The molten plastic I smelled while walking the floor of Autodesk Univesrity 2011's exhibit hall was coming specifically from a Morgan-Press injection molding machine. As crowded as TechShop's booth was, I managed to score a quick video demo from engineer Charlie Nguyen, who was busy pumping out poker chips that attendees could subsequently have custom engraved at a nearby Epilog machine.

For those of you in the Detroit area, TechShop is holding an open house for their new facility there on December 26th. We New Yorkers, meanwhile, will have to wait a while longer to get our hands on some TechShop machines; their Brooklyn facilitated is slated for a 2012 ribbon-cutting, which they will presumably do with a laser.

» Part 1: What They Do
» Part 2: The ShopBot and Epilog Laser Engraver

As we wrapup the last weeks of 2011, what better to way to prepare yourself for the coming year than picking up a calendar for 2012? Last year we gave you the Men of Smart Design pinup calendar. This year, the pet-loving designers at Method have put together a beautiful Dogs of Method Calendar to spread some philanthropic cheer—100% of the proceeds from the sale go directly to the Petfinder.com Foundation and will help save the lives of homeless pets.

Each calendar has double perforations on each page, allowing you to slightly customize your calendar: if you love the dog of the month and want to keep it, tear off the bottom perforation to change the month. If you want to change the dog, tear off the entire sheet. If you want to save the print of the dog, tear both perforations to save just the print.

The calendar has 12 months, starting in January, each month with a distinct photograph. It also comes with a hole for hanging on the wall.

All photographs were taken in Method's New York studio, and the calendar was designed and produced by Method.

For $25 you can help the lives of pets (and pet lovers) around the United States or visit the site to donate directly to the Petfinder.com Foundation! Pick yours up today!

The Eames: The Architect and the Painter documentary is set to air in the U.S. on PBS next Monday the 19th, and Herman Miller has posted an attendant website intended to give viewers "an inside look at the connection between the Eames' legacy and Herman Miller's design heritage."

Eames enthusiasts can explore images, videos and quotes exclusively collected from the Herman Miller archives, with additional support from the Eames Office. The site features:

- A visual timeline that brings to life the major milestones throughout the Eames' body of work while working with Herman Miller. Users can scroll through the timeline or jump to specific time periods by clicking on the Eames signature icons that are representative of when they were released.

- A mix of photography, video and product photos are woven in with quotes and historical anecdotes about Charles and Ray, their work, and their life together.

- A chance to win the classic Eames Lounge Chair and Ottoman by signing up for the giveaway.

If you missed it when we originally posted it, check out the trailer here.

Last night saw the opening of the Brooklyn Night Bazaar at 149 Kent Avenue in the Williamsburg, a stone's throw from lower Manhattan but a veritable world apart... not least for the availability of massive repurposed industrial spaces. The former warehouse was divided into sections: a marketplace that is open to the public from 5PM—1AM tonight and tomorrow, and a music venue for ticketholders only. (Food and drink are available in both parts.)

The marketplace floor

Refurbished typewriters from Kasbah Moderne

The stage was set up at the far end of the venue space

Fabricator's Guild set up their wares on a plywood bleacher designed by Julien de Smedt architects. Stop by and say hi to our Core77 Design Awards intern Marko, who is moving on to bigger and better things with as a founding partner in the Bushwick-based digital fabrication startup...

You definitely don't have to sit through these videos in their entirety to get the gist, but check out at least the first few seconds of racing game fanatic Chad Smith's five-monitor setup. (He strapped a GoPro camera to his head to capture the footage.)

The first vid is of a game called iRacing, but the second one, of the Richard Burns Rally game, has livelier footage:

Buffalo-based Kee Safety Inc. produces a line of very basic railings, barriers and perimeter protection, all held together with some variation on the Kee Klamp. The latter is just a humble pipe fitting, available in both aluminum and less-expensive iron, with an obvious appeal: Armed with nothing more than a hex key, a builder tightens a single set screw in the clamp that can subsequently support up to 2,000 pounds. An adult with access to common steel pipes can then operate like a kid with a Lego set.

Steel pipe is an inherently efficient structural component. It is strong, has no sharp corners, and is readily available worldwide. The difficulty in using steel pipe to form structures arises when joining. Threaded pipe must be supplied in set lengths making for zero flexibility in installation. Welding is labor intensive, requires a highly skilled workforce, and specialized equipment.

The answer is KEE KLAMP components. The underlying principle is simple but highly effective: use slip-on components to create versatile and rigid tubular structures....

The Kee Klamp comes in scores of varieties to deal with different angles, coupling situations and pipe diameters. Next we'll look at what some DIY'ers have been using the stuff for.

Gerald Kiska founded his eponymous design company over two decades ago, in 1990, and over the past 21 years, the company has become the largest design consultancy in Austria. In particular, the Salzburg-based company is known for their work with European vehicle manufacturers, among other projects and clients, and they've recently released a video that nicely illustrates their process in developing a cutting-edge electric vehicle concept for German automakers Opel.

The battery-powered tandem 2-seater RAK e is the dynamic lightweight concept of a zero-emission vehicle and takes Opel's pioneering spirit in alternative concepts another step further. With its funky and innovative design, 100 km driving range and 120 km/h maximum speed, the emission-free electric city car even looks good on the highway. The groundbreaking concept reaches far beyond any conventional vehicle. To drive 100 kilometers would cost just 1 euro. The RAK e also aims to make pure electric driving affordable for younger customers, allowing for drivers as young as 16.

The Opel Rak e is a hybrid vehicle in the sense that its form and function lie somewhere between that of an automobile and that of a motorcycle. The 48-horsepower engine, of course, is entirely electric, boasting a 60-mile range and 75 mph top speed as noted (in metric) above; a substantially less flashy MSNCars clip provides a nice rundown of the features of the Rak e:

We're digging this series of illustrations by Guilherme Henrique, a graphic designer who's currently based in Paris (via his hometown of Curitiba, Brazil). "Ville vs. Vélodrome" is a series of eight pairs of quasi-infographic images that compare and contrast the two settings: the city vs. the racetrack. (Check out our post on London's brand-spanking-new velodrome for the 2012 Olympics here.)

The series starts with the disparate environments, progressively narrowing down to "The Competition," "The Riders," and "The Bike," depicting the binary illustrations with an elegant visual language and just a few facts in each one.

The simple forms, minimal palette and clear overall aesthetic make for a nice piece of design work indeed.

I realize that the design of these Ministry of Sound headphones was the result of countless ID man-hours: Sketching, 3D work, mock-ups, testing, not to mention the back-and-forth with the engineers and suppliers. But wouldn't it be cool if designs simply sprung to life in our heads the way it's shown materializing in the video below?

That video, by the way, was the result of man-hours put in by motion designer & director Paul Clements, who's got some great stuff up on his website.

Senior Footwear Designer
adidas
Herzogenaurach, Germany

The industry-leading sports brand is seeking a Senior Footwear Designer for the adidas Innovation Team. He or she will develop creative concepts, design market leading products and appropriate high value innovations, which improve brand competitiveness through design and product leadership, and enable adidas to deliver added value to consumers and athletes.

» view

The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.

In her new book Design by Nature, Maggie Macnab addresses the importance of metaphor in communication using the natural world as a starting point. For an abstract thought or concept, meaning can sometimes be expressed faster by pairing two superficially dissimilar ideas than by trying to explain it directly using the physical sciences. Consequently, metaphor has existed as a tool for conveying thought since human beings first began to examine the conceptual relationships that underpin our world. Clearly, a mastery of metaphor in the visual arena can go a long way towards effective visual communication.

An early design example Macnab uses is the outline of an animal paw with a Band-Aid on it. Pairing two different concepts familiar to most viewers, she's able to (quite successfully) piggyback upon all of the associations we have. After seeing the logo, hearing that it's meant to represent an animal hospital should come as no surprise.

The idea of metaphor can be traced at least partly to Aristotle's Poetics, and it's no coincidence that the first scientists were called Natural Philosophers. In trying to make sense of the world, they tried to ascribe meaning (i.e. philosophized) about the natural world. Not surprisingly, when viewed through our modern lenses, be they telescopic or microscopic, they got a lot of it wrong. In our prior review for Macnab's Decoding Design, this reviewer expressed a great deal of consternation that she often spoke of both science and pseudoscientific interpretations as equally factual. In that book, however, the focus was on interpreting those concepts (or those of nature) to the artificial forms created by others.

We're happy to report that this time around, Macnab begins with nature and builds from the ground up. While many of the concepts she discusses (e.g. the four elements plus quintessence/ether) have now passed into pseudoscience, at one point they represented significant building blocks in the way that natural philosophers attempted to comprehend the universe. Consequently, even if they don't conform precisely to current scientific understanding, they remain accessible metaphors for communication, and the graphic designer's job is to communicate with a mass audience, not PhDs.

2011 has been a hard year. Global Revolution! Natural disasters! Bankruptcy! What's next? We're not hedging bets for 2012 just yet, but in case things don't turn out the way you'd expected, we've got you covered. Core77's Ultimate Gift Guide has everything you need to get through these hard times and survive through the... end times?

Today's pick is from Dave Seliger, one of Core77's esteemed cloggers who is currently completing his degree in Engineering and Studio Art at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire.

It's hard to balance speedy access to your camera and letting it hang in a comfortable position, but the Black Rapid Camera Strap lets you accomplish both. You'll be a camera-toting gunslinger on the wildest streets the world has to offer in no time.

See the full gift guide HERE.

A special Thank You to this year's Gift Guide sponsor: Felt & Wire Shop offering a selection of curated paper goods direct from designers.

As the calendar year draws to a close, ultracontemporary watchmakers ZIIIRO are pleased to announce the release of two new models: the "Ion" and the Proton." The former watch design (left) marks a radical departure from the chic / sleek aesthetic of their debut from a year ago and Spring 2011 releases, though ironically this is precisely because it features what is essentially a classic analog display.

Still, the "Ion" is entirely in keeping with ZIIIRO's minimalist design philosophy, the face stripped down to a disc with a pair of disparately-weighted radial lines (i.e. the hands of a clock). "The Ion offers a touch of simplicity with its minimalistic dial and two-hand analog movement. Comes together with an understated transparent bracelet strap, this combination reveals a truly elegant timepiece."

The "Proton" is simply an update on the display that they developed for the "Aurora" and "Celeste" models.

Both the "Ion" and the "Proton" are available in three colors: transparent, transparent-smoke and milky-white, and "both models are fully interchangeable with all watches from the bracelet series (Gravity, Aurora, Orbit, Ion and Proton)." They're currently available for pre-order from ZIIIRO's online shop, set to ship on December 23rd.

On a website called Simplified Building Concepts, DIY'er Chris P. documents a wide variety of furniture he's made out of pipes and Kee Klamps: Chairs, tables, clothing racks, rolling shelves, and more.

In addition to providing Instructables-like photos and videos of the process behind each piece, Chris also posts freely-downloadable PDFs and/or Google Sketchup files so you can duplicate or tweak his efforts. At press time the currently featured project was the classic Maker Faire table shown up top.

Check out the hundreds of available projects by Chris and others here.

"Ask any welder, woodworker, or tailor where their products are most
likely to fail," writes craftsman Noah Lambert. "They'll point to the weld, the joint, or the seam—anywhere two pieces of material are fastened together."

When people get bright ideas a light bulb pops up over their head. For British designer George Carwardine, that light bulb was followed by a spring.

Throughout the 1920s inventors tinkered with articulating-arm lamps, experimenting with parallelogram arm structures and counterweights. None of them really caught on until Carwardine, a UK-based freelance car designer and engineer whose specialty was vehicle suspensions, invented the desk lamp we all know today. Carwardine realized he could add suspension mechanisms to lamps, tweaking the springs and pivoting arms to provide balance and obviating the need for counterweights.

Carwardine's area of expertise was design and engineering, not business. Although he had the foresight to patent his design, he figured the lamp would be helpful on the production floor of the car factory where he worked at the time, and had no greater plans for it.

Originally hailing from the Quebec countryside, Samuel Bernier has found his calling at the University of Montreal's product design program, where he has launched "Project RE_" with the blessing of his thesis supervisor Louis-Philippe Pratte. It turns out that Bernier's collaboration with Udi Rimon for ENSCI Les Atelier's SupraDesign project was but a diversion from his true passion: DIY design. For his graduation project, Bernier asks:

What motivates people into making their own stuff? Is it to save money? Is it to express themselves? Or is it just a human need to create, as proposed by the Italian philosopher Piero Ferrucci.

Some people appreciate standing out of the crowd by creating a unique product. Others build to show off their skills and values. Today, with the rise of automated manufacturing machines and the access to cheap and intuitive 3D programs, the quest for customization will become a reality.

Project RE_, then, is as much a thought experiment as it is a series of hands-on projects, the realization of Bernier's interest in "do-it-yourself communities and the capacity of their members to reproduce locally objects designed in other countries." In this sense, he's taken a cue from Instructables (which was recently acquired by Autodesk), championing the same "open source principles and successful business model," noting that "all 3D printing files and laser cutting files will also be published on Thingiverse."

All of which would sound like the same old spiel if not for the fact that Bernier actually produces—upcycles, in the parlance—some pretty neat "Things That Look Like Other Things" from otherwise quotidian raw materials:

See how each set of materials fulfills its destiny after the jump:

On Showtime's excellent Homeland, a team of CIA agents attempt to determine how a terrorist cell is moving money around on U.S. soil. When their observation of digital banking transactions goes nowhere, their attention turns to a physical object: An extraordinarily expensive necklace stolen in a suspicious robbery. "A nomadic culture has always known," says the senior analyst, "that jewelry is the easiest way to move wealth."

The usage of jewelry as currency rather than mere ornamentation is an interesting one, and RP-happy designer Michiel Cornelissen (we've covered his work before here and here) toys with this concept with his E 5.55 Necklace. Precious gemstones are replaced by more literal (if lower-value) counterparts: 5-cent Euro coins. Explains Cornelissen,

I'm always intrigued by the beauty of some of the things we take for granted; like coins—little industrial gems.

This project makes use of the intricate geometries and flexible behavior that are possible with 3d-printing—holding 111 five-eurocent coins firmly in place to create a stunning necklace.

One of the many things the Angelpoise lamp was good for was sewing. With a sewing machine you really needed to get light down by the needle. So in 1936, when a Norwegian textiles machinery importer named Jac Jacobsen ordered a bunch of sewing machines from England for a Norwegian textile factory, there were two Angelpoise lamps included in the shipment.

Jacobsen liked the lamps so much that he contacted their manufacturer, Herbert Terry & Sons, and asked about acquiring the licensing rights for Norway. The Terrys said yes—if Jacobsen would kick the deal off by buying parts for 500 of the lamps.

That was a major purchase at the time, but Jacobsen agreed. The Terrys continued manufacturing the Angelpoise for the UK and other Commonwealth nations, while Jacobsen started making his own for Norway.

But having a keen eye and some design skills, Jacobsen tweaked the design, Scandinavian-style, and by 1938 had his modified version ready to sell. It was called the L-1, and Jacobsen created a company to produce and sell the lamp. He named the company Luxo, Latin for "I give light."

Convinced he had a hit product, Jacobsen subsequently negotiated with the Terrys to obtain the licensing rights to sell the lamp outside of the Commonwealth territories. The Luxo lamp was born.

Experience Designer
Philips
Andover, Massachusetts

Philips Design is seeking an Ambient Experience Designer to with a focus on the design of spaces and experiences within healthcare environments. Philips provides Ambient Experience Design services to improve patient and staff experiences within healthcare environments. Using field research and an expertise in the healthcare domain our designers define solutions that improve spatial environments and clinical workflow. Designers work in multidisciplinary teams consulting directly with the healthcare industry and are able to deal with issues around interior architecture, lighting and workflow within clinical environments.

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The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.