Made from 12 $4.99 Lampan Lamps

First of all, I apologize for not blogging in a very, very long time! However, I bring you very cool stuff this time. While scouring the internet for methods of cheaply decorating my apartment (without it looking like all the IKEA catalogue clones in NYC) I came across an interesting idea. IKEA “hacks” basically take IKEA’s stuff and modify it to make better stuff. For example, this Lampan lamp made from 12 of the little guys, making a glorious dodecahedron (but 3D) of light! There are many other hacks just like this, which require a simple trip to your local IKEA and some time. More details after the fold!

You can find out how to make the Lampan lamp here with detailed instructions!

Other lists of awesome IKEA hacks can be found here, here and here.

Here are some notable hacks!

A romantic night alone?

Charging station for your electronics! (<$20!)

Outrageously cheap and ingenious shoe rack.

Created in 1973 by Anthony McCall, “Line Describing a Cone” is one of my recently discovered favorite works of art.  At its most basic form, it is a 16mm film that shows a dot of light which slowly travels the route of a full circle, leaving a trail along the thirty minute duration.  This may seem mundane, but “Line Describing a Cone” is considered a “solid light film.”  What brings the piece to life is the presence of smoke in the room, illuminating the normally invisible path of light forming a cone with the base on the wall and the point at the projector.  Further, this is a fully interactive piece, presented without seating, allowing the audience to play with the light, blocking it, walking through it, etc.  Originally designed to work with a room filled naturally by dust and casual cigarette smoke from patrons, a fog machine produces the same effect in more recent incarnations.  More pictures after the fold.

Audience interaction

Sans audience

Against the wall

Apologies to all for not having updated in a month.  I suck.  Hopefully the contents of this post will be worthwhile enough for you to keep reading my blog.  For those of you who don’t know, Banksy (famous UK graffiti artist) recently opened his first installation in NYC.  It’s located at 89 7th Avenue between West 4th and Bleeker Street in the West Village for anyone who plans on visiting (which you should).  It’s called The Village Petstore and Charcoal Grill and consists of odd animatronic exhibits such as chicken nuggets dipping themselves in sauce while the mother hen looks on.  My favorite is what appears to be a leopard, but is actually just a cleverly draped fur coat.  Watch the video and check out the pictures after the fold.

Best video out there right now

Big Cats

Chicken Nuggets with Sauce

Fishsticks in their natural environment

Alexander Wang in his Atelier

Ever want to see really cool people in their elements?  Well now you can at The Selby.  My sister sent me this site a few days ago and I haven’t stopped looking at it. It’s a collection of photographs of creative personalities shot by Todd Selby.  He’s amazing with the camera and manages to capture these designers and artists in their homes and studios in a very evocative way, as if you’re there sharing the experience.  He’s even shot the “party photo king” aka The Cobrasnake.  It’s just an amazing site, check it out.  More of my favorites after the fold.

Christina, Swaim and Lowe Hutson (designers of Obedient Sons)

The Selby Dinner Party Watercolor portraits (as photographed by The Cobrasnake)

Georgie Greville

Go to The Selby, now.

My roommate turned me on to this video after I told him how much I loved 8 1/2, and I have to say, this is one ingenious piece of mashup art.  It’s a trailer that features the music from 8 Mile, starring Eminem and footage from Federico Fellini’s 8 1/2.  It really captures the similarities between the two films, however culturally different and anachronistic they may be relative to each other.  I’d have to say it’s really only worth watching if you’ve seen 8 1/2, but I’m sure that the mind-blowing juxtaposition can be appreciated by everyone.  See for yourself.

Flexible Love by Chishen Chiu

Flexible Love is a piece of experiment furniture designed by Chishen Chiu, a talented young designer based out of Taiwan.  Essentially, it is a “Flexible Loveseat,” made entirely out of recyclable paper and wood products, using pre-existing methods of production to be as environmentally friendly as possible.  It is an amazing, accordion-like piece of furniture that is mind-blowing when you first see it.  It comes in 4 different flavors, a 16 seater, a 12 seater, an 8 seater and a miniature version to impress your friends without breaking the bank.  Incredible video demonstrating the fluid and organic nature of the piece and where you can buy it after the fold.

I couldn’t find a US distributor, but you can order from their Australian website here.  Prices range from AUD 30 for the miniature version to AUD 899 for the 16 seater.

See, wasn’t that easy? Now go do it for all the other posts!

Rasterbator + Art = Awesome

It’s not what it sounds like.  The Rasterbator is a program that creates huge rasterized images from any picture.  It expands the picture and breaks it down into 8.5″ x 11″ pages that are printable from your own printer.  A couple years ago, I took Banksy’s “Chalk Farm Maid” and turned it into a giant poster for my room (pictured above).  The Rasterbator is a really cool way to make giant art that would normally break the bank at Kinko’s or a poster store for pennies on the dollar.  You can also get creative with the images, put them on your ceiling, wallpaper your room, have the images interact with things in your room, etc.  In summation, the Rasterbator is the perfect solution to make your room awesome if you a.) can’t afford posters and/or b.) are sick of the stock, overused posters plastered in seemingly every college dorm.  More pictures of creative Rasterbator uses and a disclaimer after the fold.

A clavier on a wardrobe.

Tastefully done and individually framed.

Stair porn and cool cropping.

DISCLAIMER: It is very easy to make the final product look horrible.  You should do measurements and lay out the placement before putting up the first piece of paper, and it will probably take you awhile, depending on how big your poster is (mine took a few hours).

Who knew stairs could be so pornographic?

I came across this site and thought the idea was awesome and well executed.  It is a website dedicated to stairs, and only stairs.  Stairporn.org is a TypePad powered blog that exhibits the design side of stairs (not your average, boring, handrailed steps).  It’s quite therapeutic to browse through the posts and aside from its namesake, there is nothing about this website that’s not safe for work.  More of my favorite stairs after the fold.

Simple and beautiful

Yes, those staircases are hanging.

Don’t forget to check the website out here.

Play the YouTube video, and then read this post.  In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past couple years and haven’t heard about this musical artist, allow me to introduce you two.  His name is Gregg Gillis, but he is better known by his stage name, Girl Talk.  His specialty is mashing up songs to create new music, and glorious music it is.  I can’t even begin to express the genius behind his stuff, so please, listen to it.  Check out his website here and be sure to listen to his two most recent (and best, in my opinion) albums Feed the Animals and Night Ripper.  The YouTube video is the first track from Feed the Animals – Play Your Part pt. 1.  Oh, and his concerts are pretty much the bees’ knees.  More of his songs and a video of him at work after the fold.

Night Ripper – Bounce That

Awesome fan video using rotoscoping (a la A Scanner Darkly)

Ridiculous video of him at work.  So much talent.