Long-time contributor and wide-reading eagle-eye Susan Dworski alerted us to Core 77’s Weekly Design Roast, which gives our Annals of Bad Design a serious run for the money.  Every week, industrial designer Rain Noe deconstructs high-minded, idiotic design with an acute eye, channeling her imagining of the design thinking behind it. As Susan wrote: “all of them, so funny, and comments!”

Here are some favorites, starting with the amazing leg chair, above, and the (imagined) design thinking:  “We have a deal with a leg manufacturer where if we move a lot of legs, we get a kickback.”

“While most beds provide convenient ingress/egress from the sides, I wanted to design one where you need to crawl in and out through the foot of the bed. I also wanted it to be difficult to make the bed each morning.”

“My design conveniently stores the staples in the top of the stapler. You know, the part of the stapler that you press on with your…hand. Okay, maybe I didn’t think this through…. Hey Jeff! Jeff! Do you know if they make blunt staples?”

“I don’t like how people can just pop earbuds in without paying careful attention. This fixes that.”

“I wanted to design a bed that makes both sleeping and having sex more difficult.”

“Bananas can be tough to cut into slices. So I designed this plastic object, which is as difficult to clean as Venetian blinds, to solve the problem.”


“I wanted to design a piñata for bears.”

“As an architect, I like to have control. With staircases, it’s always bothered me that my clients could choose which foot to place on which step. With this design, I am able to dictate which steps I want you to use your right foot on, and which are for your left foot. You use these the way I decide you use them.”

“When dining, I like to have a white cylinder of light blocking my visibility of the person across from me. I also love this thing because after my guests leave and I close it up, the room is dominated by a hulking white pod.”

“What’s the big deal? Just wash your hands after you use it, you puss. This is a space-saving design.”

“You told me the bike lane needed drainage, but you weren’t specific about how bicycle tires work. So I don’t think this is my fault.”

“Instead of buying a versatile sponge that can be used anywhere, buy our proprietary sponges that attach to our plastic sponge handles. And who among us doesn’t want to pretend they’re ironing clothes while they’re scrubbing a sink?”

“This works great! (Except for that one time I forget to set the parking brake. Yeah, that was pretty bad.)”

 

More here.

 

Thanks Susan!

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2 replies on “The Best of Core 77’s Hilarious Weekly Roast of Really Bad Design

  1. “My design conveniently stores the staples in the top of the stapler. You know, the part of the stapler that you press on with your…hand. Okay, maybe I didn’t think this through…. Hey Jeff! Jeff! Do you know if they make blunt staples?”

    You conveniently left out that the stapler comes with a top, which would protect the end and complete the appearance as a whale.

    Jesus, even a short image search will reveal that, if the ridge for the top’s lid (not shown here) hadn’t made it abundantly clear.

  2. My sincere apologies for taking so long to respond. Somehow I missed this. You’ve probably figured out that the lamb needs to cook the full 7 hours to achieve that extraordinary texture. In retrospect, my giving the internal temperature probably is not necessary. “Falling off the bone” will automatically be the right temperature. I didn’t think to what that temperature might be if the lamb was only cooked a few hours…

    I hope you’ve found your way with it. It is a favorite, almost foolproof, recipe. And there are many delicious things to do with leftovers.

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