Category — Product Design

Naoki Terada of Terada Design has created Carved, a new clock with the numbers carved out. Although the product doesn’t appear to be stocked yet, Lemnos, who specializes in Japanese designer clocks, will be the sole distributor. If this doesn’t float your boat, Lemnos is stock full of designer clocks from the typographically-inspired to the, I-don’t-really-need-to-know-the-time-I-just-want-something-cool-on-my-wall clock.

Inspired by ancient sun dials, Kazuo Kawasaki created Hola. It even has an iPhone app.

Makoto Komatsu took his signature wrinkled porcelain and applied it to the Wrinkle wall clock.

Luminary designer Riki Watanabe and his simple yet gorgeous Riki Clock.

Kanako Kajihara takes her experience as a textile designer for Issey Miyake to create the soft and delicate Syn.

Related:

• Black Hall by Terada Design
• Kazuo Kawasaki and Riki Watanabe were featured in Japanese Designers 101

With cost-competitiveness sweeping through the manufacturing industry like an angry lady with a broom, sparing only those with the strength to scale up capacity and scale down price, what are Japan’s small companies and artisans to do? Inevitably, embrace. That is the philosophy of mass item, a new store started by Takashi Yoshida aimed at exploring the possibilities of plastic. He has enlisted 3 designers to assist him – 2 of which, if you are familiar with spoon & tamago, you should be familiar with as well – Shunsuke Umiyama (Microworks), Norihiko Terayama (Studio Note) and newcomer Kumano Wataru.

Although the pieces have a highly manufactured quality to them, every piece gets finished off with a human touch – whether it is vibration finish or a hand-assembly. I like the idea of subtle resistance. Here is an overview of what they have done for the shop.

Ladder by Microworks (he seems to be obsessed with ladders)

Layerscape by Studio Note

Tokyo Clock by Kumano Wataru

Related:

• f,l,o,w,e,r,s and folling flower by Studio Note
• ladder ruler and vine cell charger by Microworks

Kobe Design University recently held their senior exhibition. Designer Masahiro Minami took a trip over and came back with pictures of some fantastic, high-quality work. So many young, talented designers! Here are some of my favorites.
(all images by Masahiro Minami. Click to enlarge)

This is actually the underlay for a bento box; a solution to decade-old problems like leakage and movement. Love the aesthetic!

A wooden bicycle complete with wooden gears. Only a student could come up with something so outrageous.

Rad oversized rings

I’m not quite sure what this is but I love the display.

This 3D cutout must have taken several endless nights.

Of particular interest to me was this futuristic digital camera. It’s a working model that was co-developed by the University. The way it works is you drape it over your neck and take photographs by creating a frame using your hands. Neat!

The latest product from design studio Microworks is this insanely adorable ladder ruler. If price was not an issue I would definitely have a few of these propped up against the wall of my desk! They come in black and silver and you can buy them here for about $60.

Related:

• Microworks | No Humor No Design
• Microworks | Vine Cell Phone Charger
• AC Adapter Midor from KDDI

During the summer of ‘09 we featured these awesome canvasworks by husband-and-wife design duo Noto Fusai. Well they have recently added 2 new pieces to their collection of functional wall-art. A rack/holder for odds and ends like glasses and cellphones, and this letter rack, which I am totally getting my hands on as soon as they come out of production.

Object holder

Letter rack

Related:

• CanvasWorks by Noto Fusai
• Shikisai t-shirts by Noto Fusai

And without further ado, we give you the most popular post of 2009 on Spoon & Tamago – Vine cell charger. Published all the way back on February 4, 2009, we featured the latest creation by Shunsuke Umiyama of Microworks. We are huge fans of Mr. Umiyama’s work and as a result he is no stranger on this site. We also like checking out his wardrobe, which often stands out more than his designs. (photo courtesy of nosigner).

Anyway, at the time “Vine” was only a conceptual piece with no plans for commercialization. But 2 months later in April KDDI announced that they were renaming it AC Adapter Midori and releasing it as part of an accessory kit. We followed up with a post HERE. What we really loved about this design was that it proposes a very simple solution to a modern-day interior design problem. People are always trying to hide their electrical cords and there is no shortage of chotchkies to aid us in this quest. But in the end, we are just buying more junk we don’t need. The notion that all we have to do is beautify the ugly was so novel and so nonexistent, it was truly a splash of water in the face for us and hopefully for our generation.

Coming in at number 5 is Creative Director Kenjiro Sano published on August 5, 2009. Also known as Mr. Design, he is a force to be reckoned with in the ad world, but some of my favorite work of his ends up being the product desings that he has put out at a much slower pace, inluding the recent wooden-shaped post its and the not-so-recent pig mugs.

The Kokuyo Design Awards 2009 were just announced yesterday! In case you were wondering, the Kokuyo Design Awards is one of the largest and most anticipated design competitions in Japan. Hosted by stationary-giant Kokuyo since 2002, the competition has spawned popular products such as the kadokeshi eraser.

This year they received over 1,500 applications with the intent of selecting only 1 grand-prize winner that would be eventually commercialized and released to the public. The number of applications is up from 1,200 in 2008 but down from a high of 1,700 in 2007.  Using this as a gauge for popularity, they still tail the MUJI Awards, which boasts over 4,000 applications. (The Good Design Awards, which encompass a much larger scope, receive around 3000 applications) Interestingly enough, MUJI recently announced that it has canceled their awards this year. Perhaps it has something to do with the economy? I know what you are thinking. Enough rambling and get on with the results right? Right. One final thought… I wish they would provide more pictures/angles.

The grand prize went to Nao Asanuma for his Roots work table, which uses concave legs to create a sleek table that can peacefully coexist with computer cables.

Here are some of the ideas that took home the silver. Below is Kazunari Kodama`s Flower Tack. It is a simple idea that gives an utterly mundane object some much-needed attention to detail.

This is probably my favorite. The Margins notebook by Shohei Ono, a communication design student at the Kyoto University of Art and Design. The reimagining of margins of a standard notebook completely blew my mind! The expansion of white space gets the imaginative juices flowing. I can come up with any number of new uses and suddenly have the urge to take notes in class.

Black and White Graduation by Kaneko Hisahide is another great idea. By printing the numbers on a ruler in both black and white you eliminate the contrast problems encountered when working on multiple colored backgrounds.

I was also impressed by some of the honorable mentions, such as TO-GENKYO`s Eraser With a Core that fits around pencils. You may recall these designers as I profiled them a couple months ago with their Fresh Label.

Lastly is Primary Colors by Liu Zhi-Qiang and Ye Ming-Jie of the design unit DOUBLE. The pait pallette is an ingenious yet simple way to help kids learn about mixing colors. It is truly one of those designs the prompts the obvious question, why didn`t someone think of this before?

One of h concept’s recent product releases is this adorable cupmen figurine who is determined, and works ever so diligently, to hold down the paper lid of your cup-ramen. Sure, your chopsticks could probably match the task. But do your chopsticks react to heat, changing color to notify you when 3 minutes has elapsed? I didn’t think so.
Designed by Akira Mabuchi.

Related:

• Tate Otama from h concept

On Monday I went to go check out the opening reception of JAPAN BRAND: The Wish List pop-up shop at Felissimo’s headquarters in midtown Manhattan. The show runs through December 24th and is a must-see for anyone scouring the market for unique gifts. The impressive lineup is suitable for all budgets, and I mean all. Prices start in the single digits for exquisite washi-paper mailing cards and go as high as $18,000 for an amazing bicycle designed by Alexander Gelman and hand-lacquered by the Yamanaka Urushi masters of Ishikawa Prefecture.

Japan Brand: The Wish List
Felissimo Design House
10 West 56th St, New York
Only until December 24
Monday-Saturday, 11am-6pm

One of the highlights for me was seeing some pieces from the Nippon Sense collection, a masterfully designed series of furniture that was a collaborative effort between the Japanese and Italians.

Alexander Gelman’s urushi bicycle

Monacca bags hand-crafted from environmentally sustainable Yanase cedar sheets harvested in Kochi Prefecture.

An awesome selection of knives for any respectable epicurean.

Also, be sure to check their website for upcoming events through the end of this month and into December that include tempting hands-on sake tasting, a cooking demo from Nobu chef Akiko Thurnauer and much more.