Yanko Design - Form Beyond Function

Why sleep in a tent when you could sleep in a nest?! The Flite+ by Tentsile straps to trees, giving you airborne accommodation in the outdoors! While most tents become really messy ordeals when the floor is wet, cold, hard, or infested, the Tentsile Flite+ has no problem, because it straps to three trees, creating a hammock + home that suspends above the ground.

The Flite+ has a triangular schematic covering an area of 40sq.ft., allowing it to form two living spaces with enough storage for some gear as well. It takes all of 10 minutes to set up and comes equipped with an insect mesh top that gives you a view of your surroundings without letting the critters get to you. It also comes with an additional tarp sleeve you can slide on top for when it gets too sunny, or begins raining. The single-ratchet design makes it rather compact, and allows it to weigh a comfortable 7lbs, making it easy to carry around on all your trips… because why camp on the ground anymore when you can float right above it!

Designer: Tentsile

BUY IT HERE: $280.00 $350.00

The average business trip lasts not more than 36 hours. That rather important insight is what makes the Lundi travel bag the perfect choice for businessmen and businesswomen who take regular work excursions.

While most bags attempt at multitasking by being work-bags, travel-bags, weekend-bags, gym-bags, etc., dappling with modularity and adaptability, the Lundi travel bag isn’t a jack of all trades, but rather, a master of one domain. Creating a new category of bags designed with not activities in mind, but rather hours spent pursuing them, the Lundi is the world’s first 36-hour Travel Bag, built specifically for being the best partner for your short business trip.

The Lundi travel bag doesn’t multitask or juggle different avatars because it doesn’t need to. Firm in its resolve to provide the perfect storage for your business trip, the Lundi is one of those products that challenge the notion that a product that multitasks is a “better product”. On the outside, its leather design is classic, professional, and unisex; working wonderfully for businessmen and businesswomen on the go. On the inside, it is compartmentalized to perfection, giving you one dedicated space for office and work related items (both electronic and otherwise), and another for clothes/toiletries/travel-documents… all perfectly calibrated for 2 days and 1 night of occupational travel.

As a notion, the concept of a bag designed around a time-frame seems like the most suitable way to go. In a sense, the bag’s description is its design brief: “A bag designed for the 36-hour business trip”… and it completely does justice to it. Because let’s not forget, in the business world, Time is Money!

The Lundi Travel Bag is available in two timeless leather variants. The Embossed leather bag lives long and stays strong, while the Vegetable-tanned leather embodies high-couture in profession. The Lundi travel bag is available on Kickstarter till the 9th of April (23:00 PST), so grab yourself the best business-trip bag, pronto!

Designers: Maison Hikaku & David Mateo Design

BUY IT HERE: $349.00 $629.00

BEC is the very mark of versatility! This simple stool (that can also be used as an end table) features a trademark tier seat that gives it dimension and a subtle touch of elegance. Designed to be flat-packed and easy to put together with just a single tool, it’s quick and easy to construct or store. Made of MDF and aluminum, it’s also environmentally friendly to produce and 100% recyclable.

Designer: César Boratyn

If you find yourself yelling “what?! I can’t hear you!” over your current air conditioner, then the Anio is for you! It’s the first home A/C concept that utilizes magnetic cooling – a cutting edge technology that can achieve extremely low temperatures with little or no noise.

The magnetocaloric effect can be used for both cooling or heating by shifting magnetic field strains without using cooling agents. The result is an almost silent air conditioner. Better yet, it uses 50% less energy than conventional air conditioners. Environmentally friendly and 30% smaller than common air conditions, it’s the cleanest, most compact solution for comfort yet!

Designer: René Bade

The Smartwatch industry seemed like a bad idea from the get-go. It felt like overkill to have with you a phone that connects you to the world, and then a watch that connects you to your phone in your pocket. Now a Smart Clock, that’s something I could rally behind, because it makes sense. The clock’s ever present, always visible, and is more capable of connecting you to your internet-powered world while at home, because your phone could be anywhere, if not in your pocket.

The Glance Clock is the breakthrough product for clocks, the way the Nest was for thermostats. It doesn’t make your home ‘smart’, but it still is an immensely useful smart device at home. A simple innocuous clock on the outside, but a clever LED matrix screen behind the fabric facade, the Glance clock lights up when needed, being your information butler at home, and telling you more than just the time.

The Glance still comes with hands that constantly tell you the time in the classic analog format that we know and love. However, it’s advanced enough to provide a wide variety of other notifications too on command. Ranging from displaying the temperature, to your daily schedule/planner, to notifying you when your phone’s ringing or when your Uber/Lyft has arrived, the Glance aims at amazing you with a user experience that gives you a glimpse of the information you need to know… and sometimes delighting you with a friendly smiley face, humanizing the AI behind the clock.

The Glance doesn’t shy from celebrating the fact that it’s a clock first, and an AI assistant later. The Clock’s design stands out as modern, minimalist, and adaptable to any interior style. The fabric on the face of the clock masks the LED matrix behind, making it look familiar, rather than too modern. However, when the LEDs light up through the fabric, it’s always a delightful experience!

The Glance corrects the mistake the smartwatch industry made, by combining the timepiece and the Internet of Things in the more relevant setup. On your wall, not your wrist. Because you don’t need another portable computer on your person. I’d much rather rally behind the idea of a Smart Clock!

Designer: Glance Tech

BUY IT HERE: $149 $199

Paul Ketz is back with his uncanny, unconventional take on conventional products, aesthetics, and functionality. The designer won the A’ Design Award last year for his beautifully disorganized Nest Organizer that took the concept of order and married with chaos, resulting in a product experience filled with awe, curiosity, and joy. The Marshmallow stool aims to bring about that same reaction, by challenging the notion of how stools should be manufactured and whether form should follow function, or whether it should follow the manufacturing process.

The Marshmallow Stool comprises a single metal pipe base and a foam seat. The eye instantly goes to the way the foam seat looks to be melting over the metal base, giving it the appearance of being incredibly soft. However, the most aesthetic element of the stool (the seat) is probably the most un-designed. The designer derived the aesthetic by creating a foam base that sits below the metal mesh and expands upwards. The intersecting pipes then give the foam its “whipped” appearance, making it look like its namesake, a marshmallow. Each stool’s foam seat is unique since they don’t use molds, but rather rely on the metal piping to give them their uniquely satisfying form!

The Marshmallow Stool is currently on display at the Milan Design Week from the 4th to the 9th of April, along with the Nest and other design works by Paul.

Designer: Paul Ketz