creative lighting

One of the most overlooked aspect when it comes to remodeling a room, home or even an apartment is the choice of lighting. Lighting sets the mood and the ambiance of any room. You can simply use different forms of lighting along with different lamps and fixtures to re-create the atmosphere of any room without doing much.The use of bright light can bring a cheery feel. There are many ways to use lighting that can totally change the feel and ambiance of the room. This article covers the top 5 tips for creating an overall impact using different types of lighting.

Bottlehood brings a unique eco-friendly menorah from recycled tequila bottle necks

With Hanukkah just around the corner, Bottlehood comes up with an eco-friendly yet stunning menorah that will add a bright touch to the festival of lights. The menorah makes use of reclaimed oak wine barrel staves and recylced Patron Tequila bottle necks designed to hold the candles, preferably soy or beeswax ones, adding to the green factor.

Miniature printer prints big ideas

New technology has enabled the download of information onto the palm of your hand with the introduction of high-tech mobile phones, iPads and more. While surfing the net is easy and efficient, printing the information leads to a lot of wastage of paper and time. If you want to print a small area of data, a whole page is swallowed up and spit out with only the corner being used. Not to mention the time spent on waiting for half a page of blank paper. For those who prize efficiency and paper conservation, the Little Printer from BERG is the best solution. BERG is a London-based design consultant firm specializing in product invention. The Little Printer is slated to be unveiled and available for pre-order in 2012; there is no mention of price.

Blowing NoWhere Wind Turbine: A greener alternative to the diesel-powered electricity generators

The Burning Man festival has given us a lot of radical art including this Zeppelin-inspired Art Car and this rather bemusing bicycle sculpture thing. The European version of the American art festival called NoWhere, however, attracts less hippy-ish crowds. The annual event is held near Zaragoza in north-eastern Spain every July and though the European arts-based event leaves no trace of itself, doesn’t promote commerce and promotes radical self-reliance and radical self-expression just like the Burning Man festival does. It does it in a very distinctly European way. The Blowing Nowhere Wind Turbine by Aran Dasan is one such example of the festival’s cultural distance from the American event and it proves the difference between the American sensibilities driven by consumerism and waste and that of the Europeans that look more towards promoting sustainability.

Solar-powered classrooms to support students in developing nations

As a big relief to the developing nations, a project at the University of Southampton led by Chemistry wizards, Tony Rest (a visiting prof. at the university) and Keith Wilkinson (a former teacher in an International School) has invented solar powered generators. These generators are said to be helpful to students in developing nations to get hands-on science irrespective of power resources available.

It’s apprehensive to any student from the rural areas of a developing nation that how difficult it to get hands on experience on some of the experiments need to get carried out in the classroom. Either it may be due to lack of electricity 24×7 or lack of resources like lab equipment; the students in the developing nations sometimes had to bind to the situations of not able to gain proper/basic knowledge on science subjects.

Tapping the difficulty of students who are not able to get education on science and on any-practical-experiments-needed subjects, now a visiting Chemistry academic at the University of Southampton, Professor Tony Rest and Keith Wilkinson who was formerly a teacher in International School of Lusaka based in Zambia have found solar based solution which can power up digital projectors in a cost effective solar energy panels.

The newly invented solar powered classrooms are better enough to educate modern methods which are being developed in other countries as well as new IT techniques which require class room attention. It’s indeed a sigh of relief to the students in rural areas of developing countries who travel miles away from home, provided the cost effective factor insisted.

How solar-powered classroom works

Solar power generators equip solar panels, batteries and inverters which are adequate enough to charge up even a 50watt-power-supply-required mini projectors through which students can easily get practical training which is accessible through abundant multimedia resources. Having solar power classrooms available to students in the rural areas, it is practically feasible to teachers to show all the laboratory experiments and practical techniques which are required in engineering, physics, biology and many other practical workshop needed subjects.

As the high end projectors requires 200-300 watts power which makes the process very expensive, it is however not in all cases but in some situations suggestible to use 50 watt projectors to optimally utilize the solar battery power.

Addressing to invention, Mr. Tony Rest too has reasoned the lack of electricity in rural areas of developing countries to come up with much deserved idea. He also stressed on the drawbacks which petrol based generators accustomed to face viz. safety hazards and difficulties in supply. As the availability of sunshine is abundant in rural schools, the sustainable solar powered classrooms are indeed cost effective as we can get through Professor’s speech.

With the solar powered classrooms, students are expected to gain more knowledge on practical-attention-required-subjects such as physics, biology, engineering, crafting subjects’ viz. plumbing, carpentry etc.

In hindsight, Mr. Rest and Mr. Wilkinson’s invention through ‘Chemistry Aid’ project - solar power generators is for sure a year ending gift for students in rural areas through which they can gain hands on science and all other practical knowledge needed subjects.

Via: sciencedaily

The good, bad and ugly: Ocean thermal energy

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion or OTEC is the solar energy collector system. It converts the solar radiation to electric power through the difference of cooler deep and warmer shallow to run a heat engine. The heat engine provides greater efficiency and power when they work with larger temperature difference. The temperature difference is highest in tropics between surface and bottom of the sea level. Notably, 10 to 100 time’s greater energy than that of energy obtained by waves can be generated by Ocean thermal energy.

Seven stunning examples of art made from money

Have you ever imagined that the money that we use can be used to create stunning artworks? Yes, it’s true! Some creative people have used the money to come up with artworks that are simply amazing and unbelievable. At a time when we are concerned only about keeping our money safe in bank, these artists and sculptors deserve credit for using their creative skills to come up with pieces of art which are extraordinary. Here is a list of seven stunning examples of art made from money.

Montana Magica lodge preserves the beauty of nature

This vacation, if you want to visit a place with an amazing natural beauty, you are most welcome to the Montana Magica lodge which is situated inside the Huilo Huilo Biological Reserve, Andes of Patagonia. Located in the heart of the 10,000 acre Chilean rainforest, Montana Magica is one of its kind lodge with an incomparable beauty. The extraordinary fact about the lodge is that it is completely man made. The credit for creating this masterpiece goes to Puerto Fuy Neltume and the craftsmen of the nearby areas. The building is totally covered with greenery and it very well mingles with its surrounding.

Nanushka gets unique fabric home in Budapest

Szandra Sándor, the designer of the Hungarian fashion brand Nanushka, has opened a uniquely designed temporary fashion store in her hometown. The latest addition to the Fashion Street in Budapest, Hungary is designed by a bunch of enthusiastic architecture students. The architectural team behind the new Nanushka Beta Store consists of Daniel Balo, Zsofi Dobos, Dora Medveczky, Judit Emese Konopas and Noemi Varga.

Europe’s first recycled plastic bridge unveiled

Axion International Holdings Inc., the New Jersey-based developer of patented structural plastic products, has announced the completion of Europe’s first recycled plastic bridge. The bridge that spans the River Tweed at Easter Dawyck in Peeblesshire, Scotland is made up mainly of the eco-friendly recycled structural composite (RSC) material developed by Axion. The next-generation building material contains 100 percent recycled plastic.