FORMcard is a handy, pocket-sized bio-plastic card that users can apply to make, fix and modify the world around them.

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the japanese studio's rendition is characterized by two separate rings that form the seat surface and supporting frame; the arrangement of their parts reducing the overall weight of the design itself, and thus also making it stackable, unlike its historical counterpart.

The post drill design reimagines the traditional windsor chair with an offset version appeared first on designboom | architecture & design magazine.

In Zanzibar, tourism is a double-edged sword. It is a vital source of income for the island, but with it comes a lot of waste, especially in glass. So much glass, that it begins to overtake the natural surroundings.

As a result, six young Dutch designers decided to turn the waste into a contribution that was more meaningful, creating Bottle Up. They teamed up with local craftsman to transform glass waste into functional and beautiful products. The products are subsequently sold to tourists, coming full circle. As a result, the proceeds from the objects are invested into creating better solutions for processing all the excess waste.

Photos by Jeroen van der Wielen.

According to the Waste-Free Kitchen Handbook, everything can be saved from the garbage—even sour milk.

If food waste was a country, it would be the third largest emitter of carbon pollution in the world (and a horrible place to live). Vast amounts of energy go into growing and delivering and refrigerating food—and then, in places like the U.S., around 40% of it ends up in the trash.

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It's not your imagination: there are creepy crawling robots under your feet.

Robots are useful for "dirty, dangerous and dull" jobs, any roboticist will tell you. And that's shown once again by the Q-Bot: a robot designed for the tiniest spaces of your home—the crawl spaces where really you don't want to crawl.

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The back of the fridge will no longer be where food goes to spoil.

Before your spinach gets slimy or your strawberries start to sprout tiny forests of mold, a new app will remind you they're hidden in the back of your fridge. Then it suggests a few recipes to use them up.

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Read the rest of Tokyo’s first multistory building made of 100% wood overcomes rigid fire regulations

In some parts of the world, ‘Texas’ has become code for ‘crazy’ but that doesn’t have anything to do with the downright insane decision one utility company has made in the Lone Star State. In Dallas, thousands of customers of TXU Energy now pay absolutely nothing for electricity they use between the hours of 9pm and 6am. This move, coupled with slightly higher daytime rates, was inspired by the surplus of energy created by wind turbines in the state. The Texas winds blow most strongly at night, producing insanely cheap electricity due to the abundance and federal tax credits. It’s so cheap, in fact, that the utility opted to give it away for free.

Read the rest of Texas wind farms are generating so much energy that one utility is giving away free electricity

Details: Pleated Inflation is the name of a permanent informal amphitheater in Argeles, France designed by architect Marc Fornes of THEVERYMANY. The lightweight, selfsupporting structure is composed of 990 3mm aluminum shingles, each overlapping its neighbor to form tangential continuity and rigidity.

Says the architect, “A playful dialogue between lightness and boldness characterizes Pleated Inflation… Bringing together structural performance and spatial experience, the permanent installation immerses students of Lycee Christian Bourquin in ornate shadows cast from porous structural pleats.”

The permanent installation was commissioned by Region Languedoc Roussillon, as part of the French 1% Artistique program.

Pleated Inflation adds to Marc Fornes / THEVERYMANY’s ‘structural shingle’ project family, the studio’s unique body of research into lightweight, selfsupporting systems that unify skin, structure, ornamentation and spatial experience.

“The design was developed through custom computational protocols of structural formfinding, descriptive geometry, and stress flowdriven porosity. A 2D network of lines as a footprint inflates and expands in the air, resulting in a voluminous space created with minimal lightweight material.”

“Once inflated, the design is tessellated through a process of agentbased porosity, articulating a continuous ‘pleated’ surface of 990 intricate aluminum shingles, each pleat lends structural depth, thinning the required profile of each panel. The skin meets the ground on 26 base plates. Following digital fabrication, the parts were installed over the course of ten days by a team of four.”

Project data: Location: Lycee Christian Bourquin, ArgelesSurMer, France | Media: 3mm aluminum, thermolaquage | Dimensions: 21′ H x 46′ W x 33′ D | Commissioned by: Region Languedoc Roussillon.