David Lidsky's Blog, page 4686

ICFF 2010: Chairs for Naughty Schoolchildren

The Brothers Dressler impishly reinvent the humble school chair.

The Brothers Dressler found 93 steel-framed school assembly chairs and did what every squirming
fourth-grader longs to do: vandalized the hell out of them.

They
slapped on new legs and backs and frames and covered the seats in felt
and leather scraps. They powder-coated the metal in exuberant red
and yellow and white and raised some of the seats off of the ground,
transforming the humble school chair into a bar stool.

The...

The Italians are Coming!

An effort at boosting Italian culture abroad will get a splashy new outpost in New York.

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Italian culture is everywhere in New York: in restaurants, design shops, and neighborhoods. But the real Italians aren't satisfied. The Triennale di Milano, a government-funded program that aims to recolonize the world with contemporary Italian culture, has announced that they're planning on building a sprawling gallery/restaurant/cafe/shop in New York, designed by Michele De Lucchi and Pierluigi Cerri...

Telos Uses Microsoft Surface to Make Managing Carbon Footprints, Networks Fun

Microsoft's Surface is still out there, and still pretty amazing even if it doesn't get much limelight--case in point: Telos corp has two neat new apps for Surface that let you manage your company's assets in real time like they do in the movies.

Both systems use Telos' Se7en app framework which leverages Surface's multi-touch, multi-user powers to create a collaborative system that lets you react to and manipulate real time, or near-real time data (think of the sorts of digital workstations...

SABMiller's Beer Can Prevents Violence at Sporting Events

Sustainability Faceoff: Coca-Cola vs. PepsiCo

It's easy to have an opinion in the Coke versus Pepsi taste wars, but things get a little murky when corporate sustainability is taken into account. In the new book The HIP Investor, R. Paul Herman attempts to sort out the sustainability claims of Coca Cola Co. and PepsiCo. So who comes out on top?

Coke's most impressive step toward sustainability is its "Commitment 2020" plan, which outlines the company's goals over the next 10 years. These include: a carbon footprint reduction of 15% (from...

Why You Should Buy Tickets Today for Fast Company's Most Creative People in Business Conference

This is one conference you won't want to miss, and you'll want to reserve your spot today. The event will take you inside the minds of the most creative people in business, the progressive thinkers you read about in Fast Company and FastCompany.com every day. Here's a sample of who will be there:

Chris Barbour, Head of Digital Marketing, Sports Style Division, AdidasSoraya Darabi, Product Lead, Drop.ioJesse Dylan, Director, Form; Founder, FreeFormRay Kurzweil, Inventor and Cofounder of...

ICFF 2010: The Most Nightmarish Lamp Ever Created

British designer Alexandra Randall is bringing vermin out of the gutter and into your home. Plus other work debuting at Future Perfect.

Most of us know them as New York City's most hated residents. Alexandra Randall calls them a light fixture.

The Rat Lamp, as the name suggests, is a cluster of rats (stuffed, thankfully) clawing fiendishly to a bulb as if it were the Pied Piper of Hamelin. It's probably the sickest and oddly, one of the prettiest, objects to debut at New York Design Week...

Director David Lynch Designs Tar-Covered Speakers

They're just as eerie as you'd expect from the man behind Eraserhead, Twin Peaks, and Mulholland Drive.

Director David Lynch is famous for his visionary, hallucinatory films--and this week, he's dipping his hand in product design. Lynch has designed a pair of speakers covered in paint, tar, and lacquer. And when they're exhibited, they'll be playing an eerie score he composed himself.

Those pictures are an exclusive sneak peak sent to FastCompany.com, of an upcoming exhibit. Lynch...

Awkward!: Objects Designed to Make You Feel Spectacularly Uncomfortable

The squirm has been elevated to an art form these days. Just look to shows like The Office, The Daily Show, and The Colbert Report, which pluck the awkwardest moments from the dark heart of human shame and bring them to light for all to enjoy.
To that end, we present Uncomfortable Conversations, a design exhibit we co-sponsored for the International Contemporary Furniture Fair this weekend. Curated by the New York firm Design Glut, it compiles more than a dozen objects explicitly crafted to...

Director David Lynch Designs Tar Covered Speakers

They're just as eerie as you'd expect from the man behind Eraserhead, Twin Peaks, and Mulholland Drive.

Director David Lynch is famous for his visionary, halucinatory films--and this week, he's dipping his hand in product design. Lynch has designed a pair of speakers covered in paint, tar and lacquer. And when they're exhibited, they'll be playing an eerie score he composed himself.

Those pictures are an exclusive sneak peak sent to FastCompany.com, of an upcoming exhibit. Lynch is...