TOKYOMANGO

Get your hand-printed limited edition TokyoMango t-shirt now (2 weeks only)

My friend Ben and I made a test run of TokyoMango t-shirts on Saturday. They're really nice, do you want one? If so, you can buy one here. Below are the details:

- All shirts are 100% cotton.
- Each t-shirt will be hand-silk screened by me and Ben on his Yudu machine. The shirt logo was custom-designed by Ben. Mango design courtesy of my web designer James.
- The Women's tees come in a t-shirt style (pistacio and white) and a spaghetti strap ribbed tank (yellow).
- The Men's tees come in orange and white. In the pic above, Ben is actually accidentally wearing a girl's tee, but you get the idea... the sleeves will be more manly on the one you get.
- You can choose a custom colored tee for $25. Just shoot me an email with your preference after you place the order.
- The sizes tend to run a little big (except for the tanktops). They might shrink in the wash.
- Some of you will receive a free surprise Japanese toy or gadget with your t-shirt! I'm just gonna randomly stick them into bags, so keep an eye out.
- We're taking orders over the next two weeks only, at least for this first printing. They'll ship at the end of those two weeks, when Ben & I will silkscreen them by hand.
- Last day to order is Monday, October 5th.

UPDATE: T-shirts are no longer for sale. Maybe we'll do another round sometime!

Bamboo dining set teaches kids table manners

I love this dining set for kids made by Funfam. Everything's made of bamboo and is reusable (huge amounts of wooden chopsticks are used and thrown away every day in Japan), but not only that, the embedded cutlery design automatically teaches your kids how to set a table! It's one less thing you have to teach them &mdash not to mention that it's just an extremely cute design. The only caveat: it costs $200.

Product page via Designboom

Ashtray made out of coffee grinds

What a great idea &mdash an ashtray made out of coffee grinds, created by Ryohei Yoshiyuki. So you don't have to have that stinky stale smell sitting in your living room all day.

via Moco Loco

Gabled house in Mitaka by architect Hidetaka Shirako

Check out this cool new house in Mitaka, suburb of Tokyo, designed by architect Hidetaka Shirako.

via Dezeen, photos by Hiroshi Ueda.

Artsy video shows a designer and his beautiful colored pencils

This lovely video, aptly titled "White Box," shows a designer contemplating his colored pencils and a simple white box on his drafting table. This was actually created by director Makoto Yabuki for architecture firm Sturdy Style.

And if you liked this, or even if you didn't, you should watch Right Place, a short film about an OCD combini man, and Cornelius' awesome music video for Fit.

via NotCot

NYT article on Tokyo capsule apartments highlights problem of architectural preservation

The NY Times has a great article with pics about the imminent destruction of Nakagin Capsule Tower, a rare survivor from Tokyo's Metabolist architectural era of the 1970s. The tower, created by architect Kisho Kurokawa, is full of apartment units that are actually factory-made capsules with compact built-in furniture and a giant porthole that, for many residents, faces a busy highway. The writer offers this explanation as to why there isn't a bigger movement to preserve this unique building:

all over the world, postwar architecture is still treated with a measure of suspicion by the cultural mainstream, which often associates it with brutal city housing developments or clinical office blocks. Partly, too, it has to do with the nature of housing blocks in general. They are not sexy investments; they do not feed an investor’s vanity or offer the cultural prestige that owning a landmark house does.

Link

Beautiful fruit-shaped designer sticky notes

I love these sticky notes shaped like fruits. They are called kudamemo (kudamono = fruit in Japanese, plus memo) and you can buy them individually or in crates of six. They're so pretty!

D-Bros via Moco Loco

Cool new concept for bicycle pit stops

Check out this ingenious concept for bicycle pit stop areas by Tokyo's Store Muu Design Studio. Basically, anybody riding a bike could just ride straight into one of these tables, which locks the front wheel and provides them with an instant table to rest or snack on. The cyclist can stay on his/her seat and just have a regular seated meal. Japan has tons of bicycles, and parking them has become harder and harder as the crackdown on randomly parked bicycles continues. So this is a great solution for those who need to stop for a bite but don't want to get their bikes confiscated. I can totally see a fast food chain or restaurant wanting to install these, but I can also see it causing huge clusterfucks on sidewalks and promptly being banned.

via Shibuya246

Related stories:
Bicycle rule crackdown!
Video: the hen that rides a bicycle
Giant subterranean bicycle parking lot
Gallery of pimped out dekochari bicycles

Full-sized LED light sculpture by Makoto Tojiki

Designer Makoto Tojiki's newest creation is a life-sized LED human figure called the Man With No Shadow.

via Moco Loco

Calendar with stop-motion scenes of Tokyo and awesome music

Clothing brand Uniqlo made this awesome online calendar featuring stop motion tilt-shift scenes of Tokyo, the date, the weather, and music by Fantastic Plastic Machine. I love it &mdash and you can post it into your blog or Facebook page, too.

Link via Pink Tentacle

Colorful self-standing ladels for artsy kitchens

Look at these beautiful colorful ladels designed by Mikiya Kobayashi. They're spoon-shaped, but with flat bottoms so you can stand them up. Smart!

via Spoon and Tamago

Seasonal designer toilet bowls from Toto

Toilet company Toto came out with this beautiful new toilet bowl collection that they call Waza Miyabi. There are foliage designs for every season. Pretty, although I personally would prefer to pee and poo in a normal white toilet bowl.

via Born Rich

Juice boxes look like the real fruit

Look at these beautiful juice boxes by industrial designer Naoto Fukasawa. He made each container resemble the look and texture of the fruit it embodies—here, we see (from l-r) soy, banana, and strawberry, and kiwi (below).

Thanks, Paul!

Designer sushi roller

This neat-looking sushi roller machine by designer Osko & Deichmann will be on display at the Kitchen Ecology Exhibition in LA this June.

via Designboom

TokyoFlash's cool new concept clocks

TokyoFlash has some crazy new concept designs for tabletop clocks. This one's my favorite because it looks like a UFO. It creates great ambient light for a bedroom, and tells time through a little light animation dance. A couple more designs after the jump.

Terunobu Fujimori's super-tall, super-tiny kooky designer tea house

What a beautiful tea house by architect Terunobu Fujimori. He built it for his own use in Nagano Prefecture. A traditional tea house is supposed to be self-constructed and extremely tiny; Fujimori saw this as an interesting challenge, and created this super-tall, super-small (he can't sit up straight inside the tea room) building, which he dubbed Takasugi-an (takasugi literally means too tall). Fun! More pics here.

Photos by Edmund Sumner via Dezeen

Toilet makes you want to do a super ski jump

What could possibly feel better than dropping a giant turd while preparing to do a virtual ski jump? Not much, I'd imagine. Japanese coffee company Georgia painted public toilets at several ski resorts to mimic a ski jumper's perspective, wrapping the walls in illustrations of mountains and drawing skis where the feet go, and a giant slope on the front wall. Apparently, the toilet paper holder says:

“Seriously kick-ass intensely sweet for the real coffee super zinging unstoppable Max! Taste-explosion!”

I wish my toilet looked like that. I'd sit on it all day.

Coloribus via Boing Boing

Now-defunct bilingual design-y magazine about strange foods

Garth write in to tell us about a fun bilingual magazine that no longer exists. Lucky for us, some of the articles are online:

Eat Creative is this design house in Tokyo that started out publishing a magazine called Eat. This magazine was similar to Benetton's Colors magazine in that each article was in two languages and each issue had a theme. In the case of Eat, it was Japanese/English and the themes were always food related. They stopped publishing this magazine several years ago when they realized the could be more successful just doing design work for other companies.

I remember there was a two page spread on interesting Japanese gourmet ice cream
flavors; lettuce, sperm whale, etc. There was also an interesting/slightly-disturbing article on people that drink their own pee.

Eat main page

Tetris block-shaped stuffed toys

Check out these little Tetris block-shaped stuffed toys. You can use them for hugging, puzzle-solving, playing fetch with the dog, or simply as a nice touch to your living room furniture.

via Daily Portal Z (Japanese)

Hiroyuki Takahashi's awesome lavender cream designs

There's this great temporary store at Meguro Station called Steam Cream. It's sold in the UK and Japan in these pretty tin cans, and right now, they're having this special collaboration with artist Hiroyuki Takahashi. I bought one for 1500 yen ($16) with a nerdy geisha girl (kimono, red-rimmed glasses) on it. I couldn't resist—the design was great, and the cream inside smelled like a fresh burst of lavender and chamomile, and made my skin feel like velvet. Another reason I couldn't resist: I have had this strange urge all week to buy stuff in between interviews. I think I'm working my ass off and I deserve little rewards here and there.

Coach limited edition branded cell phones in Japan

COACH is teaming up with mobile phone company KDDI to release this limited edition branded Christmas edition cell phone. It's kinda pretty. $200 for the cover and accessories in addition to the standard handset retail price. There are less than 2000 on the market, though, so be ready to fight Shibuya gals in line if you want to get your hands on one.

via Wireless Watch

Million dollar Christmas tree unaware of harsh financial times

What global economic meltdown? A jewellery store display in Osaka laughs at the so-called "world recession" with their 1.6 million dollar 24k gold Christmas tree all blinged out with diamonds and pearls. It's decorated with over 240 priceless gems. The store attendant justifies this extravagance:

Economic sentiment is sluggish. But, at least in this store, we want people to feel a gorgeous atmosphere.

Link (by Emily Co)

Osaka office building has highway built right into it

Intern Emily found this awesome photo of an office building in Osaka that has the Hanshin expressway running through it.

Link

Kouichi Okamoto's modern multifunctional household objects

Tokyo designer Kouichi Okamoto makes crazy cool lamps and other household objects inspired by everyday objects like lightbulbs, balloons, and flat screen TVs. The umbrella stand is really neat—it has a little patch of grass on the side that feeds off of excess water that drips down from the umbrella. And that white mountain range-like thing on the left is a soup plate that simulates the topography of a mountain range.

Kyouei web site via The Japan Times

Beautiful Japanese lamps made out of recycled material

The Tokyo American Club has these awesome lamps by artist Shoichi Sakurai. He and his American wife make beautiful lamps and other furniture using recycled materials, like the breastplate of broken Edo period armor and old rusty pipes.

Bookshelf Has Embedded Lounge Chair

 

What better way to enjoy a good read than to curl up amidst your books? Bookshelf-meets-lounge chair in this sweet piece of furniture designed by Sakura Adachi.

Link

Limited Edition Colorful Toilet Seats

Your toilet seat should match your shower curtains, too. Starting in November, for just two months, furniture and interior design company INAX is selling these awesome toilet lids in 11 different colors. Of course, no Japanese toilet seat is marketable without a bidet system installed, so it is fully capable of shooting warm water up your ass. It even has a fully automated toilet seat that automatically shuts after use so you don't have to get yelled at for leaving the seat up. Oh! And also, it has a self-cleaning nozzle.

It retails for 156,000 yen, a little under $1,400.

Press release (Japanese, via Impress Watch)

New Designer Space Heaters Coming in December

Starting in December, electronics company Plus-Minus Zero is going to start selling these awesome colorful space heaters. They come in bright red, forest green, baby blue, and gray. These heaters—which will retail for about $120—were actually designed by Naoto Fukuzawa, who won the Good Design Award for it this year and also created some of au's most popular handsets, like the neon and the INFOBAR2.

Product page (via Impress Watch)

Japanese People Dressed Like Vending Machines

A recent NY Times article discusses a new clothing line by a 29-year old Japanese fashion designer who created skirts-that-disguise-themselves-as-vending-machines for paranoid pedestrians. WTF? Does she really think this will fly? I mean what if the stalker/flasher wants a drink and pushes the "BUY" button, which happens to be conveniently situated right on her left nipple? That would be SO much worse. But actually, I don't think it's so much the designer that thinks this is a real crime deterrent than it is the reporter who wrote the story.

Besides, this isn't a new concept at all. Vending Machine Red has been tearing shit up in Tokyo for months!

The designer hand-sews these things and sells them for about $800 each.

Link (Thanks, Katherine!)

Cute Cars Debuting at the Tokyo Auto Show

The Tokyo Auto Show is coming up, and the big three Japanese automakers are slated to unveil a bunch of cutesy space-agey cars like the Nissan Pivo 2, a concept car that was introduced at a preview event this past weekend. I don't know if I'd be caught dead driving this thing. But the girl pretending to drive it is cute!

More cute car photos on Mainichi.

Designer Bathtub Looks Like A Giant Glass Pipe

Check out this crazy bathtub designed by Tetsuya Nakamura. It looks like a glass pipe you can purchase at a smoke shop on Haight Street, but it's actually made of reinforced plastic. This is one of many furniture items that the artist designed for his Premium Unit collection.

Link (via Pink Tentacle)

New Red & Black DS Lite

Look! A red and black Nintendo DS Lite, coming October 4th.

Product page (Japanese)

Takashi Murakami's Kanye West Cover

Rumors are flying about Kanye West's new album, Graduation, whose cover features a Takashi Murakami flying teddy bear spewing out of a giant mouth. People are psyched because the teddy bear is wearing those patented Nike's worn by Marty McFly in Back to the Future II. Maybe Kanye's highly anticipated album will help those who have been fighting to get the "McFly 2015s" back into existence and onto the consumer market.

I love that pop culture has become so multidirectional that you can now combine American hip hop with Japanese retro cute art with kicks from an 80s movie.

For more Super Flat fun a la Murakami, check out this video.

Link

Wagashi Wall and Ceiling Lamps

These beautiful lamps from Luca Nichetto for Foscarini are made of fireproof fabric and photographic images to look like those pretty little Japanese sugar confectionaries they sell at old candy stores.

Link

Transformers Prototypes By Japan's Hottest Toy Designer

The Transformers movie comes out today in theaters across the US—very, very exciting for robot geeks and other humans who believe in more than meets the eye. PingMag has a great interview with Alex Kubalsky, the Tokyo-based toy designer at Takara Tomy who helped design the disguised robots who appear in the new movie. You can see how, from early drawings to the finished plastic product, Optimus Prime came into existence. Pretty rad.

Link

LED Cherry Blossom Tree

Can't wait for the next cherry blossom season? This miniature LED cherry blossom tree will light up any room, desktop, or garden with lovely neon ambiance. I like the red, but it also comes in multi-color. Link

Design Contest Top 3 Finalists

Guess what guys? We're on the home stretch of the Tokyomango Design Contest, and we've got our Top 3 Finalists (based on your votes, sent to me both as comments and in emails). I know you guys voted already, so don't feel like you have to do it again. But any comments, suggestions, etc. are always welcome. I'll be announcing the winner on MONDAY.

Note: Designer James sent me 2 revised designs later in the week, so I'm subbing those in for his last 2, which got the most votes anyway.

Design Contest Peripherals: Mascots and Logos

Got some peripherals (?) from the site design contest call for submissions—a mascot idea and a logo design. Look, I have green hair and a little mango friend! Two little mango friends!

Mascot design from James:

Logo design from Vinod:

More Design Contest Entries: Your Vote Please!!

More awesomely talented readers have submitted design ideas for this blog, and I need your advice. Which one do you like?? Leave a comment or email me your pick this week, and I'll announce the finalists over the weekend.

Don't forget to check out all of them—there are 10 total, and if you don't see them all here, click on the "Read more" link at the bottom to jump to the extended post.

1. Van's design:

Metaphys' LED "Flame" Lamps

Metaphys is a Japanese interior design store that makes really cool, sleek furniture and appliances for the modern home. The hono (Japanese for "flame") is a neat little lighting fixture that illuminates when you strike it with a "match" (not real, of course, but made especially for this product). It can stand alone on rechargeable batteries for up to 8 hours, or you can hook it onto your walls for a slightly different feel.

Design Contest Update: Which One Do YOU Like So Far?

The Tokyomango.com design contest's still rolling (keep the entries coming! I'm loving your ideas), but I wanted to show you guys some of the entries I've gotten so far. Which one do YOU like, and why? Please leave a comment or email me your thoughts—feel free to ramble, I want to hear what you think—on these entries.

Entry 1                                                                     Entry 2

Two more after the jump.

TOKYOMANGO Site Design Contest Reminder

Just a reminder post to all web designers and creative types to submit entries for the Tokyomango site design contest!

1. Email me your entries in PSD or JPG format.The layout has to accommodate all the stuff on the current site, and be compatible with 1024x768 browser resolution. Also include a note about your coding skillz please--as in, whether you are able to theme your design yourself or if you need someone else to code it.
2. In the next few weeks, I'll post some of the top candidates here for you guys to look at and vote on. Of course, my votes counts the most, because it's my site! But I want to hear what you all think, too.
3. The winning design will replace this shitty Typepad template as the face of Tokyomango.com.

Prizes!! All legitimate entries will get a mini-prize, the top 3 will get fun gadgets from the Mango stash, and the winner will get the mother or all prizes and street cred for designing an up-and-coming blog with over 180,000 unique visitors per month, plus a blog entry dedicated to whatever you want--whether it's your awesome design skillz or your favorite anime character.

Remember to get me your entries by the end of the month--or if you need more time, just let me know. Multiple entries are totally allowed and so is swearing. But no porn please, because Google might take down my ads again.

And many thanks to those of you who already sent entries!

Sleek Cubic Extension Cord Hides Ugly Wires

My apartment's pretty fly but extension cords are ugly and wiry and they make the hardwood floor look like a hardware store. Here's a simple but classy solution. This tapbox by Japanese design company ideaco hides four extra plugs under these sleek red and silver 4x4x4 cubes, which will sit quietly and beautifully in any room corner.

So far they're only made for Japan, but since Japan and the US use pretty much the same voltage, you can just buy a few of those three-prong to two-prong adapters at the hardware store and import yourself one of these.

Product page (via Impress Watch)

Tokyomango Site Design Contest

It's been six months since I started Tokyomango, and I'm still using this sucky Typepad template. So I decided to have a design-my-site contest!

I'm looking for amateur or professional web designers who have grand ideas about what Tokyomango could be, but isn't. Here's how the contest will work:

1. Email me your entries in PSD or JPG format.The layout has to accommodate all the stuff on the current site, and be compatible with 1024x768 browser resolution. Also include a note about your coding skillz please--as in, whether you are able to theme your design yourself or if you need someone else to code it.
2. In the next few weeks, I'll post some of the top candidates here for you guys to look at and vote on. Of course, my votes counts the most, because it's my site! But I want to hear what you all think, too.
3. The winning design will replace this shitty Typepad template as the face of Tokyomango.com.

Prizes!! All legitimate entries will get a mini-prize, the top 3 will get fun gadgets from the Mango stash, and the winner will get the mother of all prizes and street cred for designing an up-and-coming blog with over 180,000 unique visitors per month, plus a blog entry dedicated to whatever you want--whether it's your awesome design skillz or your favorite anime character.

Let all your web designer friends know about this, too, please. Thanks!

Deadline: End of the month. i.e. by May 30 07.

Chains and Shoes Puma Store

Loved this shoe display at the Puma store in Tokyo Midtown. The black chains make the otherwise gentle Pumas look like badasses.

Micro Homes For People Who Want To Live Like Ants

What do you do when you've reached that point in your life where you want to and can afford to buy your first home, but you just don't have the space to build? Well, according to BusinessWeek, you order a micro-home for rent-free urban living. It costs little over $100,000 to build some of these units, while others cost double as much. Of course, you have to buy the land to build on first. And land's not cheap in Japan.

Link (via JeanSnow.net)

Yummy Fruit Tart Candles

How yummy do these fruit tarts look? I love this stuff. But these are actually carefully crafted candles, not real food. In a way, that's much better. They won't make you fat, plus you can always keep them around for decoration. Available here.

Wooden iPod Cases

Check out these cool wooden iPod cases from toy company Asuka Kobo. Some people think the days of the iPod will be over once the iPhone comes out, but not me. I like my iPod video with movies I made of my dog. I think I like the darker wood one the best. Which one do you like?

Super Comfy Earthworm Chair

This super flexible earthworm chair is the biggest thing on Yahoo! Japan right now. It bends into a variety of different angles, making it the ultimate recliner, but it also folds out completely into a bed. From furniture company Hirureed, for just 8,800 yen ($75).

Papipo! Kids' Cell Phone.

A Papipo! is a cell phone designed just for kids by phone company Willcom and toy manufacturer Bandai. There are seven different designs to choose from--including Hello Kitty, Tamagochi, and Dragons--and comes with software that gives you brain games, your daily fortune, and a fun game called "Color Picture" where you do a paint-by-number type thing, except you fill in each block by taking a photo of something that has the requested color. It's super fun, fun enough that kids won't want to ever lose it. Comes in 5 girls' designs and 2 boys' designs, + extra covers so you can change the look of it when you feel like it.

Make Your DS Look Like A Leather-Bound Book

 
Alright, let's face it. Despite the astounding success of "grownup" video games like Brain Age, it still looks a little...childish to be hooked to your game console all day. But there's a solution to everything, and this leather-bound book cover is it for this particular dilemma.

Carrying this around, you'll look no different than the real serious businessman sitting next to you reading a How To Get Rich Quick book on the train. Well, except for your furious typing with the stylus. Maybe you can pretend it's a Blackberry or something.

I like how the product page explicitly states that the purchase does NOT come with a DS Lite.