You know that one friend who’s a stickler for everything neat and precise and perfect? Well, go ahead and show them this, and watch their faces spontaneously convulse in seething rage from the sidelines. It’s a little mean yeah, but anything for that smile on your face right?
That’s if you can stand them, that is.
How does this watering can work? The point is, it doesn’t. Athens-based designer Katerina Kamprani started The Uncomfortable project after failing to finish her studies in industrial design around 2011, and has since been growing it to the collection of objects it is today. And what a triumph it is — she nicely nails that bit of humour and irony in her product design, personally challenging herself to “deconstruct the invisible design language of simple everyday objects and tweak their fundamental properties in order to surprise you and make you laugh”. Obviously, that takes a lot of skill, plus some stellar creativity to boot. Speaking of boots…
These are some cute rain boots huh! And totally useful when waddling around wet weather and the occasional flooding because… oh wait. While a lot of the items are conceptual 3-D visualisations, the designer has gone ahead to create prototypes for some of them, just for the dream of having these infuriating and perfectly annoying objects comes to life. You can totally buy prints of them online. Key among these are is an actual key with a flat head that you’ll never be able to twist, or a chain fork you can never use to stab your food.
Then, imagine how irritating it is to lift the wine glass to your face, only to realise that you can never get to the posh liquid within; or how exactly you’re gonna manoeuvre yourself to make sure every speck of dust picked up from that broom goes into the dustpan. The brilliance of Kamprani’s designs is that they don’t require much explanation — one look, and any sane person would be able to tell how exactly they won’t work, and why that’s immediately hilarious. Go on, have a go:
That’s an inflatable door knob, by the way. Useful!
After this, you’ll probably gain some new perspective on the everyday stuff around you — from the ergonomics of your keyboard or mug or fork, to how perfectly your very normal door knob cups around your hands, to the functional design of the chair we’re currently sitting on. And finally, breathe that sigh of relief.
More of The Uncomfortable collection on theuncomfortable.com.
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