Sparkwood and 21

ISO 3103: Tea — Preparation of liquor for use in sensory tests

Duncan — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:07:37 +0000

There appears to be a standardised way to make tea. Which is nice. The abstract states:

The method consists in extracting of soluble substances in dried tea leaf, containing in a porcelain or earthenware pot, by means of freshly boiling water, pouring of the liquor into a white porcelain or earthenware bowl, examination of the organoleptic properties of the infused leaf, and of the liquid with or without milk, or both.

Some of the details include:

To maintain consistent results, the following are recommendations given by the standard:
The pot should be white porcelain or glazed earthenware and have a partly serrated edge. It should have a lid that fits loosely inside the pot.
If a large pot is used, it should hold a maximum of 310 ml (±8 ml) and must weigh 200 g (±10 g).
If a small pot is used, it should hold a maximum of 150 ml (±4 ml) and must weigh 118 g (±10 g).
2 grams of tea (measured to ±2% accuracy) per 100 ml boiling water is placed into the pot.
Freshly boiling water is poured into the pot to within 4-6 mm of the brim. Allow 20 seconds for water to cool.
The water should be similar to the drinking water where the tea will be consumed
Brewing time is six minutes.
The brewed tea is then poured into a white porcelain or glazed earthenware bowl.
If a large bowl is used, it must have a capacity of 380 ml and weigh 200 g (±20 g)
If a small bowl is used, it must have a capacity of 200 ml and weigh 105 g (±20 g)
If the test involves milk, then it can be added before or after pouring the infused tea.
Milk added after the pouring of tea is best tasted when the liquid is between 65 – 80 °C.
5 ml of milk for the large bowl, or 2.5 ml for the small bowl, is used.

So now you know, next time you make a nice cup of tea, follow the instructions.

You can read the Wikipedia entry here. And the full document at iso.org

Open Source Product Design

Duncan — Sat, 21 Aug 2010 12:10:50 +0000

Here’s an interesting thing we found over at Shapeways: One of their store owners ImprobableCog has created a great new way of getting paid for his jewellery designs. Instead of earning a small profit from the sale of each piece, he wants the money up-front in exchange for access to all his CAD files so the customer can print them for cheaper. Noah writes:

I believe in the idea of enriching the public domain with intellectual property, I want to make the designs freely available for everyone to modify, mash up, resell, print by the one or by the dozen, or insert into their game, movie, or art.

How open source product design works

One or more people invest a set amount of money into the designer
Once that value is reached he designer releases the CAD files of a selection of products for free under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike license.

Benefits: but why?

For the customers / investors it gives them a chance to buy or create the products cheaper than through the designer
The designer still gets paid for his designs
It also helps designers share ideas and create and develop new works

This is something that Sparkwood and 21 has been looking into recently and so we would really like to see how this business model pans out for him.

check out improbablecog.com

Huddle Social Seating

Duncan — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 13:55:34 +0000

Seating that uses heat, light and touch to enhance your informal public life by transforming the declining fortunes of modern public libraries into Third Places where people can relax away from home (the First Place) or work (the Second).

The presentation below explains a little behind the thought processes and the design decisions made to get to the final concept

David Lynch Foundation TV

Duncan — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 11:14:39 +0000

Working together with one of the producers of DLF-TV I was called to consult on the effectiveness of WordPress as a way of promoting the Foundation’s producer weblogs.

Why your website is the most important thing you own

Duncan — Mon, 17 May 2010 13:17:02 +0000

For an individual or organisation in this day and age, having a website is a must and not an option. You need it to look and be the best is can because it represents you to the on-line world.

Take a look at this article that gives you some quick advice on how to immediately improve your website.

Read the article

Still Small Voice Music

Duncan — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 11:43:29 +0000

Gethin, from Still Small Voice, asked me to help him out with the launch of the first album off his new record label.

Together we created a ‘house style‘ for all future album launches, developed simple and clear branding and set up a content managed website for Gethin to update and promote the artists himself.

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Active mappage from the Lowlands

Duncan — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:23:31 +0000

I have this thing about maps. I love them. They’re instruction manuals to places, they’re historical documents and they tell you where to go. Literally. I do have a problem with them though: static-ness. They don’t evolve. They don’t grow.

I found a great quote once (possibly from Benjamin Franklin) that went along the lines of…

The most useful map is one that you have made yourself

…or something. Well, I’ve done just that. To help document my experiences of Noord-Holland and its environs, I’ve create–via the magic of Google–an active map of the area.

So there you have it. As and when I add to it, this map will get bigger, richer, more informative and–most importantly for me–useful. If you really are the stalkery type then you can get an up-to-date RSS feed of new places put on the map.

2010 Business Card Design

Duncan — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 12:18:41 +0000

This is what this year’s business cards look like. They come in 5 different colours on the reverse and are printed on 350gsm sustainably sourced matt-laminated stock.

Doug’s Auto Art

Duncan — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 12:39:05 +0000

Doug wanted advice on how to best market his auto art website. We sat down for an afternoon and discussed how SEO works, what he could do to improve his website to get the best search results.

We implemented various SEO practices, set up ways of tracking incoming visitors and changed the code on his website to increase his ranking.

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New look website for 2010

Duncan — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 17:18:39 +0000

Welcome to the all new Sparkwood and 21 2010 website. Its function is to show off my work with the minimum of fuss. My promise is that I will leave it here for the whole of 2010 without significantly mucking about with it. Tweaking, yes… but as a designer I need a portfolio website, and this is it.

This website has been built using WordPress and many, many cups of tea.

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