Leading fashion houses are turning to schools in search of new materials for high-end handbags, shoes, and accessories. We’re talking fish schools, as designers troll seafood industry waste streams looking for alternatives to increasingly banned exotic leathers. It’s not new, but it is trending. Is “leather” made from fish skin inventive recycling or another misstep for […]
Imagine if passing through airport security could be as pleasant as a stroll through a park. Scientist June Medford is working to harness the innate sensing abilities of plants, genetically engineering them into lean, green bomb-and-drug detecting machines. Medford is a “synthetic biologist” (not to imply she’s artificial, but to clarify that she dabbles in the re-design […]
You’ve got open eyes. You’ve read the reports, like this one from the WWF on how polluting we’ve become. Yet we can’t get enough of consuming stuff on planet earth. Pick up the New York Times and see an editorial running on watch ads. Fancy, crazy expensive watches for elite people, not this planet in peril. […]
A pair of Israeli designers has turned alleyway graffiti into fine furniture with the help of some unwitting street artists in their south Tel Aviv neighborhood. It’s ersatz “WickiFurniture” made up anonymous contributions by anyone acting on an urge to create.
Love Lego as a kid? Or maybe you jumped straight into IKEA flat-pack furniture assembly? Now you can design and build your own low-energy, full-scale house with parts that slot together like a jigsaw puzzle. No nails or glue, screws or mortar. A new open source info system called WikiHouse allows you to download, adapt, “print” […]
How best to stay on track living productive, happy lives in the midst of communal fear and sadness? Tap into the healing power of nature, but make it more potent by pairing it with paint.
Breastfeeding is brilliant. Medically optimal for newborns and new mothers; naturally sustainable (no plastic bottles to create, clean and dispose of, no shipping and transport, and no need to refrigerate since it’s delivered on demand), and best of all it’s free. But how do you feel about breast milk turning into an accessory?
How do you feel about jewelry made from dead animals? I’m not talking about fetish jewelry where teeth, bones, and vertebrae turn into sinister charms, but tasteful pendants and earrings made more colorful by adding real insect wings.
Al Maktoum International Airport at Dubai World Central (DWC) was recently approved for a $33 billion expansion making it the largest airport project on the planet – another world record for the booming emirate.
An energy-efficient house in Barwa City, Qatar will be put through its paces to see if it can perform to computer-modeled expectations. We first visited the idea of Passivhaus in 2012, but much has progressed in making a new energy efficient standard green building for hot climates.
While many Muslims don’t drink alcohol, the people of Batroun, Lebanon love their beer. At least according to Jamil al-Haddad, the visionary behind Colonel beer and a new microbrewery built out of recycled materials.
Sometimes, design really does change lives. Dr. Amit Goffer previously designed ReWalk, a device that gives paraplegics paralyzed from the waste down mobility again. But 90 percent of handicapped people are unable to use it. In order to give quadriplegics a similar new lease on life, the Israeli designer made a few modifications with UPnRIDE.
Turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse (or silk scarves into a brilliant curtain) with upcycled materials sourced from your local souk. Make this patchwork curtain in under an hour and for about $10 – a little more work could turn it into a shower curtain or duvet cover. Get jiggy with junk! Here […]
Not everyone who visits Antalya wants to go scuba diving to see the extraordinary Mediterranean marine life, but now they can still catch a glimpse of what lives under the sea’s surface thanks to a beautiful new aquarium on the Turkish Riviera.
Turkish photographer Erdal Inci has created a series of GIF “selfies”, digitally manipulating images of himself whilst engaged in simple action so that he becomes, in effect, an army of street performers. Mesmerizing visuals and a brilliant way to keep production costs down. Like a carefully choreographed colony of ants, watch him/them stumble across a […]