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Beautiful hand made brushes.
These brushes are made by hand using the traditional methods used in brushmaking for hundreds of years. The base of the brush is birch, beech or oak and fitted with natural bristles; flexible horsehair for delicate objects, tough piassava for heavy-duty cleaning, and soft goats hair for sensitive faces. There are different brushes for different uses, like dishbrushes, vegetable brushes, bath brushes, nail brushes, shaving brushes (using badger hair), brooms, scubbing brushes and more and they are all made by visually impaired craftsmen and women. More on the Iris Hantverk website (link to the English version).
11 December 2006
The shoes that came back from the future.
During the late eighties when car business was booming, car manufacturer Volvo (then Swedish, now owned by Ford) made experiments to see if any other production method could out-perform the age-old assembly line. In Uddevalla, not far from Volvo's home turf in Gothenburg, a revolutionary new factory was built. Here, the assembly line was replaced with separate work shops manned by teams of skilled and to an extent self-governing groups of workers.
Everything in this cutting edge factory of the future was given a work-over by designers and experts in ergonomics and production techniques. In cooperation with the old and respected Docksta Skofabrik they even designed and produced a special shoe for the workers to wear. The shoe was called Dovo, possibly from combining the first two letters of Docksta and Volvo. The factory was short-lived, however. As the car industry went into less profitable times in the early nineties, the experimental plant was shut down in 1993 after only six years of production. Volvo forgot about the revolution and went back to the safety of the old assembly line.
The special shoes were all but forgotten, too, until artist (and now entrepreneur) Nina von Schmalensee (sorry, could not find a website) some ten years later happened upon a factory sale where possibly the last of the stock of the Dovo shoes was being sold out. She bought a pair, and as it turned out she liked them so much she ended up wearing them almost daily. After some time she turned to the factory to become a re-seller, but learned that production had stopped years ago, the tools had been trashed and that the factory no longer made the particular soles required for the Dovo shoes.
However, in cooperation with the Docksta factory, she managed to hand-make fifty shoes for evaluation and eventually found a sole manufacturer in the Czech Republic that could match the quality of the old soles. The new, slightly re-designed, (the consumer version has other colors and does not have steel tips) Dovo shoe is now ready for mass production. We attended the pre-launch presentation the other day, and bought a pair for ourselves. After wearing them (albeit only in the house and only for a few days) we must say they seem to be very comfortable. And cool. And that we're looking forward to wearing them outside this summer.
8 December 2006
< Previous | Home | Next >
Beautiful hand made brushes.
These brushes are made by hand using the traditional methods used in brushmaking for hundreds of years. The base of the brush is birch, beech or oak and fitted with natural bristles; flexible horsehair for delicate objects, tough piassava for heavy-duty cleaning, and soft goats hair for sensitive faces. There are different brushes for different uses, like dishbrushes, vegetable brushes, bath brushes, nail brushes, shaving brushes (using badger hair), brooms, scubbing brushes and more and they are all made by visually impaired craftsmen and women. More on the Iris Hantverk website (link to the English version).
11 December 2006
The shoes that came back from the future.
During the late eighties when car business was booming, car manufacturer Volvo (then Swedish, now owned by Ford) made experiments to see if any other production method could out-perform the age-old assembly line. In Uddevalla, not far from Volvo's home turf in Gothenburg, a revolutionary new factory was built. Here, the assembly line was replaced with separate work shops manned by teams of skilled and to an extent self-governing groups of workers.
Everything in this cutting edge factory of the future was given a work-over by designers and experts in ergonomics and production techniques. In cooperation with the old and respected Docksta Skofabrik they even designed and produced a special shoe for the workers to wear. The shoe was called Dovo, possibly from combining the first two letters of Docksta and Volvo. The factory was short-lived, however. As the car industry went into less profitable times in the early nineties, the experimental plant was shut down in 1993 after only six years of production. Volvo forgot about the revolution and went back to the safety of the old assembly line.
The special shoes were all but forgotten, too, until artist (and now entrepreneur) Nina von Schmalensee (sorry, could not find a website) some ten years later happened upon a factory sale where possibly the last of the stock of the Dovo shoes was being sold out. She bought a pair, and as it turned out she liked them so much she ended up wearing them almost daily. After some time she turned to the factory to become a re-seller, but learned that production had stopped years ago, the tools had been trashed and that the factory no longer made the particular soles required for the Dovo shoes.
However, in cooperation with the Docksta factory, she managed to hand-make fifty shoes for evaluation and eventually found a sole manufacturer in the Czech Republic that could match the quality of the old soles. The new, slightly re-designed, (the consumer version has other colors and does not have steel tips) Dovo shoe is now ready for mass production. We attended the pre-launch presentation the other day, and bought a pair for ourselves. After wearing them (albeit only in the house and only for a few days) we must say they seem to be very comfortable. And cool. And that we're looking forward to wearing them outside this summer.
8 December 2006
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DMOZ
Blogarama
Globe of Blogs
Blog Catalog
Nyligen
Weblog Directory
Breaktaker
Linkswarm
Unique Daily
Bloggernity
Blogwatch
Blogs Catalog
Elib Directory
Design sites...
My Air Shoes
Crib Candy
Design Spotter
Zakkaz
Elmanco
Cool Hunting
Design Within Reach
Formens Hus
Excel
Swiss Miss
Design Sponge
Swedesres
Nomadesign
Miood - slodkie inspiracje
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