Practical DIY Designs From ’70s Book Nomadic Furniture

Long before build-it-yourself furniture behemoths like IKEA came along, thrifty homeowners turned to DIY projects to furnish their spaces. Many of these people looked to the pages of Nomadic Furniture—a book published in 1973 by designers Victor Papanek and James Hennessey—for advice on “How to build and where to buy lightweight furniture that folds, inflates, knocks down, stacks, or is disposable and can be recycled.” …

Why Psychopaths Can’t Catch a Yawn

Catching someone else’s yawn is no simple coincidence. Researchers have proven that yawns are contagious because of empathy and, now, they’ve linked psychopaths to the inability to catch one. Researchers at Baylor University conducted the experiment by giving participants a Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised test and then subjected them to a Contagious-Yawn Experiment, resulting in a large portion of the people who displayed coldheartedness on paper …

An Unstable Playground Set That Challenges Kids to Find Balance

Unlike the typical seesaws, swing sets and monkey bars seen on playgrounds, Capucine Diancourt’s set of Loose Play structures remain unfixed from the ground, challenging youngsters to find their balance. The French designer created the playground set as an exploration into the way shapes and colors can bend the way we interact with the physical world, relying on instability uncommon colors to provide children with …