Link About It: This Week’s Picks
Maurice Sendak sniffing Sharpies, flying cars, antigravity balls and more in our look at the web this week
1. Maurice Sendak
Book lovers the world over mourned the passing of Maurice Sendak, author of such childhood classics as “Where the Wild Things Are” and “In the Night Kitchen.” Remembering him, we’ve been looking back to a particularly memorable and hilarious interview with Stephen Colbert, in which the two discuss everything from e-books to Sharpie-sniffing.
2. Redesigning Dickens
In celebration of the Victorian novelist’s 200th birthday, GraphicDesign& recruited 70 eminent graphic designers to interpret the first page of “Great Expectations”. The creative juices of the talent pool yielded “Page 1: Great Expectations“, a collection of creative type jumbled with complicated infographics, QR codes and vintage illustrations.
3. Socialmatic
Based on the unstoppable Instagram app, Italian design company ADR Studios imagined Socialmatic as a physical camera to bring the virtual snapshots to life. The concept features 16GB of storage, a 4:3 touchscreen, wifi, Bluetooth and would even print photographs like a Polaroid. They don’t mention filters, so one may actually have to rely on skill and technique to make their cat and brunch images interesting.
4. Creating Dubstep
While some may not think pushing buttons on a touchpad constitutes making music, this impressive video showcases the talent required to create dubstep. Shot in one take, Riccardo Betti’s agile hand work resembles a futuristic pianist hard at work, making the chopped samples and stretched beats flow furiously together into one head-bobbingly infectious track.
5. Vidal Sassoon the Movie
Coinciding with the passing of famed stylist Vidal Sassoon, a documentary on his life debuted last week at the Tribeca Film Festival. What started as a short film from Bumble and Bumble founder Michael Gordon soon morphed into an homage to Sassoon. His famous five-point geometric cut was worn by the likes of fashion icon Mary Quant, and was imitated by millions who favored the low-maintenance “do”.
6. Wizard of Aus
Front-line street style photographer Tommy Ton shows how Aussie girls do Sydney Fashion Week—with a refreshing shock of color. Unlike the painfully chic and somber black palette of the northern hemisphere, the fashion elite down under brought their own attitude to last week’s festivities with sun-splashed highlights, wild tie-dye, saturated florals and plenty of cut-offs.
7. Sewing Photos
Faded vintage portraits of young dancers are given new life in a series by artist Jose Romussi, who embroiders the prints with colorful thread. The pleasant contrast of vibrant sewn threads and black and white textures lends a playful quality to the girls’ retro-fitted tutus.
8. Fashion Like
If you’re wondering what the cool kids are wearing, you’ll have to hit the streets, but Brazilian fashion retailer C&A has figured out a way to share what styles people are liking on Facebook, at least. Their new Fashion Like initiative has installed digital screens on hangers that display in real time the number of “likes” an item gets in their Facebook photo gallery. An interesting experiment in the convergence of virtual and brick-and-mortar worlds, but whether “likes” align with sales remains to be seen.
9. ZeroN
MIT Media Lab has recently unveiled ZeroN, its marvelous new antigravity ball. Controlled by powerful magnetic fields, ZeroN allows humans or computers to control the path of a floating metal ball eerily similar to Luke Skywalker’s training probe. The possibilities are endless.
10. PAL-V One
Another milestone has been reached on the lengthy journey to that most anticipated of futuristic technologies, the flying car. The PAL-V One is a two-seat hybrid car that, with the push of a button, transforms into an elegant gyroplane. Requiring both a driver’s license and a Sports Pilot license, the PAL-V One has a range of up to 315 miles in the air.
11. re:route
Launched this week, and so far strictly for Londoners, re:route is a new app that aims to incentivize urbanites to use cleaner methods of transportation. Every time you walk or bike somewhere the app takes note and awards you points. Those points can then be redeemed at select retailers. Get out there, stay healthy, save the world and get some free swag in the process.
12. Candle Cake
Here’s another invention that lets us happily acknowledge the endless creative potential of food—this chocolate molten cake takes it to a whole new level. Place a chocolate candle in your cake, light it up and soon enough you have a piping hot and delectable desert.
