“Fresh” fruit sold in a posh Tokyo Midtown supermarket. Brilliant symmetries and perfections and curious delicate packing. Sorted and curated specimens. At dinner that night, I was told that Japan basically imports all of its fruit, so it becomes rather like something precious. Perhaps the plastic/foam packaging imp…

A worthwhile challenge for designers — learn how to learn. Self-evident, but I’m just sayin’. Learning the particulars of the mechanics, engineering, materials — what is often waved-off as “technology” — of the objects designed has more value than one might think at first. It’s a bit brutal at times, and daunting, a…

The Service and UI Design within Nokia Design – is expanding, and they’ve got jobs going in Palo Alto and Helsinki/Espoo for both visual and interaction designers. You’d be working directly with Chris, Adam, Younghee and Raph, and just along the org chart from Jan and myself and the rest of the Design Strategic Proj…

While in Japan and discussing design and the implications it can create around action and thought. Nothing mystical, but maybe..For example, the Zero Waste charger scooting around the Design Strategic Projects studio. The design of the activation button which starts a charge cycle that is constrained by time, to acc…

Here in Venice, where there is a tight housing market (but not unaffected by the current deep downturn), if you want to knock down the ugly old and put up your new janga-box architectural, but don’t want to hassle with the permissions to do a new construction, you can leave one wall standing and call the project a r…

It’s curious to think about eateries in time-context rather than categories of food types. In this case late night workers, people out after bar-hopping, people who just don’t cook at home and have midnight cravings. The neighborhood here is somewhat borderline in terms of its geography. It’s several blocks from a u…

What I’m coming to understand is the relationship between art, technology and design as one in which the different idioms of very distinct and displinary practices can be brought together..or not. My insights are not as thorough as yours and more driven by intuition and insight through process and projects. My own d…

Honm Friebe is an economist and journalist and one of the managing directors of Zentralen Intelligenz Agentur in Berlin.

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