"Form Follows Function" is how you design a wrench, or a toboggan, or a kitchen mixer. But as we move into this increasingly dematerialized era, the keyboard and mouse are the only parts of our computers that seem to hew to this rule. For a little while the cables we used to plug into our computers at least had little plastic ridges on them, the barest concession that human fingers were meant to grasp them, but now even that's been replaced by designer whimsy; in 2011, for instance, Parisian luxury brand Christofle designed this silver-plated USB key for LaCie that seemed like something out of a jewelry box.

The Christofle-LaCie team-up is at it again, this time with a hard drive seemingly designed by a gypsy (or Jeff Koons). The USB 3.0 Christofle Sphere is a one-terabyte number intended to sit on your desk and look purty, "hand-crafted and silvered in France" as it is.

Then again, maybe the reflective form does have a function, one more in step with our modern times: It'll let you take a selfie at your desk without having to stretch your arm out and aim.

De rigueur, classic-instrument-scored "the majesty of craft" video after the jump.

If you're one of those people who love a good ironic product (like this office-supply inspired bag we had our eyes on last April), there's a good chance you'd be able to find a place for a shark fin lamp in your home or office.

The Shark Lamp in its natural environment

We covered the design back when it was still a prototype looking for a manufacturer. Now you can snag your own lamp online from furniture and lighting manufacturer Moree.

Sanding the perfect fin

MakerBot is looking for passionate and talented UI and UX designers to create human-friendly, clean and effective consumer experiences for their desktop software, the Thingiverse web community, Mobile Apps and more. If you're not familiar, MakerBot is leading the Next Industrial Revolution by setting the standards in reliable and affordable desktop 3D printing. Who doesn't want to get involved in that?

The right candidates should have experience designing for web, desktop and mobile applications. You must create wire frames, user flows and high fidelity mockups that visually communicate your design and then, work with our development and product teams to rapidly prototype, test and iterate those designs. Join the Brooklyn MakerBot team by Applying Now.

Much like the life-saving iPhone app we featured last March, the Gabriel car set was created in a bit of an unconventional way. Similarly so, the idea that was unveiled can help prevent a multitude of accidental deaths for years to come. Last July, Opel—a car manufacturer based in Germany—conducted a competition calling for designers and car drivers to come up with a solution to the infant deaths that happen from leaving children in cars in dangerous temperatures.

The statistics are scary—an average of 20 children in Europe die from car-induced heatstroke every year, according to Opel. Add that to the 38 deaths on average in the U.S. each year, and we've got a problem long overdue for a solution.

They received over 1,350 ideas and cut that list down to 70 designs. The winner: Kenny de Vlieger, proud father of two sons. His design features a keychain that's wirelessly connected to a pressure- and temperature-sensitive pad inside the car. In a collaboration with LDV United and Achilles Design, de Vlieger and Opel made his design a reality.

Kenny de Vlieger and his family

de Vlieger calls his device a guardian angel of sorts—and rightly so, considering the lives it can save. This video goes more in-depth on the ins and outs of the design:

Bang & Olufsen's new BeoPlay A9 wireless speaker is unusual in a couple of respects. First, there's its strange saucer-like form, with a 2.3-foot-diameter disc perched on a wooden tripod. But perhaps even more unorthodox is its development story, as told to me recently by the Danish designer Øivind Alexander Slaatto.

A9 marks the first manufactured product for Slaatto; previously, he "didn't even have a single toothpick in production." Surviving in Copenhagen as a tuba performer and a caregiver, Slaatto had to borrow the money (and a shirt) to cross Denmark and knock on the door of Bang & Olufsen's headquarters, arriving unannounced with his portfolio in hand. Surprisingly, B&O agreed to meet with him—and although the company rejected most of the work in his portfolio, it nevertheless saw promise in his ideas.

B&O decided to let Slaatto work in its studio with then head of design Flemming Møller Pedersen, with whom Slaatto completed the design proposal for what eventually became A9. "The idea only took a few days to come up with, but to turn it into reality took several months," Slaatto says. "I was involved all the way to the final production. I think it was worth the hard work."

A few months ago, our columnist Fosta sent me the text of his bi-monthly column, in which he proposed a design philosophy that he dubbed "The Future Mundane," which was among the more though-provoking pieces in recent memory. When it came time to reflect on the Year in Review, I had originally intended to frame my piece on 2013 in technology in terms of practical yet powerful hypothesis, only to end up with an obliquely apologetic rejoinder to Christopher Mims' 2013-Was-a-Lost-Year-for-Tech polemic. In a sense, it's two ways of saying the same thing: Even though reality often doesn't live up to our expectations, there's no reason not to expect it to be better than it is.¹

Indeed, the Future Mundane is as much a symptom of our impatience or outright frustration with the current generation of technology as it is a measured optimism about the next one. We might reduce the sentiment to the 'megapixel effect': we've been indoctrinated to believe that more is always better when it comes to digital cameras, despite the the fact that the spec feels vestigial in the smartphone era. We may think of ourselves as discerning consumers, skeptical of marketing hype, but at some level, we are conditioned to judge new things on a superficial basis, whether it's a GIF of an interface breakthrough or the lackluster specs of the latest new smartphone.²

Lost year, maybe. But the Future Mundane is also a manifestation of a parallel theory of material culture, Naoto Fukasawa and Jasper Morrison's notion of 'Supernormal,' which speaks to the process of becoming mundane.

When we create something that is new with the expectation for it to be different yet it somehow feels normal, that is what defines what Supernormal is about. Supernormal is something that is designed with an essence of normality that we share in our memory. In other words, Supernomal is something new but it has familiarity from the beginning. Becoming normal is something that happens and it is not something we can make happen.

I invoked the ever-relevant hypothesis in an [e-mail] interview with the former and IDEO's Jane Fulton Suri, whose 'Thoughtless Acts' nicely complement so-called 'curious rituals'—device-engendered behaviors, postures, tics, etc.—as subconscious adaptations to the objects and world around us. This is the metadata of reality, which are not subject to prognostication and can only be contemplated in hindsight.³

All of which speaks to the transcendent breadth of cultural context in stories about the future. Parallax motion is a useful metaphor: Near or far, the future will be populated by an accretive totality of timeless heirlooms and novelty items alike; damaged goods, obsolescence (planned or otherwise), and buggy betas; slow-moving institutions alongside visionary products and services; as well as a persistent horizon of expectations. Taking an anthropological longview, science fiction cannot possibly take all of these things—which collectively constitute a world—into account. But these seams in the fabric of a future reality aren't plotholes so much as 'storyholes' (see Fosta's distinction), and a cohesive narrative and compelling plot will supersede any gaps or oversights.

Here's my oversimplified explanation of how the universe forms planetary bodies: There's a bunch of stuff floating around in space. The stuff crashes into other stuff, and sometimes that stuff sticks together. And gets bigger and bigger, and starts to rotate from the momentum of the impacts. Things even out when they spin, and that conglomerate, spinning stuff eventually becomes moons and planets, rendered spherical in a kind of galactic machining process.

Interestingly enough, something like this phenomenon has taken place this week, albeit at a smaller scale, in Lake Michigan. As the brutal cold snap struck the Good Harbor Bay in Michigan's Leelanau County, hundreds and hundreds of ice balls began to spontaneously form in the water. Check it out:

There's no shortage of rad watch designs—just have a look see at our features on Eone Time, Minus 8, Analog Watch Co., Mr Jones Watches and Ziiro (to name just a few). In the name of simplicity, watches have one job: to tell time. But what about when they don't do that? This is where Durr comes in.

Created by Theo Tveterås and Lars Marcus Vedeler—collectively named Skrekkøgle—the duo have come up with a concept watch manner that reminds us a bit of the Solar Light we covered from Jon Liow. By giving a quick shiver every five minutes, Durr is more about reminding the wearer to make the most of their daylight than being a timepiece. Check out this video to get a better idea of how it works:

To some, an art form. To others, common sense. To the messy outsider, pointless de-jumbling. As a savvy designer or design enthusiast, you're most certainly familiar with the principles and outcomes of knolling, even if you had no idea it deserved its own word. As the story goes, knolling got verbed by the fastidious janitor at Frank Gehry's furniture shop, who would make sure all tools and materials were 90-degreed at the end of the day, mirroring rigid angles and clean lines of Knoll furniture they produced. It was picked up by the artist Tom Sachs while he worked there. Sachs institutionalized the principle in his own work and defined in his virally adored "10 Bullets":

But knolling means more than just tidying a space by aligning tools to each other or their creative confines. Through neatness, it suggests an improvement to functionality, accessibility and efficiency. In a way it's like making your workspace into a 3D exploded diagram. Which is awesome.

Although well-organized spaces and prettily arranged items are in no way new, the hyper tidy appeal of knolling is definitely on the rise. It's seeped into every visual form you can imagine. Infographics, advertising, fashion blogs, cookbooks, whole dedicated tumblrs, merchandising, photographycollections. And Pinterest... Pinterest everywhere.

Big Improvement

So much easier to use!

For Switch, LUNAR helped develop a liquid-cooled LED bulb that casts a warm glow and draws only 13 watts.

This is the first post in our Getting Hired interview series. We'll be publishing a new interview each weekday for the next two weeks.

Founded in 1984 by Jeff Smith and Gerard Furbershaw, LUNAR has since grown into a full-service creative agency with offices in San Francisco, Chicago, Hong Kong and Munich. Still in touch with its experimental, California roots, LUNAR's 70 employees work on everything from high-concept cycle trainers to Koo, a combination bassinet and rocking chair designed for new parents. Jeff Salazar, who fell in love with LUNAR after a fortuitous meeting with Smith and Furbershaw while he was still in college, is now the vice president of design, leading the 15-person-strong industrial design team. Salazar's 19 years at the firm have helped him understand how to grow an energized and balanced community of talent.

Can you walk us through your process for hiring a new designer?

First, it's about really understanding the need. The need could be driven by any number of things: a vacancy, an emerging market we want to spend more time on, an emerging skill set that we feel we need in order to complement what we already do. Rather than just plugging in a body, we want to make sure it lines up with our long-term goals and isn't just a near-term reaction—like, "Oh crap, we're busy, let's hire people." People stay here, on average, for seven to eight years, and I think it's because of how we thoughtfully identify needs and introduce new creative energy to the team.

Once we've identified a need, it may be that we already know someone—a freelancer, a contractor or a former intern—who could fill this role immediately. If not, we have to craft the right way to talk about it. Unfortunately, I don't think people always read that stuff. I think they just see, "Oh, so-and-so is hiring," and they send their portfolio. We have to then wade through an enormous queue of portfolios, and maybe one out of three are a fit.

In reviewing portfolios, I want to be moved by a point of view—because that's what we then want to do out in the world. And as I'm combing through portfolios I'll also be having conversations with the team about what we need. I have an idea for what we need in a creative director, for instance, but I'm interested in the team that's here now. What are they looking for? What's that persona like?

Jeff Salazar, LUNAR's vice president of design

There were no shortage of smart watches at CES this year, but PEBBLE seemed to be the only maker who evolved the industrial design of the smart watch beyond a mini smartphone stuck on your wrist. It was only a matter of time before these devices moved from the literal semantic play of a mini smartphone with a strap to a mass adoption state that aligned with fashion trend. Cheers to PEBBLE for getting there first.

Photos via Dark Rye magazine

If there's one kind of design that no one enjoys, it's coffin design. However morbid it may be, it's completely true. Austin-based furniture designer Michael Yates quickly learned this after being faced with a tough request. His aging grandmother—who was perfectly healthy at the time—wanted him to build her casket. Such a request from a lively friend or family member is enough to throw anyone off. Yates, who was also a professional notable in our 2013 Core77 Design Awards, eventually agreed after taking some time to mull over and come to terms with the inquiry.

The impending death of a family member or friend is nothing anyone wants to think about—let alone obsess over in the way a designer engrosses themselves in a project. In a tear-jerking mini documentary from Dark Rye magazine, Yates battles with the idea of death and its role among the functionality and customization of design—and he manages to do so gracefully, if that's even possible.

Check it out:

Hayao Miyazaki is leaving us, and there's a new (old) reason to be upset. Socially speaking, it is common law that you must enjoy Miyazaki. This is not optional. Doesn't matter if you're "just not into anime" or "can't stand two dimensional characters" or were "born without any sense of joy or wonder." Still required. This is the man who brought us the high-quality weirdness of Spirited Away and Nausicaa, innumerable excruciatingly beautiful nature scenes, and the gigantic pillowy monster that is Totoro. While we're obviously grateful and can probably all agree that the man has earned his retirement, I've just learned that two of my all-time-favorite magical childhood worlds could have been woven into one beautiful whole but weren't: Hayao Miyazaki wanted to do an animated version of Pippi Longstocking, called Pippi Longstocking: Strongest Girl In the World. Given his proclivity towards badass animal-loving ladies with slightly impossible hair, the absurdity of the Pippi stories, and the bucolic loveliness of the Swedish countryside, I'm positive it would have been a great fit. If you're not familiar with the original Pippi character, get thee to the internet and then imagine the childish glee we were all denied.

At eight-minutes-plus, this production methods video is longer than the average internet denizen's 2.5-minute attention span, but anyone who makes things out of wood will find it fascinating. This unnamed Hungarian craftsperson shows you every step as he goes from felled tree to cutting board, and what's most interesting is the dedicated series of jigs, rigs and fixtures he's come up with to speed up his production, as well as the combination of machines he uses. Be sure to check out:

The fresh floor-embedded pneumatic lift he uses to get the logs up to the bandsaw at 1:20

His lath drying rack at 3:29 and spinning drying rack at 3:47

The Global Data Chandelier—a big name for an equally sizable installation (physically and in theory)—is more of an infographic of sorts than anything else. Created for the Center for Strategic and International Studies' new headquarters in Washington D.C. by Sosolimited, Hypersonic Engineering & Design, Plebian Design and Chris Parlato, the chandelier consists of 425 hanging, low-res pendants that brighten and dim in a synchronized patterns to display different data points—GDP growth rate, renewable water resources and energy consumption, to name a few.

From directly below, it'll only take a moment to grasp the contours of the map, which shifts into different arrangements as you view it from different angles. Check out this video of the installation at work:

Time for our annual check-in with Reinier de Jong (see complete list below). The Rotterdam-based designer's REK expandable bookcase design is amazing enough that since its 2008 launch, it's experienced multiple popularity booms on the interwebs. The only downside to the REK is that you need a good amount of free space to put it in; de Jong's latest, the MODULAR shelves, can also take up a lot of space, but give the user the option of building them up over time.

The MODULAR's building block is a single and simple rectangular unit, fitted with holes on two axes for dowels.

In design school in the '90s, they taught us that products about to become obsolete change their form factor to imitate their successors shortly before dying out. In other words, the lesson went, landline telephones would start to look like cell phones in a desperate attempt to stay relevant, and then they would disappear.

Twenty years later, we see an almost opposite phenomenon with LED bulbs, which have oddly tried to mimic the physical appearance, in broad strokes, of the incandescent bulb. But finally Philips has realized this is silly—and expensive, as LEDs occupying a lightbulb-sized volume require pricey heat sinks. Thus they've designed these cool, new SlimStyle LED bulbs.

They've got the efficiency you've come to expect from LEDs—a 60-watt equivalency wrung from just 10.5 watts—and because they're so skinny, and made from plastic rather than glass, the bulky heat sink can go away. That's good news for consumers' wallets, as the price-per-bulb has finally dropped below the $10 threshold. And yep, they're dimmable.

Anthro Corporation is a lot of things, including profitable since 1984, voted one of the best and greenest places to work in Oregon, plus an award winner for their innovative designs in technology furniture. They also have an open spot on their team for an Industrial Designer. Perhaps that's you?

Curious by nature, the designers you could be joining can often be found in their state-of-the-art onsite manufacturing facility assembling prototypes and pushing the capabilities of their machinery. They need people who are problem-solvers, enjoy tinkering and are willing to "rock the boat" when it comes to innovative product designs. Having at least 3 years of experience in Industrial Design doesn't hurt either. Apply Now to get the ball rolling.

We human beings enjoy making things rectilinear, which is why you're reading this on a glass rectangle while sitting at a wooden rectangle in a rectangle-shaped room that you entered by passing through a rectangle. So as soon as we could figure out how to turn trees into neat wooden rectangles, we did, by eventually coming up with the circular saw blade and the sawmill.

But before the circular saw blade became the preferred method for turning logs into boards, we tried some pretty kooky things, like this:

That ten-bladed monstrosity is a steam-powered vertical frame saw, and some American yahoo invented it in 1801. Depending on how the blades were spaced, it could provide boards of different thicknesses.

By 1809 the invention had spread to England, and by 1821, the Netherlands. In Dutch the machine was called a "raamzaag," literally, "window saw," as the manual one-bladed version it was based on looked like a window frame bisected by a saw. Several years ago the Dutch Steam Engine Museum actually restored one and got it working. The video they shot of it isn't terribly thrilling, but does give you an idea of what an ordeal it was to operate the thing:

Designers prototyping concepts for Brand New IDEO, the company's recent brand exploration

This is the second post in our Getting Hired interview series. Yesterday, we talked to the VP of design at Lunar.

IDEO's 600 employees don't fit neatly into categories because the firm famously works across disciplines, and encourages its employees (and by extension its clients) to unlock their potential in creative ways. This has led to many firsts, including Apple's original mouse and the Treo, to name just two. Founded by David Kelley in 1991, IDEO is a design consultancy focused on helping its clients innovate and grow, and on bringing new companies and brands to life. As IDEO's global head of talent, partner Duane Bray handles anything that involves the company's people and culture—how people find out about the company, how they join IDEO and develop their careers, how they build their internal and external networks, and even what it looks like when people transition out of the firm.

Can you walk us through your process for hiring a new designer?

At a certain point in the year, we'll start to identify what our needs are for any of our locations. This is basically aligning what the market is telling us in relation to our portfolio and the skills that are necessary, and asking, Where are our gaps? When we start doing that, there are three places where we look to fill those needs. The first is looking internally; we encourage people to move around the firm a lot, so often we'll start there. Then we'll also reach out to our network, because we often have folks at IDEO who already have an ideal person in mind. And, finally, we'll post the position. You'll see activity from us on LinkedIn or on our website, doing a broader outreach to the world.

There's always an evaluation process before bringing someone in. It starts with their portfolio, their work and what we understand about their work. Any recruiter at IDEO will tell you the resume is the last thing you look at; the work is always the first. Once we do that and identify candidates, particularly if it's someone we want to hire who doesn't work at IDEO, we'll start arranging a series of conversations with them. There are usually multiple conversations. It's rare that someone comes in for one interview and they're done.

Then we'll start to look at what kind of the conversations we need to have at IDEO. We'll arrange deliberate conversations that cut across boundaries, and sometimes we'll put people through activities. We've done everything from throwing cocktail parties where people come in and we mingle, to putting them through an actual working session where we'll have them join a team. We'll do things to try them on for size, from both a cultural and a professional perspective.

What makes good candidates stand out?

Once we reach out to someone, we've usually seen their work and now we want to talk to them. We're looking for people who are great storytellers. What got them here? How do they solve problems? What inspires them? We often see people who have followed rich and diverse paths to get to where they are. So sometimes that story is really interesting to us, and we look for that. Storytelling is number one.

We also want to know that they're passionate about the role. Sometimes there's a distinction between being passionate about working at IDEO and being passionate about the role we're hiring for. Do they truly love the idea of this job, whether it's at IDEO or somewhere else?

We also look for people who embody our values in some way. Just simple things like being collaborative and being comfortable with ambiguity. Development at IDEO is not a rigid structure; it's much more of a negotiation. Therefore, ambiguity and how you deal with that is important. Then there's the notion of making others successful. We look for people who, when talking about their work or projects, talk about how they were part of a team. It's not just "I did this" or "I had the good idea." Finally, curiosity: We love for them to be curious, to ask us questions.

Duane Bray, IDEO's global head of talent, and a team-building exercise outside IDEO's New York City office