Refinity dresses consist of interlocking parts which can be added or taken away from a garment, allowing users to alter it’s design on demand.

Italian coffee maker Illy Caffe will challenge Starbucks Corp’s stronghold over the US out-of-home coffee market by expanding its reach within independent coffee shops, rather than opening up its own.

For its 57th issue, Visionaire draws inspiration from the Smart Fortwo car.

Stefan Hobmaier, a photographer from Germany, has a new series of photos called Dorfjugend that covers young people growing up in small towns.

The Pirate Kiosk is a local and public backup of the Pirate Bay’s torrent catalog broadcast from a WiFi router, allowing peer-to-peer file sharing without the need for the internet.

Italian graffiti writer and graphic designer NICO189 has created a nice-looking set of conceptual spray paint cans using colors from the Pantone Matching System .

We recently came across Motto Berlin, a unique, carefully edited store dedicated to fanzines, small run magazines, books and self published printed matter.

London based RKCR/Y&R offered its creative and strategic services to local small businesses in a pop up ad agency for a week.

A forthcoming exhibition at the Appel Gallery in Berlin presents the new work of designer Hermann August Weizenegger. The Digital Couture work presents varied objects designed with rapid prototyping and traditional ‘turning’.

Bicycle commuting is growing in popularity in major cities across the globe. Portland’s Create-a-Commuter program is the first project in the United States that provides low-income adults with commuter bicycles, equipped with lights, a lock, a helmet, a pump, tool kits, maps, and rain gear.

Architectural firm Visiondivision have designed a stylish and imaginative storage facility around a power plant in Gothenburg, Sweden. The storage area presented a unique design challenge because of the large industrial supplies that need to be quickly accessible by a crane truck at all times. Their solution was to create a modular wall that protects the equipment inside, improves the visual look of the facility and permits easy access.
The exterior facade is made out of perforated steel plates, which minimize wind loads, and permit interior views while maintaining a consistent, clean look. Visiondivision has also added a clever narrative illustration [...]

Image credit: Getty Images, Marianne Taylor/Flickr
Cultural critic Paul Virilio has said that the speed at which something occurs can change its very nature; moreover, what happens quicker will always dominate the slower.  In this sense, the creation and subsequent circulation of ideas is dependent on the speed of distribution. We’ve seen this come into play with the rise of the blogosphere as a primary source for information, and  the subsequent move of print media to digital.
ExperimentaDesign is an international design, architecture and creativity biennale that addresses this very affect of time– more specifically speed and acceleration–on design. Opening on September [...]

We recently came across this video of an audiophile troubleshooting a speaker system he built on some knäckebröd, a Swedish type of crispy flat bread.  The noisy cracker is actually an object built for a three day Sound Sculpture workshop at the Neon Gallery in Brösarp, Sweden.
It doesn’t produce a very pleasant harmony and the wiring looks quite haphazard, but for those pushing the limits of experimental sound, this could be the music their waiting for.  Who knows? Maybe the next revolutionary speaker system will be built out of matzah, we’re already seeing cell phones made of corn.  Without further [...]

At the ARS Electronica festival in Linz, British artist, Demitrios Kargotis, unveiled Dr. Whippy, an ice cream machine that serves customers based on their stress levels.  The unique machine that has traveled across events for two years, measures how unhappy the user is based on voice stress analysis and then serves up a dollop or heap of ice cream based on its diagnosis.
The machine asks several questions and after assessing the patient, immediately prescribes its dose for effective results.  The project was funded in part by the Royal College of Art and will hopefully continue to circulate as crowds gather [...]

For fans of light writing, there is now a handy LED light specifically designed for those familiar with graffiti using a spray can.  The fake aerosol can, designed by Aïssa Logerot, is called Haloand simply replaces the nozzle with a tiny LED.  Logerot has a number of innovative light designs and is currently based in Paris.

The real creativity in the Halo design comes in the possibilities of manipulation.  The light’s brightness can be changed and the colors are interchangeable.  The power is generated by shaking the bottle, just like a spray can.  The design reminds us of the WiiSpray and [...]