Notice how most umbrella straps and fasteners only work unilaterally? Roll it up the wrong way and you’ve gotta undo it and start over. It’s never been an annoyance for me since I always make sure to roll it up the right way but that doesn’t mean it’s a problem that should be ignored. The Double Sided Umbrella uses a magnetic peg and ring so no matter which way you roll up the umbrella, it fastens in place.

Designers: Prof. Jeon Sung-Su, Prof. Kim Ki-Pil, Prof. Ku Ja-Yoon, Kang Ju-Hyung & Lee Tae-Hoon

Oh but it’s much much more. The Sikker (Danish for safety) is a jack of all trades baby monitor, radio, alarm clock, and watch. One bracelet stays on baby; the other on parent. The units work in tandem with the base station to transmit basic biometric data about baby’s condition like temperature. The units also transmit sounds and even remotely play music for baby.

Designers: Jessica Mendoza & Henoc Monte

Hello you late to bedders, did you know we’re awake at the same time? The darkness makes it seem like you’re alone, but I will haunt you FOREVER! No, actually, what I’m saying is that lots of people, especially people who spend the majority of their time on these internets, stay up very late into the night (and usually into the morning then too.) Darkness, that’s where it’s at. It’s where all the good stuff happens if it’s winter, and it’s where it’s funny to run around in a tshirt in the summer. But once inside, we gonna need us a clock.

This is the “Clock for Night Owl” by designer Tiancheng Luo, and it’s made for those folks to stay up into the darkness. The wakie time for these people, you and I, is very different from that of your average human, in that while they’re asleep, we’re probably not.

Here’s a clock for all of that loveliness.

Designer: Tiancheng Luo

What strikes me most about the Playing By Heart (quite a fascinating name for a laptop!) concept is the simplistic way it tries to achieve its set goals. The goals being: portability, smooth looks, multi-level elevation, cooling & sleek form. All it takes is a handle on the back-end of the laptop, steel or aluminum finish for the cover and you have a rocking Laptop Briefcase in your hands! Think about it…no more laptop covers or sleeves either!

Designer: Zhang Shouze

And this is EASILY the best one ever. Best possible cane. Why? Because it’s made out of a broom handle. That’s right! What better use is there, besides stabbing zombies in their utterly exposed brain matter, for a broom?! None. It goes zombie stabbing, Walking Cane designed by Itay Laniado, then maybe cleaning up the floor. That’s in order of what’s best to do with a broom, not the order you’re supposed to use the broom in. Then it’s just the opposite.

I’m sorry this post turned so quickly into a zombie instructional monolog, but there are certain things people are going to have to know when the invasion comes. Actually, when you think about it, these are the kind of canes we’ll almost certainly be using years after the hoard of zombies has subsided. It’s really a DIY cane, easy to construct, great for war-stricken areas and 3rd or 4th or 5th world areas.

Designer: Itay Laniado

Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t a lamp the last thing that comes to your mind when you think of the title “AT-AT Walker?” Me, for me, it does. It’s the last thing. But hold on here, wait, take a look at the lamp that goes with that title. It does bear a…very striking resemblance to the Star Wars dark side machine of death, does it not? Yes it does. And it’s a lamp! Who would have thought? It’s made by Life Goods for Ormond Editions to be a futuristic fantasy of luxury lighting.

Life Goods designers set out for themselves to approach this whole lamp situation as a piece of wooden furniture. Inspired by veneering in anique, fine furniture, they decided to take elements normally reserved for these cabinetwork projects they were studying and apply them to this futuristic form.

The legs? Expanded. The light? On a dimmer. The Dimmer? It’s intensity is connected directly to the opening of the drawer, the drawer being opened with “a simple fingers pressure (switch on).”

70 x 60 x 174 cm
68 x 58 x 120 cm

Wild!

Designer: Life Goods for Ormond Editions

In this digicam era there still exist old school folks who prefer photo albums and frames on the mantle place. Frames for pictures do have their own charm and no modern gizmo-digital frame can replace it. The GrowFrame are timeless handmade wooden frames with powerful hidden magnets inside, that allow you configure your own unique set. This Friday you stand a chance at winning FOUR SETS of GrowFrames (a set of 4 – 3×3 squares) for your cherished photographs. Details Inside.

All you need to do is watch the video below and tell me how you will customize your 4 GrowFrames with the included wedge connector pieces. You may choose from the 13 options below, or describe your distinct style.

*We are giving away a set each to 4 lucky winners!

Contest Closes: 21st March, 11:59pm PST
Designer: Trevor Elliott

The GrowFrame from GrowShow on Vimeo.

GrowFrames are available at the YD Store.

It’s tough keeping a track on futuristic iterations of computers, so backtracking into the forgotten era sometimes spring up surprises. This retro-steampunk gem is a customized work of art which uses lots of wood and a good measure of brass to get in the right effects. As the designers put it “These custom-made keyboards, framed monitors and computers are completely functional, but with a 19th century/ steampunk aesthetic.”

Designer: Old Time Computer

Remember the scene in FRIENDS when Monica finishes vacuuming the room and then removes a small handy vacuum to clean up the big one? The Dustpan Vacuum continues the saga….

Shaped as a dustpan to efficiently gather in all the grime; the vacuum system nestled inside the handle, then sucks up the dirt. Accompanied with its special brush, it gets the job done faster. I’m no Monica, but my desk could sure use this!

Designer: IlGu Cha

The title and images say it all. Mowing lawns suck. It’s a back breaking and boring task unless you have a riding mower. But for those of us with small yards, the Lawn Mower Scooter is aces. The electric motor drives the blades and scooter. All the cuttings are stored in a transparent bin in the front. I’m already imagining weekend lawn mower races with my neighbors.

Designer: Vicky Petihovski

I have a secret obsession with scissors. There’s a room in my home where I do all my clothing work and in a box are scissors from Germany and Japan since they seem to make the best steel. I would love to add one more to my collection from designer Michael Antrobus called Ground Tools. A stunning pair of shears made from carefully bent flat steel bars using homemade jigs and presses. The result is minimal, raw, even primal..

Designer: Michael Antrobus

Or a cracklin. How cracked do you want your nuts? Very cracked, or just opened up a little bit? You need those nuts cracked. Walnuts. And if it’s not the winter holiday season, you’re going to look too weird using a traditional nutcracking agent. So what are you gonna do, then, hey? You need this wild thing right here. It’s a walnut yo-yo. Yo! It’s not just for fun. It’s for cracking your nuts.

All you need to do is put the nut in there, yo, re-yo, and bang! Actually you’ve gotta hit something with the yo. You fasten the nut inside the yo, then you yo the yo right into a wall, the floor, or your grandmother, and bang! You’ve got a cracked nut.

And if you don’t have a cracked nut after hitting your grandmother with the Walnut Yo-Yo, you’ll probably be feeling some pain pretty soon.

In the nuts.

Designers: Xiaofei Wang and Beibei Wu

If you’re heavy into design, like you’re an addict, you basically can’t stand to see much in your environment that ISN’T put in place by a human being, you’re basically guaranteed to be at least generally alright at both interior and exterior design, the arranging of elements in your environment. And if you are, and you’re a generally make-your-own-profit sort of person in our modern world, you also like to find ways to conserve energy and make things less expensive for yourself. How about harnessing the sun for all of this?

Woo yes! Sunlight! It’s up there shooting out energy and we’ve not even really begun to delve very deeply into the ways we aught to be able to use it. Well let me tell you something. Drzach and Suchy are sticking their fingers into it, and they ain’t getting burnt! Nay! Let’s look at this!

What they’ve created here is called “Piksol,” and it is made to both collect solar energy and create arbitrary patterns and images on a building’s facade. Win? Yes.

Then, in combination with Shadow Casting Panels, these Piksols can be used to create fabulously lovely images that can change dynamically throughout the day as the sun changes positions.

Quite simple, quite smart.

Designers: Drzach & Suchy

Hello there archerists. I know that word is wrong. But you wouldn’t be telling me it was wrong if I had a BOW and ARROWS would you? No way! Having a bow and arrows is totally intense. Completely fierce, and not just Beyonce fierce. Like really wolflike and cougarlike. Comin at ya! And you know this bow is wild if we’re featuring it here on Yanko. We only feature the most fierce! This bow is a Recurve Bow, the kind they use in the Olympics. And you know they only let wolves in that.

This bow is called the “INNO CTX”, designed by a couple of intense designers by the names Won-Jae Lee and Won Jung Shin. Made of X carbon, aka the of the aviation sort, with according to these statistics I read before me in the information provided by the designer, is an 40% increase in intensity over the strength of any other carbon, while at the same time is thinner than any that’s come before it. That, and the elasticity’s increased over 190% compared to the general carbon used today. What’s this do?

It raises the intensity of the handle.

It strengthens the role of the bow as a shock absorber.

And it totally gives you like 100+ points to your archery skills.

Designers: Won-Jae Lee and Won Jung Shin for Win Archery

The last Rubik Cube that we saw on Yanko Design had textures as tease for the visually challenged; this current iteration uses only Braille. Colors embossed include green, blue, red, yellow, white & pink. One of the more sensible concepts in a long time that hopefully will delight the sighted folks too! Maybe we’ll learn Braille in this process!

Designer: Konstantin Datz

In supermarkets where loads of veggies is stacked and dumped, freshness may not be a priority. Keeping a track of all that’s been brought in can be time consuming and not all buyers may have a knack for freshness count. The Fresh Code offers a simple solution to this problem; it’s an intelligent barcode with a graph that indicates the freshness level. As time passes by, the graph on the barcode keeps receding, till it finally reaches “0”; indicating that the veggie needs to be dumped and not sold.

Designers: Sisi Yuan, Yiwu Qiu, Lei Zhao, Qiulei Huang, Lijun Zhang & Weihang Shu

Here’s a slightly different take on the backpack. The Dumpling, inspired by the delicious pouch foods, is a backpack that treats your belongings as color coded and compartmentalized items. The backpack is actually made up of a series of roll-up bags. Take only what you need and roll them up into the main support guard which is quite simple in design – a couple straps and a big hook. It looks crafty but something about it is very attractive.

Designer: Shin Ji-Young

If you were to study human interaction, you’d find there is a tight knit group of people who you are closest with. This is also known as the human web and connections outside the web can extend infinitely. That’s called 6 degrees of separation. If you were to visualize all of that into a tangible object, you’d probably end up with something similar to the Drops concept.

Drops is a unique prototype that physically represents the interactive possibilities between your closest kin. Confused? Everyone in your circle of friends gets a unique personalized wood token and a docking station. Simple interactions like docking your token lets everyone else know you’re there. Stroking them sends out a subtle glow – a playful reminder. It’s meant to be an esoteric gesture, but an important one which is why it’s made of wood to symbolize strength and the organic nature of friendship.

More pictures of the process: Here & Here.

Designers: David Sjunnesson & Pedro Nakazato Andrade

Drops from Pedro Andrade on Vimeo.

One of the cutest and most universal signs of growing up, marked by the parents of the child, is the pencil mark above the head on the wall. Pencil mark on the wall to show how tall. Young ones growing up, head height by head height. The only thing is, the place where this is generally marked is on a wall in a house that might not even be in the possession of the person once they’re grown up. So how does one keep this treasure? Let me lead you to it. Mark it here.

This right here is the “MeasureMe Stick” by our pals at Studio 1a.m., made of bamboo and printed ink. Dimensions are 84″h x 4.7″w x .5″d. Weighs is 5 pounds. Hand made in Chicago, Illinois, stainless steel mounting pegs included.

Pretty! Feel free to hang em all up, even if you’ve got only a bunny and a kitty and no kiddies like me.

Batteries not included.

Designer: Studio 1a.m. [ Buy it Here, MeasureMe Stick is available for $120 @ YD Store ]

MeasureMe Stick is available for $120 @ YD Store

So you’ve got some laundry to be hanging out in the dark, right? And you don’t want the boogie-man to get that laundry out there, right?! You need these rechargable light-up pegs to keep them safe! OR you could use them for about a million other projects or situations I bet. You’re a “gotta use it” sort of person, right? I bet. These is the “light PEG” project, and it’s going to hook you basically instantly.

You have a tree charger that’s plugged into the wall, you’ve got 8 individual chargeable pegs, each one of those pegs with 6 LED bulbs in them. Each of the pegs turns off and on with a simple click, and they work in wet, and cold as well as room temp because they’re waterproof, and they hold 4-5 hours of power after just a 30-40 minute charge.

Lamp is made from spatial electrically conductive material and pegs are made from recyclable plastic with LED bulbs. Must. To. Me. Give.

Designer: Natalia Romanova