Essentially Odd : The Best Products From The 826 National Stores

When we were on Valencia in San Francisco a couple of weeks back, PSFK popped into Dave Eggers’ Pirate Supply Store and picked up a copy of Essentially Odd. This book is a catalog of all the fantastic products that have been created to aid education programs at the 826 National Stores across the US

Essentially Odd offers a behind-the-scenes look at the innovative design that takes place at our chapters across the country and features more than 150 pages of color photos of each 826 chapter’s storefronts and products, along with notes and commentary from the product designers.

We rifled through the book and picked our selection of the most interesting products from each store:

826 Valencia – The Pirate Store

Mermaid Bait / Repellent

“Sprinkle a small amount of this substance into the sea. Sometimes they come closer, sometimes they swim away. It’s complicated.”

826 Valencia Website
826 NYC – The Superhero Store

Bottle Of Chaos

826 NYC Website
826 LA – The Time Travel Mart:

Fear Chip For Robots Of The Future

826 LA Website
826 Michigan – Robot Supply & Repair:

Robot Larynx Replacement

826 Michigan website

826 Seattle – Space Travel Supply Company:

Black Hole Starter Kit

“Often regarded as the most horrifying force in the universe, the super concentrated gravity of the black hole is not only useful for jump-starting the spiral motion of a galaxy, it is also an ideal catalyst for generating worm holes to aid in long-distance interstellar space and/or time travel. Compressed molecular empty space and distorted time trajectories are worries of the past with this easy-to-use Black Hole Starter Kit. Contains two 1″ magnetic balls.”

826 Seattle Website

826 Boston – Big Foot Research Institute:

Kranz & Anderson products

“Our Kranz & Anderson line of products probes the strange things that people will do to fill gaping holes in their lives. By relating historical vignettes of danger and intrigue we try to answer the question: what are cryptozoologists really searching for? These product tags feature mock customer recommendations and epic near-death monologues that aim to woo the unsuspecting customer.”

826 Boston Website

826 Chicago – The Boring Store:

Diversion

826 Chicago Site

You can buy the book at each of the stores or you can buy it on Amazon.