packthecool's Blog

Topoware is a tableware collection that questions the landscape of dining. Taking inspiration from the recent popularity of geography as a media of communication and more specifically with topographic maps, which define heights of a landscape two dimensionally, Topoware in turn, "outlines" the dining experience.

Made up of cups, plates, bowls, placemats and a tablecloth, the collection explores the visual and social landscape of dining by using outlines and descriptions to describe, question and push our eating experience, making it really feel like a journey.

The designers are Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino (Canada) and Karola Torkos (Germany), and an article by the former on the design process behind the collection was just published in Ambidextrous, the design journal of the Stanford d.school.

In a practice dating back to ancient Rome and attributed in origin to Julius Caesar, where the Acta Diurna ("daily events") of political and social events were posted on the city walls, Helsinki, Finland's capital, has launched The CityWall (images - video), a large multi-touch display installed in a central location, a great example of the simplicity of multi-touch displays and surface computing, and the collaborative and playful human engagement that it naturally leads to.

Using a series of intuitive gestures users can navigate and arrange media as if you were manipulating physical pictures. The touchscreen technology which enables this direct interaction has been specifically designed so that several people can interact directly with display at the same time.

The CityWall is located in downtown Helsinki, Finland. It can be found in Lasipalatsi opposite Forum. The touchscreen technology and applications have been developed by the Ubiquitous Interaction research group at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology, as part of IPCity.

Via Influx Insights, Surface Sightings and The Daily Galaxy.

Nic Kolya's newest projects involve painstakingly hand-sliced sheets of A3 paper and various dolla-dolla billz from around the world. His A3 Cities series portrays the feel of various cities in simple profile form with no color or third dimension. The International Currency project is a reflection upon the circulation of money and asks the various bills where they've been. You can actually snag Kolya's A3 pieces on Etsy for $40 a piece.

via coudal