Awesome Art & Design

Switch things up for the holidays by displaying Treetopia’s Knocked Upside-down Christmas Tree. Not only does it look funny, it also takes up less floor space so you can fit it even in small rooms. It comes with 500 clear lights, a stand, a foot switch and extra bulbs and fuses.

Taiwan design outfit Mininch presents a stainless steel writing instrument that conceals a second purpose. Simply remove the pen’s barrel, undo the safety lock, and you’ve got a tiny pair of scissors that goes anywhere. Given their size, they should be TSA-friendly too.

Quartertwenty created this slick piece of upcycled modern furniture which is made using cork from inside of aluminum baseball bats. The cork provides style and cushioning, while aluminum rods and steel provide stability.

Alessandro Novelli created this animation about a source of light born into the world with the endless possibilities, and how expectation forces it to conform, gradually losing what made it unique – a metaphor for certain aspects of our lives that many of us can relate to.

Looking for a unique geeky gift? Heartwood Editions makes intricate, limited-edition, laser-engraved wood wall art based on franchises like Overwatch, Street Fighter, and Starcraft. Each measures 11.5″ x 17.5″ x 1″ thick. Also sold as a discounted 3-piece bundle.

A fun play on classic diner menu sign boards, ThreePotatoFourCo’s 10″ x 3.5″ black-on-white desktop version challenges you to spell out your thoughts with the utmost economy of language. Includes an oak wood base and 145 interchangeable letters and numbers.

END. Clothing’s upcoming exclusive Vans collaboration twists the classic checkerboard pattern into an “optical-whirl.” The pattern will be available on the OG Slip-On and the OG Old Skool. Both shoes are made of jacquard, canvas and leather. Drops 12/8/18.

April Soetarman’s work went viral when she anonymously installed what looked like a street sign, but actually said “Attention: You Are Wonderful And Deserve Every Happiness.” You can now get that sign as well as others she made by helping her raise funds.

Etsy shop Foxbairn makes custom family tree or genealogy chart engravings on a cross-section of a tree. The laser engraving is highly detailed, and the wood is obtained from a sustainable forest. They offer the chart in 3-, 4-, or 5-generation versions.

Like their dinner plates, Calamityware’s porcelain ornaments feature tiny towns experiencing big disasters, from volcanoes, to sea monsters, to giant robot attacks. Sold in series of four images, each 3.75″ ornament has the same design front and back.

These small wooden birdhouses from OneManOne Garage are inspired by the look of classic Scotty campers. Each one comes flat-packed and ready to assemble without glue. Available fully-painted or unpainted if you want to do your own decodrating.

French artist Parse/Error created a machine to produce his rhythmic and undulating line drawings. The designer conceives each image on a computer, while the machine acts as his hands and outputs his work. You can purchase original drawings in the Parse/Error shop.

The artist Monde makes unique dioramas that are meant to be inserted between books in a bookshelf. The dioramas look like urban back-alleys, with air conditioners, pipes, windows and doors. They even have working lights.

To celebrate the International Space Station’s 20 years, the ESA released this 15-minute continuous time-lapse video captured by astronaut Alexander Gerst, as the ISS orbits the Earth two times over. The clip is comprised of 21,000+ images captured over about 3 hours.

From The Flintstones to Scooby Doo, the cartoons of Hanna-Barbera are as memorable for their characters as they are for their sounds. Patrick Sullivan’s video looks at how limited animation budgets and time forced the use of sound to bring scenes to life.

Designer Duncan Shotton makes some very cool stuff, like pencils that leave rainbow-colored shavings. He also makes a teensy-tiny solar system with meticulously hand-painted pushpins, along with an optional cast-concrete moon pin.

Photographer Lars Leber captured this breathtaking footage captured from a vantage point above the clouds near Colorado Springs. By speeding up their movements using via time-lapse, the puffy white clouds look like the undulating waves of a surreal sky ocean.

Keith Williams of Oddball Gallery shows off a sculpture he created from birch plywood. He first cut and assembled 180 triangular pieces into a geodesic orb, then sanded it to smooth the edges and reveal its grain. The sander time-lapse is so awesome. Here’s its little brother.

3D printing company BigRep shows us how far the technology has come by creating NERA, an electric motorcycle. With the exception of its electronics, all of the motorcycle’s components were 3D printed. That includes its airless tires, frame, fork and seat.

Artist Tim Klein loves to combine i mass-produced puzzles, which are often cut on the same dies, then mixes the identically-shaped pieces into “a surreal picture that the publisher never imagined.” Unfortunately, all of his works are sold out as of this writing.

It’s time to kick some ass with this wall clock from WHENWATCH. The clock features an unspecified martial artist obviously based on Bruce Lee, whose body twists and turns to tell the time. His torso is the hour hand, his right leg tells minutes, and his left leg is seconds.

Alex Sherwood, Ben Harper and Sean Mullen of Giant Animation Studios’ amazing short film proves that animation is definitely not just kid stuff, with their tragic tale of a shipwrecked and injured fisherman as he searches for signs of life on the island where he was stranded.

We’re looking forward to The Royal Ocean Film Society’s upcoming three-part film essay about the history of animation, and a group of rebellious animators whose creativity changed the course of the medium forever. Part one drops on 11/27/18 on their YouTube channel.