GIVING BEAUTY BOTH WAYS
When you have a passion for art and design, it comes out in what you collect and in what you give. We’ve curated a set of exceptional beautiful giving opportunities for art, music, and photography lovers.
From an exquisite masterfully designed vehicle for sound, to a pieces that elevate the creation of beautiful images, here are some of the most beautiful gifts we are eying right now . They give beauty two ways -- in form and in function.
Photo: Courtesy of Hitech. Parrot Zik.
PARROT ZIK HEADPHONES
When it’s time to focus more on the beauty of sound, itself, when it’s time to send ears into rapture, you can still keep your visual aesthetic high with a gift of Parrot Zik Wireless Noise Cancelling Headphones. Designed by Philippe Starck, they are like aural jewelry, embellishing the wearer’s head, while delivering the most real, true, and gorgeous sound.
These headphones deliver further delights. If you can bear to remove the plush cups from your ears, the Zik will automatically interrupt the song that is playing. If you get a phone call, you can keep your Zik on, thanks to its Bluetooth and integrated microphone.
Photo: Courtesy of Bit Rebels. Parrot Zik.
Your gift will come in a glass-like box. You will open it to find the Zik, which will captivate you long before you try to listen. The soft warm leather and polished chrome are a sensual pair, made so by Stark’s play and resolution of clean planes, tight curves, and liquid accents.
Stark keeps the tech in check, insisting on its compliance with his design aesthetic and vision, with the USB cable and the jack lead following along his vision.
Photo: Courtesy of The Gadgeteer. Parrot Zik.
Zik’s Bluetooth can pair with your iPad or another device. The Zik is fitted with an ultra-intuitive touch control panel on the right headphone. Just slide your finger vertically to adjust the volume and horizontally to skip to the next track. Zik’s genius movement recognition algorithm rocks.
You’ll want to download the app for an enhanced experience. The Parrot Audio Suite let’s you customize. The app controls the processor, which spatializes sound and recreates the acoustics of a concert hall, an intimate club, or simply your cozy own living room. It has an equalizer with a number of preset options that can serve the sound up just the way you like it.
Photo: Courtesy of Ekstra Bladet. Parrot Zik.
We fell in love with Lou Reed all over again when we watched and listened to him talk on this video about his passion for sound and his visceral connection to it in an interview he did with Parrot. He made it on September 30th, 2013, just a few weeks before he died.
"I know the way I like things to sound," says Reed. "There is a sound you hear in your head that is your nerves, or your blood flowing. There is the sound of wind. There is the sound of love."
What is your very first memory of sound? Your mother’s heartbeat. "You grow up, from when you were a peanut listening to rhythm," Reed reminds us. "That’s why we love hearing poof - poof - poof."
Photo: Courtesy of Mosspop. Spermatazoa ornament.
SPERMATAZOA ORNAMENTS
Spermatazoa was created as a limited edition of thirty individual unique pieces, each designed, mouth-blown and hand-painted by Victor Chiarizia for the 1998 holiday window of Moss Gallery. It was a controversial show, borrowing imagery associated with sexual reproduction to celebrate the birth of Christ.
Photo: Courtesy of Mosspop. Looking Glass Ornament.
The vision was to present natural conception through traditional holiday ritual, but it made some people crazy. The pieces were taken down and stored for 15 years until now, when these seven spectacular pieces are available once again.
Looking Glass, the most complex of the pieces, is an organic creature, with multiple legs, in need of a looking glass -- A perfect gift for someone named Alice.
Photo: Courtesy of Mosspop. Murano Tumblers.
CURATED MURANO GLASS TUMBLERS
I once purchased 165 place settings of vintage dishes from a series of about 50 yard sales over the course of 3 months because I thought it would be better than renting dishes for a wedding reception. None of them matched, but together they became a beautifully curated collection. And I loved receiving additions from friends over the years.
This curated set of Murano Tumblers is a great gift for someone who appreciates the beauty in mismatch. They are wonderful together or on their own. You can find them at Mosspop.
Photo: Courtesy of Jay Tsujimura. Leica.
WILD & ELEGANT LEICA
Japanese designer Jay Tsujimura has conceived a series of elegant adornments for the classic Leica. These ornamental additions for the hot shoe and soft release components of the camera are styled with organic detailing. Some are carved floral patterns and some present a distinctive stippled texture, mimicking a reptile’s skin, with a leathery touch.
Photo: Courtesy of Jay Tsujimura. Leica.
Tsujimura calls them “Wild & Elegant.” They are available in silver, gold, and platinum, with or without embedded diamonds.
Photo: Courtesy of Nendo. Chocolate Art Supplies.
CHOCOLATE ART SUPPLIES
Two of my dearest loves, painting and chocolate, have come together in Chocolate Art Supplies. Created by design firm, Nendo, for the Seibu Department Store in Japan, this 12-piece paint set is completely edible.
Photo: Courtesy of Nendo. Chocolate Art Supplies.
You can eat the chocolate tubes, of course, as well as the colorful paints, made of different flavors of caramel. The color of the tube labels correspond to the flavors, such as strawberry, green tea, and honey. (via Yatzer)
Photo: Courtesy of Linea Di Sezione. Wearable Wood.
WEARABLE WOOD
It will be held long and often. Fingers will caress its facets and tap gently as they wait for their next move. This gift will carry life, in bits and pieces -- essentials of the moment, in soulful style.
Photo: Courtesy of Tesler Mendelovitch. Wearable Wood.
"Wearable Wood" is a new series of totally original, limited production, luxurious clutch purses from the textile design and development team, Tesler and Mendelovitch. They apply traditional wood craftsmanship to a new technology that they first introduced in their "Diamond Wood" geometric wood surface home furnishing pieces.
Photo: Courtesy of Tesler Mendelovich.
The architectural looking clutches are skinned in real wood, with soft leather lining. The geometric surface design enables flexibility resiliency. They are available in 4 exotic woods, including the spicy scented fine-textured dark brown Emboya, also known as Imbuia, fragrant reddish rosewood, deep streaky ebony, and purplish chocolate walnut heartwood, among others.
Photo: Courtesy of Makerbot. Replicator 2.
If the object of your affection is someone who would rather design and make something beautiful themselves, the gift to give is the Makerbot Replicator 2 , a 3D printer boasting a resolution capability of 100 microns and a 410 cubic inch build volume for creating ever larger things.
It’s ecofriendly too. It was designed and optimized for Makerbot's new renewable bioplastic PLA filament.
Photo: Courtesy of Life With One Eye Open.
Read more about Beautiful Giving, as it relates Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact in our posts throughout this week, including The Most Beautiful Books to Give, Beautiful Then & Always Gifts, and Beautiful Gifts from the Heart & Hearth.
Get busy and enter the BN Competitions, Our theme this week is Beautiful Giving. Send in your images and ideas. Deadline is 12.15.13.
Photo: Courtesy of InterActiveMediaSW.
Also, check out our special competition: The Most Beautiful Sound in the World! We are thrilled about this effort, together with SoundCloud and The Sound Agency. And we can’t wait to hear what you’ve got!
