Everyone seems to own a pair of faded, worn-out, past-their-prime jeans—or at least a pair that came from the store looking that way. But maybe you’re more into sleek, modern jeans. Or the ′70s denim-from-head-to-toe look.

Whatever your preference, May 20 marked a big day in the history of jeans—the 139th anniversary of Levi Strauss’ patent for copper-riveted jeans.

Levi Strauss moved to California in 1853 to capitalize on the market for goods started by the Gold Rush. Strauss started an import business called Levi Strauss & Co. through which he sold dry goods, among other things, to small stores all over California. One of the more popular items he sold was canvas pants to miners, who often complained of the short lifespan of regular pants.

In 1872, Jacob Davis, a tailor based in Reno, Nevada, who was one of Strauss’ distributors, proposed an improvement to the canvas pants. He found that placing copper metal rivets at stress points on the pants made them even stronger. However, he lacked the funds to file the patent on his own, so he teamed up with Strauss, and the next year, on May 20, 1873, the patent for “Improvement in Fastening Pocket-Openings” was issued.

The modern blue jean has seen several upgrades since 1873. Strauss eventually switched from rough canvas to the softer serge de Nîmes, a cotton twill originally from the French city of Nîmes. De Nîmes is the source of our modern word, “denim.”

In 1934, Levi Strauss & Co. introduced “Lady Levi’s® jeans” specifically designed for women. This signaled the beginning of the jeans’ transition from workingman’s uniform to universal wardrobe staple.

Today, most changes to jeans focus on aesthetics over function. Jeans come in dozens of styles, washes and colors. But even a pair of acid-washed skinny jeans represents an attention to form and a dedication to simplicity.

More than 100 years ago, Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis recognized and addressed a need for a high-quality product built with the customer in mind—a tenet simplehuman emulates every day.

So the next time you put on that old pair of jeans, take a moment to appreciate the innovation of its copper rivets. They’re part of the reason your jeans have lasted so long.

Photo Credit: yeryabs and James & Mary Bilancini.

But before I jump into giving you my stellar tips and ideas, I’d like for you to imagine receiving an unwrapped gift. Oh, the disappointment! There is no element of surprise, no suspense and it doesn’t feel as special. The way we present a gift is a reflection of our own care and creativity. Case in point, Japanese gift wrapper Akiko Keene believes, “the way we wrap things and the material we use tells the person how we feel [about them].”

At simplehuman, we like to come up with efficient ways to do and make things. We look for innovative solutions to solve any given problem, while adding a bit of flare and design. In that spirit, we found some wrapping ideas that are sure to leave lasting impressions.

To begin, I borrowed this tutorial from our friends over at Real Simple to ensure that you – our simplehuman readers – have the basics down.

If you’re going a little more advance, check out these tips below from Martha Stewart online for a stand out gift!

• Use some of the vintage and repurposed paper and material from the list above and jazz up your present by layering different colors and textures over one another. You can also add bells, beads, or doilies to give it a finished look.
• Look no further than your backyard for your gift-wrap. Birch bark and fresh leaves are surprisingly flexible so all you need to do is hold it in place by adding some twine, yarn, or shoelaces.
• Why spend money on patterned gift-wrap when you can create your own! Take an old shopping bag, cut it along one fold and then cut out the bottom of the bag. Use stamps or a wine cork, dip into ink (or dark fruit juice), and make your own designs.
• There is nothing more adorable – or less expensive – than kid’s artwork. So put little Johnny to work as your elf for the day and have him doodle on any wrap-able surface (see material list above), then complete with nice ribbon or yarn for a very loveable gift!
• Dress up plain wrapping paper by weaving ribbons in and out of one another for a festive creation that really goes outside the box. Start with a single ribbon stretched across the top of the package, and tie up the loose ends on the bottom with tape.

You don’t have to get as passionate about gift wrapping as say, Rowan Atkinson in Love Actually, but do take our ideas, put them to use however you see fit, show some love to the people in your life and enjoy the magic of gift giving.

Spread the holiday cheer and post your gift wrapping creations on the simplehuman Facebook. Happy holidays everyone!

Images used from Martha Stewart Online

The excitement is already brewing and if you can’t feel it, I’m sure you can see it! Emails, advertisements, commercials, banners all promoting the outrageously good deals, slashed prices, and enticing specials…yes, folks, Black Friday and Cyber Monday are upon us! Here at simplehuman HQ, we are preparing for the upcoming shopping holidays with our own very special deal. And being a copywriter, I am a bit of a word maven so naturally I got to wondering: why is Black Friday called Black Friday?

Black Friday isn’t negative, like the word “black” connotes, in fact it is a pretty positive with all the money saving deals, if you ask me. So why is it called “Black” Friday and not Pink Friday or Blue Friday? I decided to do a little investigating and find out for myself.

Kimberly Amadeo, author of “Beyond the Great Recession: What Happened and How to Prosper,” asserts the name Black Friday officially marks the start of the Christmas shopping season. It was first recorded in 1966 in an advertisement posted by Earl Apfelbaum, a dealer in rare stamps. Apfelbaum said the Philadelphia Police Department repurposed the name Black Friday, which was originally coined to describe the financial panic in the stock market in 1869, to describe the accidents and violence from the mobs of people at stores the day after Thanksgiving. With the congestion of pedestrian and automobile traffic coupled with the bleakness of the day, the name “Black Friday” was instituted.

Another theory states that Black Friday derived the name “Black” from the idea that during the holiday shopping season retailers shifted to profitability or being “in the black” from being “in the red.” According to HowStuffWorks.com, when accounting records were kept by hand, red ink suggested financial loss while black ink suggested profit. Hence the terms of being “in the red” or “in the black.”

But it wasn’t until 2002 that Black Friday actually became the most profitable shopping day of the year, beating out the Saturday before Christmas. And in 2010, consumers even set a Black Friday record by spending $10.69 billion, which doesn’t sound so “black” to me, in fact it sounds pretty happy for our economy!

This season, simplehuman is celebrating Black (or Happy) Friday with our blackcyber frimonday event! When you make a purchase from simplehuman.com on Black Friday, November 25th, through Cyber Monday, November 28th, we are giving away a gift with any purchase – some gifts are valued up to $200! You never know what you might win as your bonus gift – maybe you’ll get our laundry hamper you’ve always wanted, or some of our new liquid hand soap (the lavender is my favorite). It is the season of giving thanks, so this is our way of showing our appreciation and saying thank you.

Along with our bonus gift, we also want to give some tips so that you don’t fall prey to the temptations of the door buster deals and other incentives that stores and brands offer such as my Aunt Milly did when she bought a designer dog bed for the dog she didn’t have just because it was 80% off. To help spare you from a similar shopping mistake as my Aunt Milly’s, I enlisted some co-workers to share their best shopping advice.

1. “Set a budget, just because things are discounted 75% doesn’t mean you should spend your whole paycheck. Trust me.” – Hanna Min, Accounting

2. “Plan ahead. Make a list like you would if you were going to the market so that you don’t buy any unnecessary items.” – Mia Fields, Public Relations

3. “I always make sure what I buy is returnable because sometimes I get caught up in the frenzy, urgency and excitement of the limited sales, and once I get home I realize I don’t need whatever I bought.” – Lisa Chen, e-Commerce/Marketing

4. “Read online reviews. This often helps to determine whether or not the juice is worth the squeeze.” – Frank Yang, Founder

Happy Shopping!

In my mind, we exercise to be functionally fit, and looking good is a secondary benefit. This is similar to how we engineer our tools here at simplehuman: efficiency and function-ability come before aesthetics, yet aesthetics are definitely part of it.

Being fit is one thing. But being functionally fit is another. For example, you might be toned, tight, and look great in a swimsuit, but if you can’t lift your child out of the car seat, or carry your 60-pound suitcase down the stairs, you might not be paying attention to your functional fitness. Functional fitness and functional exercise are buzzwords you might have heard around the gym lately. They focus on building a body capable of doing real-life activities in real-life positions, not just lifting a certain amount of weight in the idealized posture created by a gym machine.

Improving your functional fitness allows you to perform everyday tasks more easily, such as bending, lifting, walking, and squatting. Being functionally fit also helps to slow down the aging process, increase your strength and energy, and improve your overall quality of life.

The science supporting this strategy of functional fitness is irrefutable. After all, it’s what our ancestors did for two million years; they had to be lean, healthy, fit and strong in order to survive the pressures of their environment.

These days, spending three hours at the gym is unnecessary, because fitness regimens are beginning to revert back to our basic need: to be functional. And thankfully, the best methods maximize fitness with the least amount of time (and suffering, for some) because they are based on real-world natural movements that result in functional fitness. So forget about complicated, intricate workout regimes. And you can even forget about the gym and all that complex equipment if you want to, because achieving functional fitness does not have to be that complicated.

To that end, I’m beginning to incorporate training programs that involve simple, functional movements that utilize only my body and bodyweight, such as yoga, TRX, and Tabata. According to Mark Sisson, author of the #1 bestselling health book on Amazon.com The Primal Blueprint, these full-body workouts “use as many muscles in combination as possible, often with occasional short anaerobic bursts and then regular, longer – and easier – aerobic efforts to effectively work every muscle, energy, and performance system in the body.”

For those of you not familiar with TRX or Tabata, here’s a quick primer. TRX is an innovative method of leveraged bodyweight exercise that builds power, strength, balance, flexibility and mobility at the intensity you choose. While it started with the U.S. Navy SEALS, it’s great for all fitness levels and goals. The exercises are performed on suspension bands that can be used in your home, outside, or even in your hotel room.

Unlike TRX, Tabata is a kind of interval training that does not require any equipment. Essentially, it is twenty seconds of work followed by ten seconds of rest, repeated eight times, of any movement or combinations of movements you could imagine, such as situps, burpees, squats, pushups – all movements that only involve your own body and bodyweight. Dr. Izumi Tabata, who developed this exercise, discovered that this technique burns substantially more fat than aerobic training. On top of this, four minutes of Tabata workout builds as much muscular endurance as 45 minutes of normal cardio training.

These simplified fitness methods support my efforts to be fit and healthy, so that I can be useful and live an active, enjoyable lifestyle and do the things I love to do.

Efficient living doesn’t just take place at home, stay tuned to find out how simplehumans stay in shape at the office! To learn more about efficient workouts visit www.mobilitywod.com.

Photos provided by UC Davis Sports Recreation.

There’s no simple equation to determine how your behavior affects the planet, but we do know that small changes can have big effects. So for those of you without mom’s constant reminders, here are a few ways to save energy and help reduce your carbon footprint.

1. Turn off the lights! It may be the easiest and most effective rule of conservation.
2. Speaking of lights, use compact fluorescent or the new LED bulbs instead of incandescent bulbs. They use less energy while producing the same amount of light — talk about efficiency!
3. Use a power strip with an on/off switch. Your home entertainment center is a behemoth of power usage, drawing tons of power even in ‘s
   tandby’ mode. Switch off the power strip when you’re done, or use a sophisticated modern version (such as this one) that provides power to peripheral devices only when it senses your TV is turned on.
4. Let the dishwasher do the dirty work. Give yourself and your dishrack a break: it’s been shown that dishwashers use 35% less water than washing by hand. Also, don’t use the automatic drying feature – just open the door when the cycle is over and let your dishes air-dry.
5. Turn off the water while brushing your teeth and washing your face.
6. Upgrade your thermostat. Programmable timers keep heaters and air conditioners running only when you need them. Your power company may provide subsidies to help you upgrade.
7. Insulate your home. This is certainly a more ambitious project, but, especially in older houses, adding insulation and sealing out cold drafts will make your home more comfortable, more energy-efficient, and save you money on heating.
8. Save the trash for the trash can, not the toilet! Every flush uses around 7 gallons of water, so whenever you can, avoid unnecessary flushing by throwing garbage in the trash.
9. Pump up your tires. Proper air pressure can save you hundreds of dollars a year on gas.
10. Recycle! If you aren’t already using one of our recyclers, consider getting one to kick off your new recycling efforts. Cereal boxes, egg cartons and newspapers are all common household items that can be recycled.
11. Take your recycling one step further with our compost pail! Composting helps you convert much of your daily household waste into nutrient rich (and free!) fertilizer for your garden.

Try these easy tips in your home.  Not only will they save you money on bills, but they will also give you the satisfaction that you are contributing to the well-being of our planet!

Credits: Featured photo by Jim Salvas

As I walked down the grocery aisle in my local Target store recently, I noticed that the lights in each freezer were turning on automatically as I approached. My engineering curiosity momentarily overtook my mint chip ice cream cravings, and I began to investigate. I discovered a small mechanism just above each freezer door — a motion sensor that activated the lights. I walked up and down the aisle to test when the lights turned on, and then timed how long it took for the lights to turn off again. The other customers must have suspected I had issues surrounding frozen foods and politely avoided that aisle.

What I found was pretty interesting. A motion sensor is used to turn the lights on when a customer appears within 10 to 15 feet of a freezer. The lights then turn off 30 to 40 seconds after the customer leaves the area. For added efficiency, the lights themselves are bright LEDs that use less energy than traditional fluorescent tubes.

While the system almost certainly originated as an effort to save energy, the LED lights actually provide better lighting for the merchandise. Everything was so bright and appealing. My mint chip ice cream looked even more irresistible than usual. This simple but innovative lighting system saves the store money, minimizes their carbon footprint and enhances the overall customer experience. Win, win, win.

That is similar to what we strive for in developing new products at simplehuman. Our criteria for “good design” is probably a little more complicated than that of most companies. We look for improvements across several issues… like ease of use, durability, space efficiency and cost … just to name a few. After all, it’s not easy to create a more efficient way to tackle an everyday task.

I started with instant oatmeal, but I didn’t find a lot of difference between one brand or another. The oatmeal itself tastes like cardboard flakes to me.  So I moved on to what my mom used to cook — Quaker Oats!  It was better, but to my surprise, it was not a night and day difference.  It takes more time to cook and still has very little flavor.

A bit discouraged, I bought Mccann’s Irish oatmeal steel cut.   Wow — It takes over 30 minutes to cook!  But the results… absolutely awesome.  The texture is a complete departure from the typical oatmeal mush. You actually need to chew. It gives you a very pleasant feel for the healthy fiber, and It only needs a little flavoring. For now, I am just adding light brown sugar and some Trader Joes caramelized pecans.

I am still not satisfied.  I will be looking for different kinds of sugars and condiments in search for the perfect taste combo. At the same time, I’ll sample steel cut oats from different brands and regions.  I will also be experimenting with more efficient preparation techniques.  For example, I’m going to try a Japanese rice cooker with a timer.  That way, it can start to cook while I am still snuggling in bed.

This quest for the perfect cereal is a lot like the way we develop products at simplehuman.  Our goal is to create tools that help people become more efficient at everyday living.  We don’t settle on the easiest solutions or design for the current trends.  We do what makes sense based on lots of research, experimentation and common sense.  Of course, our process takes time, but it leads to some very efficient and satisfying solutions.

It is difficult to imagine anything more emblematic of engineering’s most graceful accomplishments than bridges — they’re durable, practical and enduring. Some stone arc bridges from 13^th century Greece, in fact, are still in use today. Modern suspension bridges can span over a mile of water, soaring so high that large ships can pass easily beneath them.

While San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, or Japan’s Akashi Kaikyō (today’s longest), are awe-inspiring, shorter bridges can be just as spectacular, and indeed they face difficult engineering challenges of their own. In addition to permitting the passage of people, cars, and trains, they must at times adapt to allow boats through the waterways below.

The idea of a bridge that can be moved to allow or disallow traffic is at least as old as medieval castles whose drawbridge granted (or denied) passage over the moat. These moveable bridges have evolved to include various designs that lift, fold, retract, submerge, swing… the list goes on.

But one of the most ingeniously elegant and simple design to date must be England’s Gateshead Millennium Bridge — an eye-shaped structure consisting of two separate arcs, connected at each end, supporting one another with a series of cables that runs through the center. One of these arcs is the footpath, which spans the river at ground level when the bridge is tilted all the way to one side. When a boat needs to pass, electric motors tilt the bridge 40 degrees the other way, lifting the footpath off the ground and creating plenty of clearance below.

The great advantage of this dual-arc design is that while the footbridge is down, the opposite arc is almost perpendicular to the ground, with the cables providing structural support to the footbridge. And since the supporting arc exerts an upward force, the electric motor requires very little energy to tilt the entire structure upward to create clearance below. The more the bridge tilts, the more gravity begins to pull the supporting arc down and the footbridge up.

Given its shape and movement, a fitting nickname has caught on: the “Blinking-Eye Bridge.”

The visual effect is stunning: the bold and graceful curves of the arcs contrasting with the fine lines of the cables between them. At night, lights mounted beneath the footbridge reflect off the water, enhancing the dynamic between the shape of the bridge and its surroundings.

It’s an inspiringly clean and intuitively simple accomplishment, visually compelling in the way its form follows its function so naturally. The design achieves a purity of form by staying close to the basic physics that inspired it. At simplehuman, all our products involve extensive research, engineering and thought — all to achieve this kind of minimal aesthetic.

This also represents simplehuman’s design philosophy: that form will follow function naturally.

With that, we created the simplehuman sunflower starter kit. For every purchase made April 20-April 22, we are offering a sunflower kit to promote this native and beautiful flower.  While these flowers bring oxygen to your home and the environment, sunflowers are also an important resource for the  bee, a species whose population is disappearing at an alarming rate.

Before we created the sunflower kits for our customers, we decided to test them out for ourselves. Watch the video below to see how we began our journey to help create a better environment for the bees. For more information and to receive your sunflower kit please visit simplehuman online.

At simplehuman, we’re obsessed with details.  We put a lot of focus into every aspect of our products, from top to bottom: finding the best materials for the inner bucket, and the strongest screws for our hinges. This focus even goes into parts of the can you may overlook, or never even see — like the material used on the bottom of the can, a decision that’s based on just how easily your can should slide across the floor.

On our step cans, there are non-skid pads designed to help prevent the trash can from sliding when you step on the pedal. This way, the can won’t move away from you every time you want to throw something away. During the development process, our engineers considered the optimal location for the pads, as well as the optimal material. Most of the time, we use a durable thermo-plastic rubber, grippy enough to keep the can in place, while gentle enough to avoid damaging your floors.

When it came to our newest sensor can, however, we rethought the design of the non-skid pad. Since our sensor can opens with a wave of the hand, it has no pedal, and therefore is at no risk of sliding. Instead of simply removing the pads, we went a step further and designed highly resilient and abrasion-resistant nylon slider discs that allow the can to slide easily while remaining gentle on your floors.

The sensor can alone makes household chores a bit easier, but this sliding feature compliments your efficiency: just slide the can away from the wall when it’s time to sweep up. And the next time you’re in the midst of creating a culinary masterpiece, you won’t need to trot over to the trash can every few minutes — just slide it closer to the action!

It’s the small, yet simple things that make all the difference.