Form Follows Fun Guy

Recently released by Dinosaur Designs, Fungi is a new collection of jewellery and decorative items inspired by 'the magical and regenerative qualities of fungi'. I've been playing around on their website with their interactive Fungiverse and now have little mushies of my very own!





Magic and fantasy have been playing a fairly substantial role in my recent research and this gorgeous collection is just one of a run of designs that have been inspired by the magic of mushrooms.


Images via Dinosaur Designs


Not new but indicative of this direction is the mushroom floor lamp by Australian designer, Simon Duff.


Image via simonduff.com


Photographed at his recent retrospective at the Pompidou Centre, this design concept for the Notify showroom by Ron Arad is a beautifully literal mimicry of natural form.


Notify showroom concept. Image by New Black


And finally this vase by Des Pots was shown at Maison et Objet earlier this year. Equal parts 'ooooh!' and 'eeewww!', especially with that slimy looking glaze - I love it!


Fungus vase by Des Pots. Image by New Black.

Love Design

At some point over the weekend the name Susan Cohn came up in reference to jewellery design. As a 1st yr arts student I had written a paper on her product design, particularly those pieces picked up by Alessi. One of those pieces was the Cohndom - an elegant little condom holder - the perfect gift for trendy people with an attractive>active sex life (easy tiger - it only holds one).

Cohndom by Susan Cohn, 1995. Image via Panik

In light of all the recent creative work inspired by eroticism, I felt it was time to revisit the Cohndom along with some of the work from the Love Design exhibition, held in Milan at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile. Unlike the more literal designer sex toys of previous seasons (eg Bone by Tom Dixon - also pictured), the Love Design book and exhibition delves into some of the psychological and emotional aspects of eroticism and intimacy.

Bone by Tom Dixon - "Tom believes that design becomes interesting when you start looking at areas where design has never gone before" ...smirk. Image and quote via Myla


From Love Design - Traces of an Imaginary Affair by Björn Franke. Images via Fast Company


Bedside lamp by Matteo Cibic. Image via Fast Company


Powered by Arik Levy. Image via Fast Company

Hitting the spot with NB is the Waveform collection by Sakurako Shimizu. These peculiarly alluring necklaces and rings are "laser cut in the shape of digital sound waves representing the voice of French actress Jeanne Moreau reading a love poem called “Cet Amour” by Jacques Prévert."

Waveform collection by Sakurako Shimizu. Image and quote via Fast Company


Sakurako Shimizu also offers bespoke wedding rings, created from an audio file of each partner saying "I do".

"I do" Wedding Bands

Too mushy for the blokes? Well then, feast your eyes on her 1981 Atari ring - "a precise cast of the original Atari computer chip out of 18 karat gold".

1981 Atari ring

It may be love after all.