In only the most recent food fad to hit the streets of London and national headlines, bearded twin brothers Gary and Alan Keery reportedly had the epiphany to open up a cereal cafe one hungover morning whilst craving a mouth-clearing and stomach settling bowl of their favorite sugar-infused processed carbohydrate with lashings of the chilled excretions of cows' udders.

Following a failed attempt to crowdsource £60,000 on Indiegogo, the duo have been riding a wave of media attention after successfully securing a business loan for the venture. Upon opening the shop in an old video rental store on London's famous Brick Lane, press coverage has reached something of a frenzy, with some actual consumers also managing to squeeze in on the fray.

With press from far and wide initially spellbound by the novelty of an establishment offering over 100 different varieties of global cereal brands, 12 kinds of milk and 20 toppings (only a small number taking aim at the sugar content and nutritional value of the so called "cereal cocktails" on offer) things turned a little sour towards the end of the week when a news reporter from UK TV's Channel 4 got up from a table with camera in tow to launch awkward questions at one of the twins about their £3.20 ($5) price tag for a bowl of cereal in an area of the city where many residents live in deprivation.

A good old-school photographer, one raised on film, will always try to get the shot right "in-camera." In contrast, young bucks raised on digital are more willing to rattle off an imperfect burst, pick the most passable shot and then spend hours retouching the errors on a computer.

The reason for the disparity is no secret: Film is absurdly difficult to re-touch by hand. One manual film retouching option was to use an airbrush, with its attendant compressor and requisite masking. Another method, which perhaps required even greater manual dexterity, was to go over the negatives with a retouching pencil or a dye brush. And according to U.S. Patent #2,422,174, retouching via pencil "is done by highly skilled operators who work over the blemish spots [by making] a plurality of microscopic, overlapping check marks or loops which must be so small and so uniform that they will not become apparent on an enlarged print from the negative."

To make this task easier, an inventor named Harry LeRoy Adams filed the above patent in 1946 for his Photographic Retouching Device.

The principal object of this invention is to provide a means for automatically forming these small, microscopic check marks so that retouching will require less skill and less time. [It] will produce retouching marks much more uniformly than can possibly be produced by hand....

While it still required a human operator with a steady hand to hold a pencil or brush down and apply pressure, the device's function was pretty clever. The operator placed a negative—we're talking 4x5, 5x7 or 8x10, not that newfangled 35mm stuff—onto the bed of the machine, between the two donut-shaped "ring plates" you see in the photo. Whichever part of the negative was within the circle was illuminated from below by the device's built-in illumination, which could be cranked up or down. The negative could be scrutinized using the magnifying glass.

Tough editors and refined designers can be hard to shop for, but we made it easy. Get your favorite typography-lover an extra glam Clampersand! These colorful clamps are the new super limited edition of coretoonist Tony Ruth's original. They are cast in the Batavia foundry in Chicago, IL, and powder coated five lovely colors in Portland, OR. They're beautiful and whimsical, and they work just about anywhere. Use them as book ends, as a centerpiece in your desk landscape, or to create visual puns around the house and shop. $65 at Hand-Eye Supply.

It's a sad fact, but true, that most of us industrial designers know the feeling of working on something that we don't care about. I myself have worked on many projects that I felt were inferior or even unneccessary, because I was part of The Machine, the one where the Design Group was beholden to Marketing. And for those of us that don't blossom into Marc Newsons, Jony Ives and Karim Rashids, we don't get much say in the process, and must continue to serve our cog-like function by slowly rotating in place.

I think that's why I found this Jerry Seinfeld clip so satisfying to watch. (Part of it is the awkward silence early on, while the audience tries to figure out if he's making fun of them or not.) He's giving an acceptance speech for winning an honorary CLIO Award earlier this year, and while on the surface he's skewering the advertising industry, he may as well be speaking to the thousands of companies pushing out unneccessary product:

In our series on Beetle Kill Pine, we showed you how some designers are trying to find useful functions for undesireable, fungus-damaged wood. Another tree with fungal woes is Pecky Cypress, whose innards are scarred by rotted-out voids, making its gap-laden boards unsuitable for say, smooth tabletops.

Instructables Community Manager Mike Warren, a/k/a/ Michaelsaurus, has a workaround: He fills the voids with resins, a technique you've probably seen before. But Warren doesn't use any old resin—he adds photoluminescent powder to the mix, producing a filler that "charges up in sunlight and emits a cool blue glow when in partial or complete darkness."

The full Instructable is here, but peep Warren's cool video first:

Karten Design is an award-winning product innovation consultancy located in Marina del Rey, CA. Their team comprises a talented group of designers, researchers, strategists, and engineers all passionate about creating positive experiences between people and products. Mechanical Engineers are the most critical team members in product development and act as champions of great design in function, aesthetics, quality and efficiency. They currently have an opening for a talented and proactive Junior Mechanical Engineer.

This position is focused on solving functional problems, creating multiple solutions, and developing product concepts via 3D and 2D documentation as needed to move a product successfully through development. If you have hands-on assembly or fabrication experience, that's a huge plus. To join this team and enjoy all the perks of a cubicle-free environment and working in Southern California, Apply Now.

There are makers with video cameras like Matthias Wandel, who can show us things like his crazy motorized scaffold being built. Then there's makers with video cameras and stop-motion skills, like Frank Howarth, who introduce creative animation into building projects, giving wood and materials a life of its own. The next level of complexity comes from Ryan Higley, a digital artist and "instructional technologist" for Colorado State University, who turned a larger-scale building project into the GIF above and the video below.

Unlike Wandel and Howarth, Higley didn't build this project himself—his background is in design, animation and education, not making—but what he lacks in shop skills, he gains in Adobe After Effects knowledge. Thus when he and his wife recently commissioned their basement to be refinished, Higley turned the entire project into a crazy 60-second animation that would have been impossible to capture in-camera:

Derby the dog could be considered unlucky, born as he was with stunted, non-functioning front legs that lack paws. But one piece of luck is that Derby was temporarily fostered by Tara Anderson, who just happens to be the Director of Product Management at 3D Systems, the South-Carolina-based 3D printing company. By working with company designers Kevin Atkins and Dave DiPinto and animal orthotist Derrick Campana, Anderson was able to harness 3DS' resources to create prosthetics for Derby. Check out the results:

What a five-axis CNC mill can do fascinates me as much as what a craftsman from Brescia can. And at their production facility in Gardone Val Trompia, firearms manufacturer Beretta has both, working in tandem to create their high-quality firearms. To show this to the world—with characteristic Italian flair—the company hired commercial firm Studio Ancarani to produce this eye-opening film, which is nothing short of glorious manufacturing porn:

The Gardone Val Trompia factory, by the way, is humungous—110,000 square meters (1.2 million square feet)—and cranks out some 1,500 weapons per day. Says Beretta:

The production departments feature fully automated work centres and highly qualified craftsmen, a prerequisite for achieving the degree of precision and high quality contemplated by its design projects. The design department has advanced systems for calculating pressure by using the finite elements method. The laboratories are equipped for research in impulsive-dynamics applied to the weapon-ammunition system, for metallographic analyses and fatigue tests.

Even more staggering is how long Beretta has been there: They began working in Gardone Val Trompia in the 1500s.

The U.S. Army announced that starting today, a batch of decommissioned Humvees are going to be auctioned off to the general public for the very first time. Here's the listing for the first 26 units, all currently parked in Utah and all with starting prices of $10,000. "This item is offered for Off-Road Use Only," the listing states, meaning it will not be possible to apply for license plates for the vehicles. "No further demilitarization is required. The HMMWV is available for pick up as shown."

In a weird twist on this, a plumber in Galveston County, Texas, named Mark O. was puzzled when his phone started ringing off of the hook—and people began making "really ugly" threats. He was stunned to find that his company's old Ford F-250, which he'd traded in at a Houston dealership last year, had been converted to a mobile anti-aircraft platform by an Islamist extremist group and was being used to wage jihad in Syria. His company's decal—and the company's phone number—was still on the side of the truck, plainly visible in a photo the terrorist group Tweeted of their exploits.

Despite Mark the Plumber having zero connection to terrorism—the dealership claims they sold his truck at auction, and no one has any idea how it came to arrive in Syria—the threats have been pouring in. "We have a secretary here, she's scared to death. We all have families. We don't want no problems," Mark told a local news organization. And Galveston County's The Daily News spells his thoughts out: "I just want it to go away, to tell you the truth."

Moral of the story: If you're trading in a vehicle that can support an anti-aircraft gun, take your company's logo off of it first.

Deadlines are drawing nearer to make your loved ones even dearer! If you haven't had time or inspiration for those last folks on your lists, it's not too late. Whether you need gifts for creatives or just creative gifts, check our collections of great stuff under $100, under $50 and under $25 for good options for every stocking and budget. Between kitchen supplies, pocket knives, art tools, and cool clothes, we'll be sure to help you find something solid.

And if you order before noon this Saturday within the U.S., we'll add a free upgrade from Standard to Priority Shipping to get your precious package there by Christmas. Get cracking, so you can kick back and focus on snacking!

In the broad spirit of co-working spaces and the sharing economy, 'tis the season for the retail manifestation of nimble business practices: namely, the ever-popular holiday pop-up shop. After all, the ephemeral storefront offers the best of both worlds: not only do you get to personally inspect many of the beautiful things you see on the Internet but you get the cachet of an exclusive, limited-time-only marketplace (some, such as last weekend's NeueHouse Holiday Art & Design Bazaar, are open to the public for but a single afternoon—often to the chagrin of those of us who find out the next day). Better yet, they're often hyperlocal, meet-the-maker affairs—exhibitor/vendor fees notwithstanding—that transcend the 'showrooming' phenomenon with what might be deemed a site-specific shopping experience. Here are a few of our favorite ones in New York City this season.

Following its relaunch at NY Now in August, American Design Club has tapped its extensive network of independent designers and makers to stock a jam-packed pop-up shop in the basement of Michele Varian's eponymous boutique in Soho. Many of the designers need no introduction here, but we were impressed with work by newcomers such as Hey Look Studio, Death at Sea and Aaron Poritz, to name a few.

Merchandising 101: Put the best sellers near the front

Photo: Rainy Day Magazine

Professional organizers will tell you that any papers with confidential information should either be shredded or taken to a shredding service (or perhaps composted). Shredders come in varying capacities; I'm going to focus on those intended for personal or small office/home office use.

The Bridge paper shredder, designed by One Tenth for Idea International, runs on four AA batteries. With its slanted sides, it's intended to fit on both round and square wastebaskets with a diameter of 21-25 cm. However, this is a strip-cut shredder—better than nothing, but nowhere near as good (for security purposes) as a cross-cut shredder. It's a fairly light-duty shredder, handling four papers at a time, which must be folded to fit into the slot. Also, unlike heavier-duty shredders, it can't handle staples or paper clips.

The Ziszor portable handheld paper shredder is another strip-cut shredder running on four AA batteries. It only weighs one pound. This would work for users who want a shredder they can just throw in a drawer or carry with them—and who don't feel they need the extra security of a cross-cut shredder.

Michael Bierut, certainly one of the most insightful and entertaining design lecturers there are, visited the MFA Products of Design department at SVA last month with a talk that was unprecedented for him: No slides. It turns out that "since his daughter's wedding" he has never given a design lecture without the use of visuals, and in this unbelievably personal talk he delivers something very special.

(The start of the video shows MFA chair and Core77 partner Allan Chochinov introducing Michael, referencing a little-known story about the genesis of Bierut's forever-fantastic 2009 Core77's Hack2Work feature article "How to Make your Client's Logo Bigger Without Actually Making Their Logo Bigger.")

>>WATCH THE VIDEO HERE

Owners of the Knee Defender may be able to purchase a companion device next year, albeit one from a different company. Said company, Soaragami, is a start-up looking to tackle "the problem of fighting for armrests" with their eponymous product.

The idea for the Soarigami came from being stuck in a very uncomfortable airplane seat. Sick of fighting for armrest space with strangers, our co-founder sketched a design that would ultimately become the Soarigami on, you guessed it, a cocktail napkin.

The services of California-based design firm Focus Product Design were enlisted, and the result is a foldable divider—gussied up to look like an old-school airmail letter, which I think is a bit too on-the-nose—that a passenger can unfurl and perch on the armrest. And for their part, the Soaragami founders don't see it as having the built-in confrontational nature of a Knee Defender: "Make a friend, share fair, and let's unfold savvier skies," they write of the product. (Your cynical correspondent doesn't think fellow passengers would react positively to anything that they perceive as intruding on their personal space, but I hope I'm wrong.)

One thing that Soaragami has for sure, that the Knee Defender doesn't, is a catchy, accompanying pop anthem:

The Soaragami is expected to go on sale next year at $30 a pop.

With all of the hullabaloo over the new lightsaber design, fans may have missed another important detail in the trailer for the new Star Wars movie. First off, most of us know the Millenium Falcon has a round radar dish, as shown above.

Fans may also recall that in Return of the Jedi, Han Solo lends the Millenium Falcon to Lando Calrissian. (Han is busy down on Endor, trying to disable the Death Star's shield.) Lando drives the Falcon into a shaft on the Death Star—and hits a pipe, knocking the radar dish off, as seen in this clip:

Core77 has obtained an exclusive, unreleased script excerpt that details the aftermath of that incident, and it just so happens to tie into the new trailer. Please see below.

This post includes photos and an excerpt from the photoessay Christmas, Handmade in China originally published by Make Works. Make Works is an organization based in Scotland championing local manufacturing by making it easier for designers to work with manufacturers and makers. Photos and the original article are by designer Gemma Lord, documenting her experience on as part of the expedition program of Unknown Fields—a nomadic design studio exploring behind the scenes of the modern world, visiting manufacturing landscapes, mines and infrastructural fields.

It's the most gallingly consumeristic time of year, and (for anyone with even the slightest understanding of modern day globalized production and manufacturing) it takes, I'd suggest, a feat of remarkable mental strength and endurance to block out the social and ecological impact of season (squirming uncomfortably in the back of our minds) and actually enjoy it. Fortunately for us, a lot of the new objects appearing in our stores—santa hats and the latest plastic kids toys dropping like some Christmas bloody miracle every year without fail—shield our innocence and let us get on with the admittedly important task of celebrating with our loved ones.

On a mission to shine a light on the realities of global manufacturing practices and make a path for new forms of localized production, Make Works have recently published a photo-essay by designer Gemma Lord documenting her experiences as part of an Unknown Fields expedition project, posing as a European buyer inside a Christmas 'decorations' factory (of course, during the height of summer in advance of the season) supplying vast quantities of jolly tat to the Western world. As well as a fascinating look behind the scenes with some stunning photography, the piece is a much needed reminder of the impacts of Christmas consumer behavior. Whilst the conditions might not look too appalling (grim, definitely, but not the worst by a long stretch), perhaps the most troublesome thought that these pictures provoke, is that so much human life is spent dedicated to the production of something so trivial, to be shipped half way round the world and in landfill by New Year's.

Imagine a Poundland store so enormous that it takes two whole days to walk from one end to the other. Even then, you'll have missed an aisle or two. Well this is Yiwu International Trade Market. Covering over 4 million square metres it is the "largest small commodity wholesale market in the world."

It's time again for Hankook Tire's biennial design school team-up, where they task ID students with developing futuristic tire concepts. Last time 'round they paired up with Cincinnati's DAAP, and this year they're at Germany's University of Design, Engineering and Business in Pforzheim. And once again, not only did the students did not disappoint, but pulled off some real socks-knockers!

The central trend is to stop looking at the tire as a rubber cladding for a wheel, and to think of it instead as something that works together with an actively transforming wheel to create some ker-azy functionality. Now maybe I'm biased because I know ID students were involved, but the following video showing the three winning concepts in action is more exciting than any action movie trailer you'll see:

Scott Stowell's Design for People was one of our Gift Guide picks this year, by way of Etsy Creative Director Randy Hunt. But we've gotta plug it again because it's in danger of not happening.

To refresh your memory, Design for People is a book by Scott Stowell, founder of design consultancy Open. The purpose of the book is to "[tell] the stories of our biggest projects through interviews with clients, consultants, designers, interns, vendors—and regular people who use the stuff we make, including my Mom and Dad (and maybe you!)," Stowell writes. "If you like to get into the details of how things work, Design for People is for you." The book also features the contributions of Core77 veterans Emily Pilloton, Bryn Smith and Alissa Walker.

Stowell has opted to self-publish, and the book is currently on Kickstarter. Here's the thing: It's short of its target with $44,000 pledged towards a $50,000 goal, and there's only three days left to pledge. The book is close, and just needs that final push!

Have a look at the trailer and see if it doesn't tickle your fancy:

Fancy tickled? Then get in there and pledge!

We've seen the design approaches taken by Jupe and Fletcher to create a circular expanding table. Now let's take a look at the more common table form factor, the rectangle, and some different approaches used to make it expandable.

The first question a designer's got to answer is, where do the leaves go? Are they stored integrally, in Fletcher-like fashion, or meant to be stowed externally, a la Jupe? Resource Furniture's Goliath table takes the latter approach. And while it may seem cumbersome to remove each panel manually and find a place to store them, this is offset by two benefits: The table shrinks down to an almost absurdly small size, offering unmatched space saving, and the length can be customized rather than locking the user into predetermined end lengths.