A small preview from our latest collection of new designs from Fred & Friends, the Inset Salad Servers are made with brushed stainless steel and nestle perfectly inside one another. Makes a cute gift for your vegetarian friends, or instant conversation starter for your next salad party! Stay tuned in the coming days as we feature more of the latest designs from Fred and Pure Modern.

Owning a pet does not have to compromise any of your contemporary style - Pure Modern offers a variety of unique, functional animal homes that not only cater to your favorite dog or cat, but actually add a stylish dimension to any room of the house. Our newest product, the Cat Quarters serves as a feeding station, litter box storage, scratching post and padded seat all in one.



Or take a look at the ZenHaus Animal Home - large enough to hide away a cat’s litter box or serve as a dog house for any size pet. The ZenHaus is available in 2 sizes and 4 colors, and with a frosted glass top and sleek fiberglass exterior, this animal home is sure to integrate seamlessly into any modern space.

From Innermost’s new lighting collection, the Many Holes and Loop Light Shades (pictured left and right respectively) are two versatile shades that function as your choice of hanging pendants, floor or desk lamps. Choose from our selection of lamp bases or pendant fixtures and these cute shades are ready to hang and provide an elegant modern style to any space.

No need to buy harsh chemicals to polish your silver, instead try some toothpaste!  Use a damp cloth or an old toothbrush to get those hard to polish crevices.  Try it, it really does work (been using this for years)!  See some other green tips from Robert Houser’s greenblog.

When you hear us promote the modern lifestyle, we don’t simply mean furniture and contemporary housewares - we also feature a line of the sleekest personal accessories available anywhere. From Philippi Products - polished stainless steel with leather accented Nailcare Sets, Business Card Cases and my personal favorite, the Giorgio Cocktail Box (pictured right) - It’s a 7-piece set that includes 2 flasks, retractable drinking cups, corkscrew, tongs and more!

Create your unique designs with Fluid Forms; you design it and they produce it.  I especially love the salt/pepper mills and belt buckle.  You can even create your own custom silver ring or brooch.  Poke around the site and see what fun ideas you can come up with.

MORE...

Make them truly eco-friendly by converting them into planters! Fiat placed life-size replicas of their cars on the streets of Milan as part of a green program.

But there is no reason to not use the real thing; click thru for some examples around the U.S.

MORE...

Marc Pascal introduces his new Orchid light to his lineup of fun, elegant, color popping lights. The light can be customized to order with any color you desire to fit your decor.  [seen via Design Spotter]

From Marc Pascal:
Orchid is the culmination of a series of lights; EYOI-YOI, XPLOFF, and ACACIA, that incorporate a kinetic quality through the use of tensile stainless steel wire.
The poly carbonate is given new memory so that the form takes on the likeness of the orchid flower.
Intricate colours and unique patterns are created through the hand dying process.  The result is a lamp that is an illustrious and delicate bouquet.

MORE...

While checking out some of my regular blogs / news feeds over a cup of coffee today, I found on CNET’s news.com site—something unusual.  Usually it’s the same ole’ rambling about gadget crap—However, today was different.  They came upon the smallest micro sculptures in the world!  Intrigued, I started to research Willard Wigan, who in fact DOES make the smallest sculptures!  This man uses dust, human hair, and other odd materials to make fantastic sculptures in the eye of a needle (really!).  I was excited to see that he’s actually exhibiting down the street from my London flat!  So we ventured out, paid our £2 ($3.25) to see about 20 of these unusual things.  Visit his site for more information - [ Willard Wigan ]—and see where his next exhibit will be.  You won’t want to miss it… quite incredible.  (Thankfully they provide the microscopes to see his work… ). 

MORE...

While we featured a new modern light called the BubbleCandy03 on Monday, we also offer a similar Pendant Light for those who simply cannot wait until London’s 100% Design show next month - the Shimmer Pendant Light. It’s made with chrome welded rings and inlayed sporadically with crystal glass.

What is that source - HEMP… yes, that’s right. The Hemecrete blocks are made from renewable hemp (produced in the UK) , lime and water. The material is actually rated as carbon negative and is vapour permeable when used with an appropriate plaster. The material has numerous benefits for energy efficiency, green construction and fire protection rating (which could be a good thing if you have a neighbor or friend who gets confused and lights up a living room wall… )  

I wonder if these speakers really sound like $325K?  Will these speakers deliver the delicious beats as I have heard from the Funktion-One sound system at Sonotheque?  The design could use some work, but feel free to check out some other sexy speakers with a heavy price tag - The World’s 15 Sexiest Speakers [via Audio Junkies]

Olympus Sound System by Adam Audio

This concept should go into production!  The Pulse concept by Teague is great in design and perfect for urban life; especially for a city like Chicago (minus the pot holes).  This concept sports LED turn signals and taillight, counter weighted pedals, rechargeable power pack, and a luminescent frame. [via Core77]

MORE...

Having lived in a fantastic loft fora few years, I have a love/hate relationship with loft living.  I’m in love with the architecture but the practicality of living in an open, hard space is a different story.  Everything echos, hard to install a proper media system, and minimal privacy.  I’ve paid attention to a number of unique projects over the years—and have always lusted after the $110Million Ten Museum Park, a swanky glass tower overlooking Biscayne bay in Miami.  Towering 51 storeys, it’s innovative design was made to take advantage of an unusually small footprint and maximizing views.  Unfortunately, with the incredible bust in Miami real estate, seems as if the developers can’t keep their website up—so a few places to see great pictures:  [ Zilbert ] [ Wikipedia ] [ Old Developer Site ] - Did I mention select residences have private pools above the city!?

Urban Outfitters released a limited edition production run of Polaroid instant cameras this past Friday - if you haven’t gotten one yet you better hurry there are only 700 kits scattered across their US and UK stores. I planned to hit the Oxford St. shop here in London but didn’t make it up there yet. One caveat - unless The Impossible Project gets that film factory up and running that one pack of film isn’t going to last very long.