Innovating is everywhere, and several people from German have collaborated to make the first manned flight with an e-powered multicopter recently. The flight is easy to operate, while not featuring a good performance as that of common aircrafts we seen in the sky. Even so, it still offers a future of flight, piloting an aircraft as easily as driving a car.
Designer: Thomas Senkel, Stephan Wolf & Alexander Zosel
With the Apple Company is promoting their products almost every year, the Twelve South is designing and launching new accessories for iPad, iPhone, iMac from time to time too. PlugBug is rightly a product from Twelve South, created to let two gadgets reenergized at the same time with merely one charger. It is essentially a splitter for the iPad/iPhone charger, and allows two devices get charged once attached to your MagSafe.
Designer: Twelve South
Selling Price:
169
Light appearing on your cellphone screen or laptop screen annoys you from time to time? Get rid of it then, with Nippon Electric Glass Co Ltd’s “Invisible Glass”. Exhibited it at FPD International 2011, the new glass can reduce the reflection of light by forming an anti-reflection film on both the front and back sides of the glass substrate. As a result, only about 0.1% of the light is reflected on it, which means you can see almost no light on the glass substrate. Moreover, the glass is even invisible if you don’t see carefully. Wow, watch out on your way if these glass is applied everywhere one day.
Designer: Nippon Electric Glass
The main reason why I don’t play Ping Pong is that I can barely touch the ball with my bat. But I’ve decided to have another try with the Virtual Ping Pong, as it features no Ping Pang table or ball at all, but instead requires the users to swing the bat in air according to the sound played by a recorder. In other words, the Virtual Ping Pong is kind of a game that you need to use your imagination to play. So are you ready? Let’s start now.
Selling Price:
How to ensure the safety of your data stored within a hard disk drive? Our suggestion is to use the EZSAVE Lockdown USB 3.0 2.5″ HDD Enclosure. Once connected to your computers, the HDD enclosure will ask you to key in a four to eight digit pin with its OLED touchscreen, and the digit pin is expected to keep your data safe without the worry that somebody may decode it. The device features AES 256bit drive encryption, which is also used by the central government of the United States, so it is really reliable to store your data within it.
Selling Price:
Nest is a new thermostat put forward by Tony Fadell, who used to work in Apple Inc. and brought us with the iPod. Designed to be a smart thermostat that can learn about your schedule of changing the temperature and thus makes temperature adjustments based on that, the Nest comes with a stylish metal body, a touchscreen as well as a rolling wheel controller. It features a energy-saving modes like Auto-Away™ and Energy History too, so as to help the consumers reduce down their electricity consumption.
Designer: Tony Fadell
Selling Price: 9.99
We’re used to walking in cities every day, but have you ever realized that each step you make can produce electricity? The Pavegen Tiles are especially designed for streets, schools, squares that are full of people. The technology can convert the kinetic energy of your steps into electricity and then use it in a variety of applications, such as to power street lamps up, to keep advertisement lamp boxes on, etc. Currently the Pavegen Tiles have been built in some schools, and we hope it would soon appear in many other places of our cities.
Designer: Pavegen Systems
164
Made of energy-efficient LED light and translucent fibers, the Hobo Lantern is a stylish bag that also doubles as a portable luminary. It was inspired by the urban nightlife of Zona Tortona during Design Week, and via the design Todd MacAllen aims to offer people some fashionable and functional accessories. Powered by 8 AA batteries, the Hobo can be safely used even when the LED light is turned on, and you may find it fabulous to go across the streets with a glowing bag.
Selling Price: -5
Led Zeppelin is a step ladder especially designed for the corner. It was named after rock band Led Zeppelin in reference to their 1971 track “Stairway to Heaven”, and we really wish it would lead us to the heaven too. But back to our real life, the ladder can rest flat against the wall and fit into the corner at a 45 degrees or 25 degrees, due to its unique shape of the top and the bottom rungs.
Designer: Arthur Analts
Dustpan, trashcan and broom are three necessary things for household cleaning. For quite a long time, they’re designed and used separately, until Brendan Ravenhill’s dustbin that integrated them together. In this design, the dustpan also serves as the lid of a trashcan, subtly attaches onto the top of the trashcan and moves for you to use. The beech wood brush can hang on side of the bin with embedded rare earth magnets, thus making it easy and clean for storage.
Designer: Brendan Ravenhill
