TomCorner

I can do that!

Push the lever and generate random activity

Comfy chairs, ergonomic chairs, posture correcting chairs, all well and good – but like everyone, designers sometimes like to bend the rules and be bad, oh so bad! These 13 uncomfortable chairs show that even the best furniture designers take (and give) pains to stretch the limits of their art.

What are permablitzes all about? How did they begin?A permablitz is basically a permaculture-inspired backyard makeover where people come together to share knowledge and skills about organic food production in urban gardens while building community and having fun.

General knowledge, from capital cities to key dates, has long been a marker of an educated mind. But what happens when facts can be Googled?

Grooveboxes, or more generically known as Step Sequencers, allow performers to create electronic music on the fly. But the methodology can also work to illustrate some of the principles about music writing and production. Hobnox has a free web app called iNudge that allows you or your kids to play around with a virtual step sequencer in a simple and intuitive manner.

"I first set my eyes on it one Saturday morning in Rough Trade in late June 1979. The record had just come into the shop… I bought it immediately.”Jon Wozencroft on Peter Saville’s work on Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures album cover, as he developed from the ‘Use Hearing Protection’ posters of Factory Records into a graphic design icon.

When King David lamented “How are the mighty fallen” in the Second Book of Samuel, he had more on his mind than the demise of a once promising pop band, but the quote fits the amazing rise and fall of ABC. They were new wave/new romantic gold record-winning hit-makers one day, and flowers in the trash bin of pop history a few short months later. Seldom has a band released an album with so many great tunes that it was a virtual greatest hits collection, only to vanish and never return. Well, okay, they did return, but their albums after The Lexicon of Love were so paltry that even the band’s website sums up their post-The Lexicon of Love output in five sentences. They’re currently playing the new wave nostalgia circuit.