It's been nearly two years since we checked in on McMansion Hell, the website that scornfully highlights choice examples of suburban architecture. The site's anonymous author is still at it, tearing through America state by state, with the current target being big-ass houses in Texas. "I've been poisoning my brain the last couple of weeks narrowing down 2000 prospective McMansions to 16," s/he writes. "Instead of ranking them myself like I usually do, I will be doing a bracket at the end of the next post where you can vote for the Most Terrible in Texas!"

Here are the first eight "entrants:"

Round Two is reportedly on the way. In the meantime you can read more details about Round One's monstrosities here.

Chris Lefteri, the materials designer who literally wrote the book on the subject, has cooked up a new plastics-based concoction meant to be used for DIY repairs. Called FixIts, Lefteri's blend of polymer-based herbs and spices comes in stick form and is user-moldable:

"FixIts are incredibly tough and made to last," says the Kickstarter campaign. "Once hardened, they can be drilled into, hammered into, screwed into, sanded down or cut to size." In terms of texture, "Once it has cooled down it forms a hard plastic that is similar to nylon in strength." That ought be appealing for folks looking to outgrow Sugru.

Each stick is 150mm x 16mm x 4mm, and a three-pack will set you back $7. They've already been successfully Kickstarted, and there's 24 days left to pledge.

BioLite is looking for an experienced, mechanically-oriented, senior product design engineer to join us in developing our next generation of clean energy solutions for both outdoor recreation and emerging markets. In this position, you'll play a crucial role in developing a range of exciting new products with potential for massive

Another design awards season, another opportunity to throw a raging party honoring the best designers of the past year.

We were thrilled on June 14th to have the opportunity to throw our 2018 Core77 Design Awards results celebration on the roof of Kickstarter HQ in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, where we honored our 2018 honorees and shared a toast to another year of hard work. 

The place was packed with Core77 Design Awards winners old and new, jury captains and teams, and other Core77 friends. 

The beautiful rooftop garden at Kickstarter headquarters was the perfect setting for a summer evening party.

 

Cocktails by Duke's Liquor

Chocolates made for the party that emulate the Core77 Design Awards trophy (plus the mold and 3d prints used to make the custom chocolates!)

Snacks by Campbell Cheese and Grocery

Core77 friends partake in some delicious refreshments 

For New Yorkers, a rooftop reigns supreme as the perfect summer party spot.

Cheers to another great year of world-changing design! And free drinks :) 

Matt Brown of Small Planet—an interaction design studio who's Executive Producer Joana Lehman served as Interaction Jury Captain in the awards this year—brought some fun to the party with his expert tarot card readings.

John Skabardonis (left) and Chris Lefteri (right), members of this year's Covestro Materials Prize jury team, share a drink with Core77's own Deb Aldrich (left) and Laura Des Enfants (right).

Senior Producer Allison Fonder stands with 2018 Core77 Design Awards partners, Jury Captains, and winners while proposing a toast for everyone's hard work on the awards this year.

 

Core77 co-founder Stuart Constantine gives a big thanks to Kickstarter, Covestro, and Firsthand Fab for partnering with us on this year's awards and providing an unbeatable party space to celebrate. 

 

Party festivities went well into the night!

When all was said and done, the 2018 Core77 Design Awards Results Celebration was a rousing success, and a great night to get everyone from the Core77 community to come together and celebrate the best in design of this past year.

The show's not quite over yet, however - there's still a role to play. From now until July 14th, we're turning to the Core77 community to vote for their favorite honored project to receive the 2018 Community Choice Grand Prize. This year, the Community Choice Grand Prize Winner - the project which tallies the most votes overall - will be taking home tickets and airfare to attend our 2018 Core77 Conference in New York, "Now What? Launching & Growing Your Creative Business". So be sure to look through the full cast of 2017 Core77 Design Awards honorees and show your favorites some love by giving them your vote!

The following is a sponsored post, courtesy of Covestro.

Consumers are increasingly being expected to have a greater role in "healing thyself." Shorter hospital stays, fewer instances of clinician-administered medication, and more do-it-yourself cases of in-home care drive the need for innovative home-healthcare devices. The implications are many—not only for sis, dad and grandma—but also for healthcare brand owners, pharmaceutical packaging producers, medical device designers and related materials suppliers.

For starters, such devices need to be on-trend, consumer-friendly, easy to use, and durable. Safety concerns, of course, are paramount. Drugs previously delivered only by trained professionals in monitored, medical facilities now are being self-administered by non-medical personnel in home settings. It's important to guard against things going wrong. Designers have a huge role to play in ensuring they don't.

Lefteri

"Materials are huge drivers to what is becoming a major factor in healthcare, which is the focus on products that are integrated into a patient's lifestyle rather than being hidden away," notes Chris Lefteri, a London-based designer and materials expert. "Materials in general, but in particular polycarbonate (PC), can address the needs for toughness, for increased mobility and reduced weight, decoration and light-transmission for integrating lighting technologies."

With a growing portfolio of medical-grade resins and a wealth of healthcare device experience, Covestro is particularly well placed to offer advice and guidance about its offerings to designers and brand owners alike through the sometimes intimidating maze of medical standards, protocols and material selection requirements. After all, when a patient needs life-saving medical treatment, well-designed devices made with the right materials can be used to mitigate or eliminate serious health complications.

Materials companies such as Covestro also are taking this challenge seriously, and developing advanced plastic resins that can meet all the necessary performance parameters in terms of biocompatibility, chemical resistance, sterilization, flammability ratings, durability and the like, while enabling innovation.

New packaging concepts for drug delivery: As healthcare becomes more dependent on self-medication, Covestro has explored how Makrolon® can be used to create packaging more focused on patients' lifestyles, taking advantage of its durability and potential for reuse. (Illustration courtesy of Chris Lefteri Design)

Let's look at a couple products and medical devices that reflect current home healthcare trends:

The smartphone-based Vital Moto Mod can monitor 5 vital signs in minutes. (Photo courtesy of Vital USA Inc.)

At the CES 2018 show in January, Los Angeles-based Vital USA Inc. launched, in partnership with Lenovo and Motorola, what it calls the "first connected, integrated, multi-vital-sign monitoring platform that you can operate through a simple app on your phone." The Vital Moto Mod snaps on to any of Motorola's Moto Z Android smartphones and connects via WiFi or Bluetooth to the Internet. With a durable case made of a polycarbonate/ABS resin blend, the device incorporates an inflatable, silicone finger cuff into which users insert the index finger on their left hand.

Within two to three minutes the device can accurately measure five vital signs—temperature, pulse, respiratory rate, blood oxygen level and blood pressure. It saves the data, and uploads it to the cloud, creating a sharable history of measurements.

The second-generation OrCam artificial vision device aims to bring new freedom to the visually impaired. (Photo courtesy of OrCam Technologies Ltd.)

Jerusalem, Israel-based OrCam Technologies Ltd., meanwhile, recently rolled out its second-generation OrCam MyEye 2.0 artificial vision device, designed to help visually impaired, blind or individuals with reading difficulties. The size of a finger and weighing just 0.8 ounces, the device snaps on to the temple of your glasses. A tiny camera inside scans text it is pointed at—be it a newspaper, a computer screen, a product label, money notes, etc.—and instantly reads the text out loud to the wearer. 

While diverse and different products, these share some common elements—they involve complex engineering, in small form factors, with miniaturized components, and all connect to the Internet in one way or another. (OrCam MyEye 2.0's proprietary algorithms work independently offline—without any data or subscription fees, connectivity lapses, or privacy concerns. Wi-Fi connectivity only comes into play for software updates.) They need to be lightweight, durable and impact resistant.

Zetts

Adoption of connected health wearable devices is growing fast. The housings of such devices need to be friendly to the skin, durable and able to withstand exposure to everyday chemicals such as sunscreen, hand lotions, and the like, noted Lauren Zetts, the firm's Pittsburgh, PA-based healthcare market manager for North America. Makroblend® M525 from Covestro fits the bill as a grade with skin-contact biocompatibility that also provides exceptional low-temperature impact strength, good flowability and excellent chemical resistance.

Another Covestro material—Makroblend® M4000 FR—is helping medical device makers to meet the flame retardancy and chemical resistance requirements that are vital when selecting a material to use in medical equipment housings. This grade offers flame retardancy of V-0 at 2.0 mm and 5VA at 3.0 mm, is appropriate for skin-contact applications, and meets key ISO biocompatibility standards. It also provides high toughness, resistance to stress cracking, good flowability and high tensile modulus.

Merz's Cellfina device (Photo courtesy of Merz Pharma)

As a result, Merz Pharma GmbH & Co. KGAA, a Frankfurt, Germany-based global aesthetics and neurotoxin company, selected Makroblend® M4000 FR for the housing of the motor module of its Cellfina® System, which is the only FDA-cleared, minimally invasive procedure shown to improve the appearance of cellulite for up to three years. The Cellfina® System also uses the biocompatible Makrolon® 2458 in the sterilized disposable parts used with the system.

Other medical devices are tackling challenges head-on. Biologic drugs—derived from a microorganism, or plant or animal cells—are increasingly popular for treating rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes, cancer and other diseases. Biologics are difficult to form into solids or capsules and so usually are injected or infused, which can require inconvenient visits to specialty healthcare facilities or painful self-injections for patients.

Enable Injections' on-body drug-delivery device features polycarbonate components injection molded using Covestro materials. (Photo courtesy of Enable Injections Inc.)

Enable Injections Inc. has developed a disposable, on-body, drug-delivery device that allows patients to comfortably self-administer high-volume and/or high-viscosity therapeutics. Components of the Enable device are injection molded with polycarbonate materials from Covestro.

The housing of the on-body device features Makrolon® Rx1805 polycarbonate—a workhorse medical-grade resin—in a purple tint. The device's transfer system, which allows the patient to easily transfer the biologic drug from its original container to the Enable on-body delivery device, features Covestro's Bayblend® M850 XF.

One of Covestro's most recent innovations is the recent introduction of its next-generation, medical-grade PC, called Makrolon® Rx3440, said Zetts.

Designed for use in luers and other intravenous connectors, the new grade offers superior durability and chemical resistance to the aggressive solvents found in oncology drugs and other treatments. This helps to prevent cracking so that healthcare professionals can more safely deliver oncology drugs to patients. Makrolon® Rx3440 also offers biocompatibility; greater structural integrity to allow for thin-walled designs; toughness to resist mishandling; and dimensional stability in shipping and storage, Zetts added. (See brief clip here)

NOTE: Makrolon, Bayblend and Makroblend are registered trademarks of the Covestro group. 

The winners of this year's Swarovski Designers of the Future competition recently unveiled what they've been up to at Design Miami/Basel. On display as a complete exhibition, the commissioned projects each used Swarovski crystal innovations to explore the theme 'Smart Living'. Crystal definitely isn't the first material that comes to mind when you think of smart tech solutions for the home, so we were fascinated to see the results and learn more about each designers' thought process.

Frank Kolkman

The three winners came up with diverse solutions, each focused on a different area within the broad smart living space. 'Dream Machine'by Dutch designer Frank Kolkman is an ethereal device that explores using neuroscience and crystal technology to help us cope with the cognitive demands of our modern lives. The device generates light and sound patterns that synch with the user's brainwaves to bring them into a state of artificial dreaming. The video below gives a closer look at how the machine is intended to be used:

Dream Machine represents everything that encompasses the wholistic living trend, from home gyms and yoga studios to excessive skincare routines. As we as a culture continue taking more time out of our days to care for our bodies, why not take time to care for our minds? Through the use of Swarovski crystals, Kolkman's design begins to speak about cognitive health and technology as part of a daily routine and show the potential evolution of future wellness equipment.

Slanted Tiles

'Slanted Tiles'by Dutch and Japanese studio Study O Portable is a series of structures that display the more analogue properties of crystal and light. Instead of going the tech route, designers Bernadette Deddens and Tetsuo Mukai decided to focus on the importance of recognizing things we take for granted in our daily lives. By playing with the blurring color and light that Swarovski crystals emanate, Study O Portable was able to communicate that living an aware life outside of technology also falls under the 'Smart Living' umbrella.

Study O Portable

'Home Shrine'by Yosuke Ushigome is an AI home assistant device that utilizes the mystical material of Swarovski crystals in an attempt to personalize the relationship between man and technology. 

As interaction with smart home devices is shaping the way we communicate, Ushigome's Home Shrine imagines a world where Swarovski crystal inserts a ritualistic aspect to the way we interact with our voice-activated assistants. In addition to its unexpected material and form factor, Home Shrine delivers data in a conversational and ritualistic way that completely counteracts the mundane, robotic exchanges we typically have with smart home devices like Google Home and Amazon Alexa. 

Yosuke Ushigome

"The future is full of tough problems when it comes to our relationship with technology. Designers get to work with emerging technologies before they get embedded deep in our culture, and this can play a tremendous role in shaping our future and imagination." -Yosuke Ushigome

If you're curious to see more of the winning projects, the below video runs through the Design Miami/Basel exhibition space and gives a closer look at the details:

Here's a brilliant bit of PR: Domino's Pizza has been funding road crews to repair potholes. Seemingly random towns in America--Athens, Georgia; Bartonville, Texas; Burbank, California; Milford, Delaware--have had just over 200 of their collective potholes repaired, then stamped with graphics:

Domino's says they're doing it because "Potholes, cracks, and bumps in the road can cause irreversible damage to your pizza during the drive home from Domino's." To illustrate this they placed a camera inside a pizza box, then ran the car over increasingly worse potholes to show you the pizzageddon in action.

Patching potholes prevents pizza pulverization, but does nothing to reduce transit times. Papa John's needs to step up and start working on the traffic problem.

You know how in movies, if a protagonist is looking at a framed photo of a loved one, then places it face down on the table, it means they're about to do something said loved one wouldn't approve of? The implication is out of sight, out of mind.

One of the features that Google rolled out earlier this year as part of their Digital Wellbeing initiative is Shush mode. It's simple and brilliant: You place your phone face down, and in that orientation it avoids alerting you to anything.

The iPhone has an accelerometer in it, so why this feature hasn't been added is a mystery to me.

Features I'd like to see added next:

- The vibrating motor is tweaked to occasionally flip the phone over from face-up to face-down and into Shush mode

- If your dinner companion attempts to photograph the meal, power is re-routed from the flash to deliver a powerful, punitive shock

- Through the harnessing of antimatter, smartphones steadily grow heavier throughout the day, reaching weights exceeding 25 pounds

- Phones are no longer able to be charged at home, at the office or in your car, but must be brought to community centers and charged behind a counter by an attendant. The charging process takes 30 minutes and during that time, you are forced to converse with someone of a different profession. Afterwards the two of you are quizzed on facts about the other, and if either person fails, both of you must start over

We love design and we love gear. We are looking for an exceptional industrial designer that shares our passion for design, gear, and outdoor sports. This is an opportunity to create the equipment that people love. We need a hardgoods designer with a proven track record to

We've reached a moment in time where everyone is beginning to consider the ways in which AI and robots could take over their jobs in the near future. Luckily, robots don't quite have a knack for human emotion or creativity yet, so for the most part, design jobs are still in the safe zone. Tailor Brands, however, is on a creepily accurate track with their AI logo and brand identity design system. 

Through a series of basic questions, Tailor Brand's AI attempts to formulate the perfect logo for your company. Naturally, I decided to test the free version of the system with Core77's name and description to see what would happen. The system starts by asking what type of company you're working on and requests a brief description of the business for more accuracy. 

Next, the prompt asks you what style of logo you're looking for—icon-based, name-based or initial-based. I selected name-based for Core77.

The final stage in the logo generation process is answering a series of typeface preference questions. Generally more curly, elegant typefaces are presented against more clean, modern ones. I went with the more modern ones because script isn't our blog's vibe.

After the type style questions, the system generates a few sample logos, business cards, website and mobile site options.

Option 1:

Option 2:

(These are just two of the free options. You can, of course, pay extra for more detailed ones.)

I prefer our current logo, but these aren't horrible. I ran a couple more free tests after this one, and it seems like many of the options are simple, yet stylized with trendy shapes and typefaces. Tailor Brands' AI isn't necessarily creating any new design elements we haven't seen before (squares and bubbly fonts are used all over the place), but it's clear the system's algorithm recognizes current type and shape trends seen around the web. 

The results are trendy and creative, but not quite as creative as human graphic designers, which is comforting. However, I could see Tailor Brands working well for smaller businesses that just need one logo and don't want to put in the time, back-and-forth communication and cost that comes with a human design team. Or, as a preliminary step for non-design-minded business owners to figure out a branding direction they're interested in. 

Threaded connections, such as bolts and nuts, are used in a wide variety of applications, ranging from plastic toys to massive bridges. The one similarity that ties them together is that these connections need to stay together when we want them to, but also come apart when needed. For example, the valve covers on an engine have to stay in place while driving, but we also need them to be removable, so we can service the engine components.

Most of us raised in the 'States probably think of this as the first U.S. flag:

That's the "Betsy Ross" version they showed us in textbooks. Thirteen stars and thirteen stripes to represent thirteen colonies. However, the story of upholsterer Betsy Ross having sewn the first U.S. flag in 1776 is now under question by historians.

Believe it or not, the first actually documented flag of the United States was actually this monstrosity, known as the Grand Union flag:

Yes, while trying to throw off the yoke of our British masters in 1775, the United States Continental Army and Navy flew a flag incorporating the then-British flag in the canton. It's overly busy, awful and gives me a headache to look at. If I was on that design committee I'd have shot to my feet and shouted "Remove this flag from my sight at once!"

The sharp-eyed among you have probably noticed that the Union Jack in the canton (below left) is not quite like today's British flag (below right).

Well, that's because the current British flag is itself a mash-up of three different flags:

St. George's Cross, England

St. Patrick's Saltire, Ireland

St. Andrew's Cross, Scotland

The Union Jack

Wales is also part of the UK, but got screwed out of being added to the flag, presumably because the Welsh flag is this:

I'd love to see the design meeting where they tried integrating the dragon and were forced to give up.

Anyways, the British flag in the canton of the Grand Union flag lacks the St. Patrick's Saltire because Ireland hadn't yet been subjugated.

Happy Fourth, and be thankful this thing isn't flying in front of your house.

The (RED) brand and a thoughtful approach to all creative outputs are key assets to the organization’s success. We are a small team of visual storytellers that taps into people’s passions to engage them with the AIDS fight - whether it’s through shopping, eating, music, art or experiences.

Yesterday some of our American readers watched people do extremely dumb, dangerous things with fireworks. July 4th is a busy time for ambulance drivers, ER doctors, and YouTube camerapeople. Miraculously no one was hurt during this particular stunt, where the guys from Hoonigan—"a motorsport-lifestyle brand with a penchant for automotive debauchery"—took what looks to be a '90s-era BMW 3-class, painted it up in the Stars 'n Stripes, and turned the car into a rolling fireworks show:

The Mealtime Monkey Hide & Eat—a baby's first plate for independent eating with finger foods! The monkey is designed to allow kids to have a cute dinnertime buddy that is associated as a toy rather than just a plate. The friendly monkey encourages baby's exploration with solid food and provides the opportunity for playful interaction with their family at mealtime.

The monkey plate is based on peek-a-boo, which reinforces cognition and the gradual realization of object permanence, which is the existence of an object while being out of sight. Using the mealtime monkey plate is a great way to promote and strengthen baby's motor and perceptual abilities, such as hand-eye coordination and fine and gross motor skills.

In the last post on McMansion Hell I failed to credit Kate Wagner, who specializes in architectural acoustics, as the site's author and founder. Apologies to Ms. Wagner, who last year presented this excellent TED Talk on how the McMansion problem started and what architecture should and shouldn't do. She is as funny on video as she is in print:

Thanks to readers Rob and Billy for the alert!

From Sweden came the trend of Plogging, whereby joggers rid the streets of litter while running their routes. Japan has wandering litter cleaners too, but they're dressed in kimono and wield fire tongs like swords:

The group is called Jidaigumi Basara, and they describe themselves as a "Picking up trash Samurai Performance Team," doing their thing in order to draw people's attention to the litter problem. (The group seen in the video is the Tokyo branch; the parent group, Issei Ichidai Jidaigumi, is based in Hokkaido.)

What we want to see next: Footage of the sneaky ninjas responsible for depositing the trash, and hopefully a mass confrontation between the two groups.

Tynker is looking for a strategic thinker who will turn ideas into amazing product workflows that engage our primary customers – kids! You will be responsible for delivering all aspects of design, from defining customer needs to delivering prototypes and UI specifications. Tynker is the #1 Kids

Artist Jonathan Trayte's first US solo exhibition, Fruiting Habits recently opened at Friedman Benda, and the included pieces are definitely not for the conventional-minded. Trayte's approach to furniture and lighting design is the combination of his fine art/sculpture background and his training as a chef and foundry metal worker. All of his skills and interests merge together to create one dreamy installation, which features furniture designs that are both playful and functional.

(Editor's note: It's easier to see the furniture details in the product images instead of the installation images. To see the actual installation, visit Friedman Benda in NYC.)

The installation itself is assembled as a landscape that includes areas for living, sleeping and eating. Thanks to his background in the catering industry, Trayte has a thorough understanding of the texture of produce and the form factor of kitchen utensils, which he applies to his designs in unexpected ways. 

"Trayte is struck by the fact that food, one of humanity's few true universals, is visualized so differently in various cultures. Beneath the bright and playful veneers of packaging, Trayte finds real psychological depth. He draws from that deep well a commentary on personal desire, cultural habits, and rampant consumerism." -Friedman Benda

Details of the furniture collection include sculpted shapes inspired by melons, gourds, desserts and meats, made from opulent materials, including painted bronze, leather, wood and marble. Trayte also draws from the colorful designs of candy wrappers and snack packaging that he collects from around world.

We've seen the Memphis trend run rampant at furniture fairs and design weeks over the past few years, and Trayte's designs definitely fit somewhere in the more stripped down, minimal end of that vibrant spectrum. In a sense his designs fall on the trendier side, but through the incorporation of textures reminiscent of food and kitchen tools and his use of striking, linear forms, Trayte manages to push the limits of the Memphis style, creating a unique, delicious category of his own.   

Fruiting Habits is on display at Friedman Benda through July 27th, 2018.