Yanko Design - Form Beyond Function

A city as stunning as Prague deserves park furniture equally as beautiful. The latest from Art Lebedev studio aims to provide just that to the city center. The range of demure benches, trash cans and bike racks offers improved aesthetics and functionality over existing dilapidated park features without compromising the beauty of the historic district.

At the heart of the collection is a bench with unusual cast-iron supports. It’s laconic and straightforward with a black and white color scheme – all except for a detailed embellishment of the coat of arms of Prague. Additionally, recesses on the sides mimic that of the arches of the towers of the famed Charles Bridge resulting in an interesting familiar touch for tourists and locals alike.

The garbage bins, which are more often than not the biggest eyesores of any park, are designed to look more like art objects than rubbish container. They feature a matte metal frame and complex shape in the form of a pedestal with triangular cutouts. The higher-than-normal trash can also allows users to throw away garbage even on the run.

The minimalist yet expressive bike rack delicately blends into the urban environment fitting in with olden street lamps and cast-iron manholes. Of course, the coat of arms embellishment in the corner ties together this cohesive set of objects.

Designer: Art Lebedev Studio

By PriMo, we me primitive modern! Do a quick internet search for “primitive washing machines” and you’ll be mesmerized by the work people had to do with their hands! Even more amazing is how far washing machine tech has come in a relatively short amount of time. Inspired by these old clothing cleaners, the Vitez washer fuses the simplistic beauty of these primitive designs with modern innovation.

The result is a minimalistic top-loader that uses 30% less water and a lot less floor space than your average machine without sacrificing capacity. Unlike other waterfall-style methods, it employs Jetwash tech that blasts water molecules and soap upward through clothing fibers so they’re not only cleaner but require less water to rinse. An Aqua Groove Pulsator feature keeps clothes moving and water flowing at a consistent rate ideal for cleaning.

Additional convenience features include an ergonomic and clean-looking handleless lid, easy-to-read curved-glass display interface, as well as lid-integrated LED lighting that indicates the machine’s cycle progression.

Designer: Aditya Patil

You work for 7-8 hours in a day. If you stood and worked for just half that time, health experts say you can burn close to 500 calories. Standing desks are the new office trend to keep us fit and healthy, as opposed to those comfortable chairs that not only make you inactive, they turn you into sluggish creatures, causing you to work slower. So far, the only caveat with standing desks is the fact that they aren’t exactly champions of ergonomic design.

Designed to be attached to any surface you call your worktable using a patented suction adhesive, the Standable (a portmanteau of the words standing and table) converts your sitting desk into a completely customizable workspace that you can sit at or even stand at! Its non-invasive nature means it can be easily attached to or removed from any workspace.

The Standable comes with two easy-sliding shelves that allow you to position the display and keyboard at levels custom tailored to your ergonomic needs. While most standing desks only come with one single surface for your laptop, resulting in the screen either being too low, or the keyboard being too high, Standable comes with two independently movable shelves, allowing you to place your screen at a height that is easy on your neck, and the keyboard at a position that forms a 90° angle at your elbows, as recommended by most doctors and physiotherapists. Plus, when you’re in the mood to rest those legs, just slide the tables back down and the Standable becomes a neat sitting table too!

Designer: Daniel Fintzi

Click here to Buy Now: $149.00 $349.00

Click here to Buy Now: $149.00 $349.00

With the new year fast approaching, it’s that time again where desperate resolutions are made – join the gym, quit smoking, less cake, start yoga and a multitude of many more. If you are one of these people or you find yourself talking to a friend who has decided to pick one of these up, then the W&P Designed Water Bottle Roller is the perfect gift. This 2-in-1 workout essential combines an insulated double-water water bottle with a removable high- density foam sleeve that turns the bottle into a portable foam roller for massaging muscles and joints. The bottle itself is nothing fancier than your run of the mill insulated container but the addition of the foam roller adds an element of mystery to passers-by and certainly helps in the prevention of damaging the bottle too. A useful gift and definitely a practical form of innovation around an already established product.

Designer: W&P Design

The Cozy table exists at the intersection of furniture and appliance, doing double duty as a both a side table and indoor air purifier. Because certain appliances can be eyesores in your living space, it only makes sense that certain products be camouflaged or hybridized into something that already exists!

Cozy’s straightforward aesthetic makes it a subtle accent to any bedroom, living room or den, classic or contemporary. As an added bonus, the top surface doubles as an induction charger for Android and late model iPhones AND there’s a built in light. So, whether you’re a master at minimalism or just looking to clean up your clutter, it’s an easy solution to reduce the number of items you need and see!

Designer: Jinsu Doo

The single worst thing about riding a motorbike is the cold, cold winters, sitting at the traffic lights looking at everyone signing away in their warm cars. It’s near impossible to look cool when you’re shivering. Who has it tougher than those cool bike riders? Delivery men and women who drive for hours on end in the harsh winter conditions.

Byeongjun Kim has designed a simple yet effective solution to those cold winter journeys – the B-HEAT. This is a hot air fan for motorcycles that recycles exhausted engine heat. While riding, B-HEAT self-generates and saves electricity by upwind, and while waiting for a signal, it sucks and conveys heat up to the driver. With the simple twist of the outside tubing, the user can determine the speed at which they deliver the hot air up to the body.

The B-HEAT isn’t made for every bike though, designed for the Underbone – one of the styles of motorcycles that uses structural tube framing with an overlay of plastic or non- structural body panels, and are most popular in Asia, particularly in Southeast Asia, Middle East, India, Taiwan and China for both daily-life and business purposes. In Underbone, the engine is located under the main body frame, between drivers’ feet, so that there are holes for maintenance on the front faring. Using these hole, B-HEAT fit on almost every Underbone bike and no tools are needed for installation.

Designer: Byeongjun Kim

Not only does the Seatylock help secure your bike safely to any immovable object, it also ensures that even if the thief manages to break past the lock, they’re going to have absolutely the most painful time making a getaway with your bike because the Seatylock, aside from being a bike lock, is also the bike saddle!

This two-in-one design not only makes sure you always have your bike-lock handy, it also helps make theft so severely counter-intuitive, it’s less likely to happen. Made from weather-proof, as well as damage-proof materials, the Seatylock will resist pretty much all sorts of breakage with its drill-resistant construction… and will do so in any type of weather, come rain, sun, or snow. Aside from that, it means if someone ever manages to destroy your lock, they better have an extra saddle handy or it’s going to be a VERY uncomfortable case of grand theft if you know what I mean! Ouch!

Designer: Seatylock

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Designed completely with a cradle to grave mindset, the Lattice Tent serves all needs. From a shelter for humans in both recreational and safety setups, to even a greenhouse towards the end of its life, the Lattice Tent is made up of multiple thoughtfully-designed components, beginning with a proprietary “hat” that serves as an attachment platform for utilities like radio antennae, satellite dishes, and rain harvesting systems, held up by a SUP (Set-Up Pole) that provides initial support. The Lattice name comes from the lattice shaped outer skeleton that is inflated, and then lined on the inside with lightweight yet durable walls that are made from an eco-friendly membrane. The entire Lattice can be packed tightly into a cylinder that occupies as much space as a gym bag. The Lattice can be easily broken down too by scattering seeds around it and allowing the membrane to erode to turn the Lattice tent into a hub for plant growth. Grazed on and trampled on by farm animals, the once rigid structure will be ground down and eroded to a point where what remains can be easily removed and disposed of.

The Lattice Tent is a winner of the Red Dot Design Concept Award for the year 2017.

Designers: Rodney Adank, Andrew Drain, Michael Jones, Sam McCafferty & Lachlan McIntyre.

Atelier ARI questions whether there’s more a light can do than just simply illuminating. The Pluglight, a result of having asked that question, gives the lighting device another much needed function by turning it into a power socket that hangs from the ceiling.

Made out of a clear cube of Acrylic, the Pluglight has a hole running through its center, which acts as a housing for the socket as well as the lamp. The outer surface remains clear whereas the cylindrical hole on the inside has a slight texture that helps in diffusing the light on the inside as well as concealing the ugly electronics to create a product that is clean and pure.

The added bonus with the Pluglight is with the plug-point hanging above your head, you eliminate wire clutter on your desk or your floor… but that means the wire plugs right into a socket hanging off your ceiling, so the convenience of that seems debatable… but with people like Atelier ARI and Sony (with their bluetooth speaker lightbulbs) extracting every bit of functionality out of a lightbulb socket, it seems like quite a win-win situation for everyone!

Designer: Atelier ARI