Time for a new section: Manufacturing Porn

The fact of the matter is, automated manufacturing is off the hook. I have always had a thing for the making of things, but a combination of advance in CNC technology and YouTube have taken this interest to the maximum. Check out a few of these videos. They are incredible.


How on earth this thing works is beyond me. Lathes- check, mills- check, what on earth this thing is- no idea. By the way the music Is God awful.


I love this thing. Just watch. Oh, and listen, I love the noises it makes.


This one goes out to anyone who has ever worked in foam. This is absolutely incredible. It is limited on the amount of forms it can do, but hey, it still blew my mind.

There are many more of these to come, so keep checking

Cutouts are pretty cool right?

Yuken Teruya cuts trees out of everyday paper objects, and they turn out pretty amazing.

Shameless Self Promotion: I'm now making narrow bars...if you're into that sort of thing

I now have a form set up to churn out some pretty narrow bars in addition to the wide ones.

This view shows the shape of the bars a little better. The Big bars are 24 inches wide with 16 degrees of sweep and 5 inch straight section in the middle. The Small bars are 16 wide, with 12 degrees of sweep and a 3 inch section in the middle

This made me laugh to myself: Hit It is pretty good

"Hit It" is a series of furniture by Johannes Hemann, Leslie Hildebrandt & Kai Linke that is supposed to make getting in a saloon style fight safe and fun. Now you don't have to think twice about beating your two-bit, no good, rotten enemy over the head with a chair

At first I thought these were hanging from the ceiling out in the middle of the room-

well they aren't, they're on the wall, but they are still pretty cool nonetheless.This wall mounted, corrugated storage system from Ampersand is pretty cool. Just mount them on the wall in different patterns...they automatically look pretty interesting. They could also ship flat which is pretty cool.Editors note: I just went to their website and realized that the guys behind this are currently seniors in ID at DAAP...ha

Kids love blocks, why do we stop loving blocks?

Jan Vormann, a dude from Berlin had a pretty good idea. Why not repair brick walls with colored bricks? Entitled Dispatchwork, this project rules, and looks great. I am not sure if he does it secretly or not, but if that's the case, it's even better.
Thanks Visualingual

Dieter Rams= yeah, smart dude

Dieter Rams is a German designer responsible for many of Braun's products in the second half of the twentieth century. Not only that, but Jonathon Ives, the head designer at Apple, says Rams is his major influence. When you look at Rams work you can definitely see that it inspired the esthetic of many of Apple's recent products. Click the picture to watch a video interview sort of thing with Rams.

Andrew Bird can get down

My little sister has always been huge on listening Andrew Bird, but I have to say he was a hard sell to me...that is until I heard this Anonanimal. I can't embed the video because it's Quicktime, but it is definitely worth a watch. Click the pic to check it out.

Ryan Mcginness exhibit at the Cincinnati Art Museum: don't miss it

No two ways Ryan Mcginness is a badass. His work definitely bridges the gap between fine art and design, and it is absolutely incredible. I was lucky enough to just stumble across his exhibit at the Cincinnati Art Museum the other week. It was the third time I had seen some of his work in person, and I love it every time. Hurry up and get there because the exhibit closes on Feb. 15

British stuff: Evening Tweed= awesome

While I was in New York I met this lot of British designers/illustrators that were all awesome. Super nice bunch that were all super talented. Sarah and Owen were two of them, and they are part of a little collective called Evening Tweed:
Above is a banana that Sarah wrote on. It is pretty damn cool.
This is an illustration for a t-shirt Owen designed. I like the wild iso grid.

Check out more of their work at Evening Tweed

British stuff: Stamps commemorate Iconic British Designs.

While the idea of having stamps commemorate iconic pieces of design is nothing new, the ones for iconic British designs are just pure class.
Sidenote: After looking at these, I find it a bummer that they are redesigning the buses. Those originals are so great...why mess with perfection? It is odd being a product designer when faced with a challenge like this. The fact is, with the cost of labor, new manufacturing technologies, and new trends, the newer buses will lack the character the old ones have. They will be all ID'ed up and be corny for sure. I don't condone this type of design. If it ain't broke, and you can't make it better, leave it alone.

British stuff: British coins actually work together

The British are up to some pretty cool stuff lately. The new coins they will be releasing are awesome. I love the idea of all the coins interacting with each other to make a cohesive composition...pretty awesome.
The design was the winner of a nation-wide competition which received more than 4,000 entries. The winner was 26 year old Matthew Dent. Congrats.

Festo Air Jelly: I want one

Festo is a company specializing in cutting edge pneumatics. They've developed some pretty cool pneumatic muscles used in manufacturing, but my favorite things are the things they do more or less for fun. Here is the Air Jelly and it is pretty sweet. Check our more at Festo's Bionic Learning Network

Time for Change

Tomorrow, January 20th, 2009, will be a day to remember. Barack Obama will be sworn in as our 44th president at roughly noon. Should be amazing.

The Bouroullec Brothers do it again...they are smart

Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec are a team of brothers out of France who design absolutely amazing products. Pictured above is a room divider they designed for Kvadrat. Not only does it look amazing, but it can be free standing, and is made up of one part that is multiplied many times to get such an effect. (That is one of my favorite approaches to anything.)

Thanks Dezeen
See more at the Bouroullec Bros' site

My sister Leah can paint pretty well

This is one my sister's paintings she has been working on for a while. She is an amazing painter and super cool for letting me stay with her in New York for 3 months. By the way, this painting is huge!
It's nice being part of a family of makers. Pretty fun...
Check out her little blog to see a few more at Leah E Dixon

I can't find much about this designer, but this table idea is fun

Marc Ligos designed this table that you have to be sitting at for it to stand up...I dig.

Thanks Pan-Dan

It baffles me that this is considered normal procedure

Shameless Self Promotion: Internship with Paul Loebach

This fall I was fortunate enough to intern for a super talented furniture designer, Paul Loebach. Paul is a talented and knowledgeable guy, as well as being just a great dude.

Be sure to check out his site at Paul Loebach

Also keep an eye out in magazines such as Wallpaper and Surface, cause they feature his work from time to time, and it is the hotness.

Shameless Self Promotion: Wooden Bike Parts

I met this designer, Karl Zahn, while I was out in New York, and he happened to make wooden handlebars for his bicycle. Well it inspired me, so when I got back to Cincinnati I decided to make some wooden bike parts. So far I have made most of a fender and a pair of bars, but I have now got the jigs and tools to turn them both out relatively fast...I am psyched.

Check my progress on my Flickr page.
Check Karl's work on his site.