the chiocciola or “little snail”; in Dutch the “monkey tail”; in Chinese the “little mouse”; and in Russian “the dog.” I bet Twitter didn’t know that…
In our inaugural wtf-product-of-the-week news, a Japanese design firm named Cocoa has just released the second iteration of their inexplicably odd “Cupmen.” The “relaxed” or “laid back” little men serve a dual function: first promising to keep down the flimsy paper lid on instant noodles; and the second — Ã la the mountains on Coors Light bottles turning blue — actually letting the eater know when said noodles are ready to be devoured. That’s right, the Cupmen’s arms gradually change from whatever color they first were to white, signaling the noodles are prime for consumption. The Cupmen are available in a variety of colors for around $9.00. Pretty weird. [Fresh Bump via SPGRA]
Utilizing the trademark imagery from everyone’s favorite summertime chew, Bubblicious, 5boro’s “The Ultimate Boro” decks are for my money the coolest skate decks around. See them big and get pricing info below. [Via MashKulture]
These are bananas! Pick up a set from the very talented Mr. Adler ($48.00). Things That Might Be Art is a weekly feature here on The Jailbreak. We present you, our readers, with a product, idea or creation that skirts the line between art, design, fashion or something else entirely. Then you must tell us what you think via a handy poll. Sound good? Great, let’s get started.
Above (top left, clockwise): W.O.W, Barracuda, Sioux Lace and Kerin.Rose for Christian Siriano At this very moment, I’m sharing a desk with our friend Kerin Rose, she the maker of absurdist (and absurdly popular) designer eyewear line a-morir, who finally decided to grace us with her presence in the office today. For the past six hours or so I’ve been watching her adorn plastic sunglasses with hundreds of tiny Swarovski crystals, and it got me wondering whether or not I’m sitting next to an artist at work. We’ve featured her sunglasses — worn by the likes of Lady Gaga (et. al in Alejandro), Rihanna, Katy Perry, Adam Lambert and Snoop Dogg — before, but never have we asked you to tell us whether or not they should be considered art. Click through to see more styles and bigger photos if you need further evidence before making your choice. So, what do you think? Read the rest of this entry »
Just a week ago, we shared bars of soap made for geeks, and now were back with another niche-targeting cleaning agent. But this time around the soap’s audience is more likely to dominate you on the battlefield than in a game of Mario Kart. Stinky Bomb Soap makes these goat-milk soaps that quite accurately resemble WWII grenades. They offer proper hand grenade soap as well as Russian F-1 grenades and mortar fuze versions in a number of colors. Each is cast in a double silicon mold made from a diffused — one would hope — grenade used in the war, allowing it to hold all of original weapon’s intricate detail. Pick one up and blow the dirt away ($7.00-$12.00).
Yes, it’s true. The Jersey Shore‘s Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino (shown), DJ Pauly D and Snooki have been immortalized as bobbleheads by Washington-based company Funko. They omitted the rest of the cast, which was probably smart considering nobody seems to care about J-WOWW, Ronnie, Vinny et. al to begin with. I don’t know what’s more distressing, the fact that these were made or that I was able to correctly spell each of their names off the top of my head on the first try. Getting a bobblehead fashioned in your likeness used to actually mean something. It was, some might suggest, one of the highest forms of flattery. Now, not so much. These three bozos have banked on America’s infatuation with idiots on TV, and we honor them with a bobblehead? Ugh, now no matter what happens to them in the future, they can look back and shove one of these deck-standing trophies in our faces. Oh! And they talk! How great. You can pre-order each from Entertainment Earth for $12.99 (estimated ship date of July 2010). Look below for Pauly D, who resembles himself much more than the other two, and Snooki, who looks nothing like herself and more like an amalgamation of a brown Olsen twin, Jennifer Lopez circa “Jenny From The Block” and Selena Gomez from the Disney Channel, with bright blue eyes and a mediocre “pouf.” Will you be purchasing a Jersey Shore bobblehead?
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