caffettiera

Architect David Chipperfield has redesigned and reissued the iconic Moka Pot for Italian design line Alessi, launching it at the Salone de Mobile of the Milan Design Week.
The original was introduced to the public in 1933, invented by engineer Alfonso Bialetti (*1888 – †1970), this percolator making it possible for more of the coffee-drinking public to enjoy an espresso at home—since previous contraptions were large and unwieldly and not well-suited for domestic use. The trained metal-worker also introduced aluminium for kitchen-use whereas it had not been a common feature beforehand. The redesign is of course informed by Bialetti’s conception but is a hendecagon and closer to circular than the octagon. Perhaps this homage, Alessi being known for commissioning architects to create signature everyday items, will give the struggling Bialetti company the boost to recover and become fiscally solvent again, the once ubiquitous and must-have appliance having lost ground to coffee pads and pods.

flip of a coin

The US General Accounting Office (GAO) is reversing its course on an initiate to replace the paper fibre dollar bill with dollar coins—a rollout began in 2007 but failed to get traction among the public (over a billion of them are stored in the vaults of the Federal Serve)—after revised studies and projections show the transition will be loss making-rather than cost-saving over the decades. Since the plan was conceived, the life span of a dollar bill has more than doubled due to the pivot away from cash-transactions and physical money circulating less. Vending and other coin-operated concessions were reluctant to retrofit their machines as well—many like parking meters and laundry machines having leap-frogged the issue entirely and allow one to wave one’s gadget over it like a magic wand.

rotating elements

Via Present /&/ Correct, we are acquainted with artist Andy Mattern whose extensive portfolio includes a recent, recursive undertaking to photograph vintage volvelles and photographic wheel charts that helped calculate and calibrate exposure and colour saturation with most of the text and numbers removed to bring out the graphic design aspect of these paper analogue computers. See a whole gallery and more of Mattern’s series at the links above.

les géants du numérique

To the consternation of the US and championing an EU-led initiative that failed to pass the supranational parliament last year, France aims to levy a three percent tax on internet behemoths whose profits surpass certain thresholds—seven hundred billion and fifty billion world wide with twenty-five million euro domestically.
The bill, referred to as GAFA for the biggest interlopers—Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple—is expected to pass the Senate with an equally overwhelming margin and Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire says France is honoured to take the first crucial step towards data sovereignty, expecting to glean around half a billion euro in tax revenue annually that will be returned to the public coffers. While the tax burden would certainly not be crippling to the captains of industry, there are fears that the scheme could incite a precedent.

alta california

Seeking the counsel and perspective of history and equipped with the patient and veteran lens of an antique camera that dates back to a time before the current US/México frontier was established and cemented
in a cultish mythology that drapes greed and racism with the civilising sheen of Manifest Destiny and westward expansion, photographer Tomas van Houtryve traced the border as it was before the Mexican-American War, telling the stories of the descendants who instead of crossing the border were rather crossed by it. The collective amnesia and avoidance of a past shameful to recall and confront allows intolerance and the powers of regression not just to keep its pathetic toehold but experience a revival. Learn more about the portraits and landscapes—lines and lineage—at the links above.

socially equitable spaces

The silhouette of the structure depicted struck us as very familiar but it was not until we were acquainted with latest offering from Design Studio Baklazanas, a Constructivism rug inspired by Moscow’s iconic Narkomfin Building (Дом Наркомфина). The utopian landmark was designed by Moisei Ginzburg (*1892 – †1946) in 1928 as an experiment in communal living with common corridors, shared kitchens and living spaces with the architecture acting as a “social condenser” to dispel traditional masculine and feminine roles and became an influential vision for later generations of planners and engineers. More to explore at the links above.

executive function

Whereas most research studies have operated under the assumption that by examining the WEIRDs (that is—Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich and Democratic) we are looking at representatives of humanity as a whole, the cognitive flexibilities demonstrated by populations subject to less stable environments where repetition and conservative behaviour are less tenable are causing ethnographers and psychologists to confront their institutional biases.
Secure in our routines, we adopt one cognitive set, informed by past success and a predictable present context, instead of being receptive to set-shifting, since there’s little sense or economy in reinventing the wheel and expending the mental energies needed for that task, but people like the semi-nomadic Himba of Namibia are rewarded for their mental limberness and willingness to pursue new and novel strategies.

found sounds

Digging through the cast-offs at the Recycling Centre—which is often used as a disposal point for surplus office equipment as much as a place to trade up or declutter—I found a vintage Phillips  dictation machine that’s really robust and solidly-built.
I like especially how the microphone feels and can pretend that I’m recording a podcast. Once I figured out the controls, fortunately it was reboxed with the instruction manual, I started listening to the mini-cassettes, not wanting to inadvertently erase a bit of history. So far, I’ve only made it through one tape—it’s interesting to note how the emphasis was on storage and not necessarily fidelity—and so far encountered an interesting sonic collage of a German woman taping a phone conversation and a man intoning a lesson on Arab vocabulary. “Sadiq means friend.” We’ll see what the rest hold. As always, the Secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions.