COOL THING WE WANT #387: A Calendar That Brews A Unique Cup Of Tea Every Day

(via) Dig this Tea Calendar from German tea company Hälssen & Lyon. It contains a unique wafer (makes 1 cup) for every day of the year. Sadly, it’s not yet on the market, and as of yet there is no price (ballpark or otherwise) that is being projected. Regardless…we want it. 

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COOL THING WE WANT #386: A Step Bench Home Library That Is Also An Amazing Slide

(via) Designed by Korean architect Moon Hoon, the so-called “Panorama House” in Chungbuk boasts an elegantly wooden stepped library that doubles as home theatre seating and home runs as a super fun slide.

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COOL THING WE WANT #385: Gorgeous Rains Drawstring Bag At Nouvelle Nouvelle

We love the hell out of this awesome bag. It’s Danish, and the Danes know about rain just as much as we do.

Rains Drawstring Sack | Nouvelle Nouvelle | 209 Abbott St. in Gastown | $75

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COOL THING WE WANT #384: “Grand Hotel” Book Pairing For Awesome New VAG Show

The Grand Hotel: Redesigning Modern Life exhibitionopens tomorrow at the Vancouver Art Gallery. The show “charts the evolution of the hotel from an isolated and utilitarian structure to a cultural phenomenon that figures prominently around the world.”

The scope of the project is global, an acknowledgement of the pervasive presence of a commercial network that is architecturally formed, geographically distributed and socially defined. The title of the exhibition is in part a reference to the influential 1932 Hollywood film Grand Hotel, in which the lives of individual guests interweave during a brief hotel stay. The film depicts a thoroughly modern condition and demonstrates the potency of the hotel as both a real and symbolic nexus of human movement, interaction and ideas. The exhibition’s four main themes—travel, design, the social and culture—consider the vital role of travel and design in the development of the hotel, as well as the hotel’s important role as a site of social interaction and cultural production. Each theme speaks to a critical force that has given shape and meaning to the hotel. Together they tell the collective story of this important built form, elucidating its prominence in the public consciousness and reflecting the nature of the hotel itself: engaging, innovative, provocative, ephemeral. Quite simply, the hotel is a veritable laboratory of modern life.

We were given a sneak peek at the exhibition yesterday and it was amazing. So many layers. So much going on! Equally impressive are the companion website, blog, and publicationof 336 pages and 452 illustrations edited by Jennifer M. Volland and Bruce Grenville with Stephanie Rebick. Since the only feasible takeaway is the book (and it’s a beautifully put together tome), we wants it.

Grand Hotel: Redesigning Modern Life | Publisher: Hatje Cantz | Available in the VAG Store | $60

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COOL THING WE WANT #383: The Hövding – Sweden’s Gorgeous “Invisible Bike Helmet”

(via) Swedish designers Anna Haupt and Terese Alstin raised over $10,000,000 in venture capital to develop their Hövding project, which they also goes by the name of Invisible Bicycle Helmet. The project began in 2005 as their Masters in Industrial Design thesis. The goal was to create a product so that “adult cyclists would voluntarily start protecting their heads on the roads without the law ordering them to do so.” Press play on the short film above. Fascinating.

Complete Hövding RO has two parts: a collar and a shell of model Raven Obscure. The collar is made in a black, waterproof and dirt-resistant functional fabric. The collar is the actual head protection and encloses the airbag and the other components. Shell RO is sewn in a black polyamide functional fabric of very high quality. The shell is washable in 30°. The shell is attached to the collar with two zips, one on the inside of the collar and one on the outside. You can use the shell to vary the look of your Hövding from one day to the next, mixing and matching to tie in with your look or suit or your mood.

Wearing one won’t mess up your hair, which means they can charge $615 per.

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COOL THING WE WANT #382: A “Spines Up” Bookshelf That Doubles As A Table, Library

(via) Italian furniture makers LEMA made this cool, functional vision from Raw Edges designers Yael Mer and Shay Alkala a reality. It’s called Booken. “We were inspired by the fact that people do not re-read the novels that are so often on the shelves,” Mer and Alkala said. “Most books are usually read once and not re-read, and then we thought, why not use the volumes as if they have a plan? Of course you can always remove the book and read it, but at the same time the books take on a new role.”

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COOL THING WE WANT #381: “Bdoja” Chair Hand-Knit In The Traditional Oaxacan Style

(via) Dig this hand-knitten cotton cord chair from Mexican designer Amaya Gutierrez. The steel-framed “Bdoja” seat weighs 50lbs and sells for a mere $2,800 USD. But still…

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COOL THING WE WANT #380: A Compact, Super Light Blue Ridge Camping Hammock

All we need to have our thoughts turn squarely to camping is a bright, rainless sky (however fleeting), the passing of six months since the last overnighter, and finding this Blue Ridge Camping Hammock on the internets. The lightweight (4.25 lbs), weather resistant, bug-flummoxing, wholly convertible tent was designed especially for backpacking in rough terrain (mountainsides, jungles, river beds). | $139.99.

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Cool Thing We Want #379: Swiss-Based Designer Tomas Kral’s “Homework” Table

(Hat tip: Alexa Harder) A sheet of aluminum folded and curved around ash wood gives the “Homework” table by Swiss-based Slovakian designer Tomas Kral a unique and aesthetically pleasing functionality.

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Cool Thing We Want #378: A Typographic Poster That Celebrates Vancouver Cuisine

We’ve been digging these typographic prints via Delicious City. They spell out the signature food items of over a dozen cities. There are plenty from the USA and some from Europe, but none at all from Canada, so we put our heads together and created one just for kicks, which you can find below…

Yeah, no halibut, oysters, ramen, or maple bacon donuts. We know. What else are we missing?

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Cool Thing We Want #377: One Of The “Joy Road” Posters From Artist Dale Nigel Goble

You know those awesome posters that come out every Spring from Joy Road, the creators of the famous outdoor God’s Mountain suppers that go down each summer up in the Okanagan? You may have seen them in specialty food stores and wine shops around Vancouver and Victoria. They’re beautifully illustrated by local artist Dale Nigel Goble. Anyway, we’ve always been big fans, so we were stoked to hear this morning that they’re now for sale. That’s every illustrated 20″ x 30″ poster made for Joy Road between 2008 and 2013! You can score your favourite one here for $75.

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COOL THING WE WANT #376: The World’s Largest Ever Mapping Of Vegetables (400!)

I’m currently rendering fat in a meat coma, so this new 39″ x 27″ print looks pretty fascinating right about now. Yup, the creative folks at Pop Chart Labs have created the largest ever mapping of vegetables; so large, in fact, that some of the vegetables are actually (botanically) fruits. Play around with the zoom here. Even for food nerds, it’s an education. Top marks if you can find the pignut (highest marks if you’ve eaten one). The price? $36. Signed and numbered (out of 500).

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COOL THING WE WANT #375: A Miniature Neighbourhood Of “Ienami” Moss Planters

(via) Metaphys, a design firm in Japan, gives us Ienami (“row of houses”), tiny home-shaped planters for mosses and succulents. They come in four types - Alley, Plaza, Tunnel, Zig Zag – and each one is roughly the size of a toaster.

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