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Helsinki Design Week 2010 invites design professionals and the general public to a week of events centred around the theme of storytelling.

Now in its sixth year, Helsinki Design Week tells all the best stories behind the creations and processes involved in design.

The week-long series of events, exhibitions and publications is already a story in itself – a tale that communicates the message of design. Design is something for everyone, and it belongs to everyone. Design is important in our everyday lives, but it is also a strategic tool for competitive businesses.

Helsinki Design Week offers design professionals a unique opportunity to display their skills and versatility – and everyone can be a part of the story. Heads are already turning towards the future, and particularly towards 2012, when Helsinki will reign as the World Design Capital.

The story of design will continue into 2012 and on into the future…

Helsinki Design Week 26 August – 5 September 2010

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Ok, it’s more funky than functional but I just spotted this from Dutch designer Tim Vinke.

The Office on Wheels, or het Kruikantoor which is a combination of the Dutch (I think) words for wheelbarrow and office which seems apt! It certainly brought a smile to my face.

Manufactured from polystyrene with a hotspray polyurea coating and available in a wide variety of colours it pretty much does what it says on the tin. The image speaks for itself I guess.

Practical? Probably not. Amusing? Certainly. Clever? Absolutely.

What do you think?

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New from Italian design company, Insilvis, is a selection of stunning new hook designs.

Seawater

The SEAWATER coat hook appears to arise from the corolla of a flower, of which it takes the pretty delicacy that crystallizes in the density of stainless steel. The structure consists of two opposed conical volumes: the first one allows the fastening of the coat hook to the wall, the second one is the actual rounded knob. The ring engraved on the fastening cone measures and modulates the surface, anticipating the theme of the circle, which characterizes the entire composition. The outer cone, while keeping well-measured proportions, finally opens itself to contemplation, exposing to the light its major base, slightly connected to the lateral surface.
The circular crown catches the eye in a turning movement that ends in the embedded Swarovski. The luminous vibrations of the crystal facets, iridescent and unpredictable as those of a smiling eye, dissolve the formal rigidity and the physical consistence of the material in a rain of enchanted reflections.

Bolt

BOLT is literally a standard object, as a mechanical part. Lightly modified in order to warrant a perfect fastening and utilized as a coat hook, it becomes a readymade object. Strength and formal settlement come from its nature: endowed with an exaggerated vigour for the actual use, it promotes a sort of perceptual short-circuit. BOLT S (pictured) is characterized by an embedded Swarovski.

More details of all Insilvis design innovations can be found at their website at www.insilvis.com.

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Designed by Valentina Trimani. A leaf of light. As thin as a page of a book, to enlighten rooms and tents, maps and books. Wireless, rechargeable, autonomous.

With adjustable brightness, A leaf of light offers private or shared light, for those who read and travel everywhere.

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12 radically temporary structures will be built in New York’s Union Square Park this September.

Biblical in origin, the sukkah is an ephemeral, elemental shelter, erected for one week each autumn, in which it is customary to share meals, entertain, sleep, and rejoice.

The sukkah’s religious function is to commemorate the temporary structures that the Israelites dwelled in during their exodus from Egypt, but it is also about universal ideas of transience and permanence as expressed in architecture. The sukkah is a means of ceremonially practicing homelessness, while at the same time remaining deeply rooted. It calls on us to acknowledge the changing of the seasons, to reconnect with an agricultural past, and to take a moment to dwell on–and dwell in–impermanence.

Sukkah City: NYC will re-imagine this ancient phenomenon, develop new methods and propose radical possibilities for traditional design constraints in a contemporary urban site. Twelve finalists will be selected by a panel of architects, designers, and critics to be constructed in Union Square Park from September 19-21, 2010.

One structure will be chosen by New Yorkers to stand and delight throughout the week-long festival of Sukkot as the Official Sukkah of New York City. The process and results of the competition, along with construction documentation and critical essays, will be published in the book “Sukkah City: Radically Temporary Architecture for the Next Three Thousand Years.”

If you plan to be in New York in September this is well worth a visit and it’s certainly something that is off the usual tourist grid!

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Once considered a ‘hard’ city, Seoul is taking strides towards becoming a ‘soft’ city. Seoul is about to be reborn as a soft city by embracing design concepts that will re-define its urban environment.

The Seoul Cycle Design Competition is part of Seoul’s city-wide effort at improving its design brand and image. The primary goal of the competition is to help build a design oriented city that focuses on its people.

The competition is divided into three categories: cycle design, cycle fashion & accessories design, and cycling infrastructure. All three categories emphasize environment-friendly ideas, with the hope that the contest will contribute to establishing a healthier cycling culture.

Cycles have become an icon of eco-friendliness & health and are part of a major urban lifestyle trend. Nearly everyone can enjoy riding cycles. Therefore just about everyone will be able to enter the competition. It is hoped that all participants will share their visions for a new Seoul, a city that has embraced change through design.

Fancy making a difference? More details at the competition website.

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Italian designers Francesco Esposito and Marianna Contaldo bring us the Swan Stool with its curvy and ‘new fangled’ shape that emphasizes the technical features of the corian material from which it is manufactured.

Italian speakers will find more details at their website.

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Cycle culture is gaining in popularity, and for new cyclists it can be hard to feel confident sharing space with cars on the road. With this in mind Dundee University based product designer Fraser Mort has produced Bike Light to make cyclists feel more confident.

Bike Light is an LED dot matrix, where the cyclist can design and download their own personalised graphics, animations or phrases to use for their rear light. Cool!

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Studio Aisslinger has presented the NETwork project, a transformation of 2-dimensional embroidery into a pop-up furniture.

The project is a combination of the application of new technologies to traditional stitching techniques. The pieces of the NETwork, armchairs, stools and lamps, are carefully designed for later flattening. The objects created are extremely light and transparent and they seem to flow in space.

3D textile pop-up technology is an empirical research/result developed with a traditional German manufacturer in Plauen, a region with a long tradition in stitching and embroidery. The combination of experimental design with a hidden traditional production is always a challenge for designers albeit an exciting field for new concepts. Nowadays the know-how of specialised technologies is more often found in the supplying industries than in the design brands themselves.

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Ann Ha and Behrang Behin are the winners of the first annual pavilion competition with their Living Pavilion.

Living Pavilion is the result of an international design competition to design and build a pavilion as a central, temporary gathering place on Upper New York Bay’s Governors Island. The competition is unique in that it asked designers to consider the full lifecycle of their proposals. With as little environmental impact as possible, considerations included the sourcing, materials, placement, de-installation, and the future of the pavilion once the summer has ended.

Living Pavilion is a low-tech, zero-impact structure that employs reclaimed milk crates as the framework for growing a planted green wall surface. The pavilion’s construction is simple and modular, relying on common materials such as heavy-duty packaging straps and weather-treated wood for its assembly. Erected in the courtyard of Liggett Hall for Governors Island’s summer season, the pavilion will provide refuge from the heat in a shaded environment kept cool by the evaporation from its planted surfaces. As the pavilion’s vaulted form meets the ground, it unfolds into a mat of crates planted with crops that can be harvested and distributed to the community. At the end of the season, its modular design will allow easy disassembly and distribution to the New York area for use in homes, public places, and community gardens.

The competition was organised by FIGMENT, the Emerging New York Architect Committee (ENYA) of the American Institute of Architects New York Chapter (AIANY), and the Structural Engineers Association of New York (SEAoNY).

The project will be assembled on Governors Island this spring, and will be open to the public from June 6^th until October 3^rd 2010.

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