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Arduino’s $61 Matter Bundle Lets You Build Smart Home Devices That Work With Apple, Google, and Amazon

The smart home space has always had a problem, and that problem has a name: fragmentation. Your Philips Hue bulbs want to talk to your Google Home, your Apple HomeKit wants to command your smart thermostat, and somewhere in the middle, your Amazon Alexa is just standing there, confused. For years, developers and tinkerers alike had to pick sides or wrestle with clunky workarounds. Then Matter came along, and the industry finally had a universal language for connected devices. Now, Arduino wants to put that language in your hands with the brand new Matter Discovery Bundle, priced at a very approachable $61.04.

Because here’s the thing: once every major smart home platform agrees to speak the same language, the real fun begins. Imagine designing your own smart thermostat, building a presence sensor that dims the lights when you leave a room, or retrofitting that vintage lamp on your desk into something your phone can control. Arduino’s bundle turns those ideas from “cool concept” into “actually buildable weekend project,” and it does it without requiring a computer science degree or a garage full of equipment.

Designer: Arduino

The kit is built around the Arduino Nano Matter, a compact but capable little board that forms the brain of whatever connected device you want to bring to life. Alongside it, you get a plug-and-play connector carrier that lets you snap in additional components without any soldering, and three sensor and control modules that cover the core building blocks of almost any smart home creation. One module handles switching real-world appliances and devices, one detects presence in a room using distance sensing, and one reads temperature and humidity. Output, presence, environment. Those three capabilities alone unlock a surprisingly wide range of DIY smart devices, all of which talk natively to Apple HomeKit, Google Home, Amazon Alexa, and Home Assistant right out of the box.

If the idea of jumping into this stuff headfirst sounds daunting, don’t worry… there’s a free 7-course curriculum you can access. Arduino built a free seven-module course on their Cloud platform that takes you from a complete beginner all the way through building devices that can be officially certified and even commercialized. The course balances theory with hands-on building, so you’re always making something tangible rather than just reading about abstract concepts. Complete the whole thing and you earn an Arduino Certified Engineer credential, which is a genuinely useful thing to have if you’re building a portfolio in the product design or IoT space.

The bundle was developed in collaboration with Silicon Labs, whose wireless chip technology powers the Nano Matter board at the kit’s core. All the complex smart home communication happens automatically in the background through Arduino’s Matter library, leaving you free to focus on the creative side of what you want to build and how you want it to behave. That’s been Arduino’s philosophy since the beginning, stripping away the intimidating technical layers so the idea can take center stage.

One small caveat worth knowing upfront: connecting your creations to a live smart home network requires a Thread border router, like an Apple TV 4K or a HomePod. Most households already deep in the Apple or Google ecosystem will have one without even realizing it. For everyone else, it’s a minor additional step before things really come alive.

The bigger picture here is genuinely exciting for tinkerers and creators wanting to hack together a product or an idea within an existing ecosystem. We talk about the smart home almost exclusively as a product category, something you buy off a shelf and plug into an app. Arduino’s Matter Discovery Bundle reframes it as something you design and build yourself, shaped around your actual space and your actual needs. Custom connected devices that fit your life rather than the other way around, available to anyone curious enough to try, for about the price of a nice dinner out.

The post Arduino’s $61 Matter Bundle Lets You Build Smart Home Devices That Work With Apple, Google, and Amazon first appeared on Yanko Design.

Govee’s Pendant Light Is the Temu Sunset Lamp’s Smarter, Grown-Up Cousin

Temu sunset lamp, we had fun. The warm orange glow, the perfect circle on the wall, the way it made any room look like a soft launch music video. But the era of the single-trick ambient light is quietly wrapping up, and Govee’s new Pendant Light is part of what’s replacing it.

This one hangs from your ceiling like it always belonged there, a wide smoked-glass drum shade with the confident silhouette of a proper design fixture. Nothing about the exterior screams smart home gadget. And then you turn it on, and the whole thing comes alive in layers. RGB color pulses along the sides. A warm RGBWW gradient bleeds across the curved interior. Clean white light floods down from the bottom panel for actual task lighting. Three zones, one fixture, and a Govee app full of presets that range from “cozy Sunday breakfast” to “we are absolutely having a party in this kitchen.”

Designer: Govee

Click Here to Buy Now

Three lighting zones make this pendant lamp an ambient gradient you can control. Govee splits the fixture into side, curved, and bottom segments, each independently addressable. The side strip runs RGB for pure color expression and visual drama. The curved middle section runs RGBWW, which is where those buttery gradient transitions happen, the kind that made the sunset lamp so irresistible in the first place. The bottom panel is also RGBWW, tunable from 2700K all the way to 6500K, with 1300 lumens and a CRI of 95. That last number matters because 95 CRI means colors rendered under this light look accurate, which is exactly what you want when you’re plating food or checking whether the steak is actually the right shade of pink.

Matter support ships standard, which in 2025 is table stakes for any smart fixture worth recommending. What that means practically is that the Pendant Light drops into Apple Home, Google Home, Alexa, and SmartThings without friction, no proprietary bridge, no separate hub sitting on your counter. The Govee Home app handles the deeper customization, 80-plus preset scenes, six music sync modes, and a full DIY color editor that lets you set each of the three zones independently. Sync it with up to seven other Govee devices and the whole room moves together. The light also responds to 2.4GHz Wi-Fi, so control is reliable and remote-accessible, not dependent on Bluetooth proximity.

Physically, the fixture weighs 5.29 pounds and the hanging cord adjusts up to 4.92 feet, which gives you enough flexibility to dial in the drop height over an island or a dining table without it feeling either too close or awkwardly ceiling-bound. The smoked glass shell does something clever optically: it reads as dark and sculptural when the light is off, almost like a piece of decorative glass, and then transitions into a glowing gradient object when it’s on. That kind of on/off personality shift is genuinely hard to engineer without the shade looking cheap in one of the two states.

Retail price is $149.99, though it’s been sitting comfortably at $109 on Amazon for months now. At that price, the comparison set shifts considerably. Proper designer pendants with a fraction of this functionality routinely run two to three times higher, and none of them pulse to your playlist.

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The post Govee’s Pendant Light Is the Temu Sunset Lamp’s Smarter, Grown-Up Cousin first appeared on Yanko Design.

This Bonkers F1 Off-Road Racer Concept Puts Senna’s McLaren MP4/4 on Monster Truck Stilts

What happens when you yank one of the most dominant Formula 1 cars in history off the smooth tarmac of Suzuka and hand it the suspension travel of a Baja 1000 trophy truck? Pascal Eggert decided to find out, and the result is equal parts sacrilege and beautiful.

Eggert, a Presentation Director at EA DICE in Stockholm (the studio behind the Battlefield franchise) and former Art Director at Crytek, clearly spends his off-hours channeling a very specific brand of automotive madness. His latest personal project, titled “Offroad Racer,” takes the unmistakable silhouette of a late-1980s Formula 1 car and reimagines it as a lifted, wide-track off-road machine that looks like it escaped from a fever dream involving Ayrton Senna, the Dakar Rally, and a really ambitious RC car collection.

Designer: Pascal Eggert

The primary variant wears the iconic Marlboro McLaren livery in all its red-and-white glory, complete with the number 3 on the nose cone, Honda badging on the rear wing endplates, Shell logos, Canon branding, and Goodyear Eagle tires. For anyone with even a passing knowledge of F1 history, that combination screams McLaren MP4/4, the 1988 car that won 15 out of 16 races with Senna and Alain Prost behind the wheel. It remains one of the most successful single-seater race cars ever built, designed by the legendary Gordon Murray and Steve Nichols, powered by a Honda RA168E turbocharged V6. Eggert has taken that iconic bodywork and done something beautifully absurd with it.

The track width has been stretched dramatically. Long-travel double wishbone suspension arms sit fully exposed at both the front and rear, made from what appears to be tubular steel framework that would look right at home on a desert pre-runner. The ride height is jacked up considerably, giving the car enough ground clearance to tackle terrain that would shred a real F1 car’s floor in milliseconds. Up front, a pair of compact headlights sit recessed into the nose, giving the machine a menacing, almost insectoid face when viewed head-on. And at the back? The entire rear end is stripped bare, exposing a complex engine with a tangled web of exhaust headers, intake trumpets, and mechanical components that give the concept an incredibly raw, mechanical honesty. There is no rear bodywork hiding the powertrain. Everything is on display, and it looks glorious.

The rear wing, meanwhile, stays faithful to its F1 roots, mounted high on twin supports with the Marlboro branding proudly running across its main plane. It is a beautiful contradiction: a component designed purely for high-speed downforce on a vehicle that looks like it wants to jump dunes and spit rooster tails of dirt. A pretty audacious render below shows the car in full flight on a circuit, a helmeted driver hunched low in the open cockpit, flames erupting from the exposed exhaust. It captures the raw energy of the concept perfectly.

Eggert also presents a second colorway that swaps the Marlboro livery for a darker, moodier Martini Racing-inspired scheme. The base shifts to black with the signature blue, red, and light blue stripe work running across the bodywork and rear wing. This version, photographed in dramatic low-key studio lighting, feels like the nighttime counterpart to the Marlboro variant’s daytime bravado. Red LED taillights glow through the exposed rear mechanicals, and the overall effect is significantly more sinister. If the Marlboro version is the weekend warrior, the Martini edition is the car that shows up uninvited to a hillclimb at midnight.

What makes this project so compelling is the tension between two completely opposing design philosophies. Formula 1 cars are perhaps the most track-specific machines ever created, engineered down to the millimeter to extract performance from perfectly manicured asphalt. Off-road racers, by contrast, are built to survive chaos, to absorb impacts, to maintain composure when the surface beneath them is actively trying to destroy them. Eggert has found a surprisingly coherent visual language between these two worlds, borrowing the aggressive aero surfaces and low-slung cockpit from F1 while grafting on the muscular stance, generous wheel travel, and exposed mechanicals of desert racing.

It helps that Eggert brings serious professional chops to the table. His career spans time at Crytek, where he rose to Director of Visual Design and served as Art Director on titles like The Climb, before moving to DICE where he has worked on Battlefield V and Battlefield 2042. The man understands how to make vehicles look both believable and aspirational, and that game-industry sensibility shows in every render. The weathering on the bodywork, the subtle dirt accumulation, the realistic tire textures: everything is dialed in to sell the illusion that these machines actually exist somewhere, parked in a dusty garage, waiting for their next outing.

The post This Bonkers F1 Off-Road Racer Concept Puts Senna’s McLaren MP4/4 on Monster Truck Stilts first appeared on Yanko Design.

This Anxiety Device Hides in Your Fist So Nobody Sees You Using It

Anxiety tools have a strange habit of making things worse. Fidget spinners draw stares across a conference table, breathing apps demand screen time mid-conversation, and wearable buzzers pulse on your wrist where anyone paying attention can spot them. The very act of reaching for help becomes another source of self-consciousness, which is the opposite of what someone in the grip of a social anxiety episode needs. The ideal intervention would be one that nobody else can detect at all.

That is the premise behind LUMA, a concept device that fits entirely inside a closed fist. Shaped like an asymmetric pebble with a two-tone split between a matte dark outer shell and a lighter inner palm surface, LUMA combines tuned haptic vibration with gentle warmth to guide breathing and counter the physical symptoms of acute anxiety. “Designed for Calm” reads the text printed along its curved body, and the device activates with a single push-and-hold action that requires no fumbling, no screen, no second hand.

Designer: Vedant Kulkarni

Early explorations cycled through squares, cylinders, pill shapes, and a water-droplet silhouette before arriving at the final biomorphic curve. Each candidate was filtered through two criteria simultaneously: does it feel natural in a clenching grip, and can it disappear inside a trouser pocket? Thumb indent placement, button positioning, and overall thickness were all iterated with physical models. The result is a device that reads less like a gadget and more like a smooth stone you picked up on a beach, except this one pulses warmth into your palm.

The calming mechanism works in two ways simultaneously. Haptic vibration patterns pace breathing rhythm, guiding the user through inhale-exhale cycles without any visual or audio prompt. Gentle heat addresses the cold-hands response that commonly accompanies anxiety spikes, while also providing a grounding tactile sensation. Picture someone at a networking event, feeling their chest tighten during small talk. They slip a hand into their pocket, squeeze LUMA, and within seconds the device is pacing their breath through their fingertips. Nobody around them notices a thing.

But wait, there’s more! Sitting on a bedside table while charging, LUMA glows softly through its LED light strip and looks like a small decorative object, something between an ambient lamp and a polished stone. It does not look like a medical device or a wellness gadget, and that visual ambiguity is entirely deliberate. Most products in the anxiety-relief space announce their therapeutic purpose through clinical form factors, companion apps, or wearable visibility. LUMA refuses to do any of that.

No handheld object can solve social anxiety. What LUMA proposes instead is that the moment of reaching for help should feel private, physical, and calm rather than clinical or conspicuous. The form factor argument is strong, and the dual heat-and-haptic approach addresses real physiological symptoms rather than just offering distraction.

The post This Anxiety Device Hides in Your Fist So Nobody Sees You Using It first appeared on Yanko Design.

5 Best Third-Party PlayStation Controllers That Actually Beat Sony’s DualSense in 2025

The DualSense arrived with something to say. Adaptive triggers, nuanced haptics, a tactile language that made games feel physically present in your hands — it raised the bar in ways the industry hadn’t anticipated. For a while, nothing else came close. That window has closed. The third-party market in 2025 is no longer playing catch-up. It’s producing controllers with drift-proof magnetic sensors, modular physical architectures, trigger calibration measured in millimeters, and battery lives that nearly triple what Sony ships as standard. The gap has flipped.

The Goo-inspired concept controller at the top of this page is a glimpse at where peripheral design is reaching — fluid, sculptural, unresolved in the best way. It hasn’t shipped. What’s below has. Every controller in this roundup is available now, purpose-built around a specific performance argument, and doing at least one thing the DualSense doesn’t. If you’ve stuck with the stock pad out of habit, these five make a clear case for reconsidering that.

1. Razer Raiju V3 Pro

Razer’s pitch with the Raiju V3 Pro is precise: take the sensor thinking behind their best gaming mice and transplant it into a PlayStation-compatible controller. The result is Tunnel Magnetoresistance thumbsticks — TMR —, and as of 2025, no other PS5 controller ships with them. Where the Hall Effect uses magnetic fields to read position, TMR uses weak electromagnetic waves to detect even finer movement with greater resolution. Drift is resolved at a hardware level, not managed in software. Hall Effect triggers cover the other high-wear surface, meaning every primary input on this controller is engineered against degradation from the start. At 258 grams, it sits lighter than the DualSense Edge without feeling hollow, and the wider grip reduces hand strain across longer sessions.

Six extra inputs are distributed across the frame — four removable back buttons in the rubberized handles and two claw-grip bumpers flanking the triggers — all fully remappable to whatever a specific game demands. Razer’s HyperSpeed 2.4GHz wireless holds latency tight, with a polling rate that climbs to 2,000Hz on PC, a number Sony’s controllers don’t approach. Battery life is rated at 36 hours, nearly triple the DualSense standard. It’s officially licensed for PlayStation 5, requires no adapters, and connects as a native peripheral. For competitive players who want every hardware advantage consolidated in one place, the Raiju V3 Pro is currently the ceiling.

What We Like

TMR thumbsticks are unique to this controller in the PS5 space, resolving drift at a sensor level that Hall Effect doesn’t reach.
A 36-hour battery life and 2,000Hz PC polling rate are specifications Sony’s lineup has no current answer to.

What We Dislike

Haptic feedback and adaptive triggers are absent — a real trade-off for anyone whose gaming skews toward immersive, story-led experiences.
The symmetrical thumbstick layout is a deliberate competitive choice that won’t feel native to players raised on PlayStation’s standard asymmetric positioning.

2. Nacon Revolution 5 Pro

The Revolution 5 Pro starts from a principle the DualSense never acted on: if magnetic sensor technology stops drift, why limit it to the thumbsticks? Nacon applies the Hall Effect to the triggers as well, covering every primary contact surface in a single design. No stick drift, no trigger wear, no gradually worsening feel over months of use. The asymmetric layout mirrors the DualSense’s familiar posture closely enough that the transition is immediate, and the premium materials wrapped around the modular frame feel considered rather than compensatory. It’s officially licensed for PlayStation 5 and built around the ergonomics of long sessions rather than short competitive bursts.

Customization is both deep and accessible. Four profiles can be switched directly on the controller without opening a companion app, though the app itself offers trigger sensitivity curves, deadzone tuning, and full button remapping with genuine precision. Interchangeable thumbstick sizes and adjustable internal weights let players calibrate the physical feel to their own preference. A standout feature that no other controller on this list includes is built-in Bluetooth audio output, letting players pair headphones directly to the controller rather than routing through the console. The Revolution 5 Pro was also designed around a reduced carbon footprint — a thoughtful distinction for a product category that rarely acknowledges it.

What We Like

Hall Effect across both sticks and triggers makes this one of the most mechanically durable pro controllers on the market right now.
Built-in Bluetooth audio pairing is a friction-reducing feature that no Sony controller — at any price — currently provides.

What We Dislike

Haptic feedback and vibration don’t function during PS5 gameplay, which strips out a meaningful portion of the DualSense’s native experience.
The profile and customization system has a learning curve that requires time to work through before its full value becomes accessible.

3. SCUF Reflex Pro

SCUF has spent years earning credibility with competitive console players, and the Reflex Pro is the most technically resolved version of that commitment. The 2025 lineup integrated Hall Effect anti-drift thumbsticks as standard hardware, closing the mechanical gap that had followed the Reflex series across previous generations. Wireless performance is clean, adaptive triggers function as expected on PS5, and vibration rumble stays intact — a combination that most third-party alternatives compromise somewhere along the way. The physical form follows the DualSense’s geometry closely enough that picking it up for the first time feels instinctive. It’s built for precision longevity first, familiarity second, and it delivers both.

The rear paddle system is where the Reflex Pro makes its case most directly. Four fully assignable paddles run along the underside of the controller, each mappable to any function that would otherwise require lifting a thumb from the sticks — jump, reload, slide, crouch, anything the game demands. Your aim stays unbroken at the exact moments it matters. Sony’s DualSense Edge, the first-party pro option, ships with two back buttons at a higher price. The Reflex Pro ships with four. SCUF also offers a Build Your Own path that opens TMR thumbstick selection at the point of purchase, giving players the option to match or exceed the Raiju V3 Pro’s sensor performance inside a controller that keeps full haptic and adaptive trigger compatibility.

What We Like

Four fully assignable rear paddles outperform the DualSense Edge’s two-button setup — more inputs, better placement, and a lower price.
Hall Effect thumbsticks are now standard across the line, making long-term stick accuracy a structural strength rather than a premium option.

What We Dislike

At $269.99, the base configuration is a steep ask for players whose gaming doesn’t warrant a competitive-grade investment.
Selecting TMR thumbstick upgrades through the Build Your Own path increases the total cost meaningfully from an already high starting point.

4. Victrix Pro BFG Wireless

The Victrix Pro BFG Wireless asks a question most controller manufacturers skip entirely: what if the hardware itself could physically reconfigure to match the way you play? The left module is reversible, allowing a shift between PlayStation’s asymmetric thumbstick layout and an Xbox-style offset arrangement by physically swapping a component. Three D-pad options, four interchangeable thumbsticks, four gate options, and a six-button fight pad module fitted with Kailh microswitches extend that physical adaptability into nearly every directional and action input on the controller. The Reloaded refresh, released ahead of EVO 2025, upgraded both sticks and triggers to Hall Effect simultaneously. No other officially licensed PS5 controller — from Sony or anyone else — offers this degree of physical reconfiguration.

The trigger system is one of the more thoughtfully executed on this list. Patented Clutch Triggers offer five discrete stop positions and a hair trigger mode, giving players direct control over how much travel occurs before an input registers. In shooters where response time separates outcomes, that level of calibration is a measurable variable, not a theoretical one. Four mappable back buttons extend the input count further, while the free Victrix Control Hub app handles button remapping, stick sensitivity, and deadzone adjustment without subscriptions or forced account creation. The controller supports wireless play via USB dongle and wired connection for tournament-legal, zero-latency use — two modes of play, one controller, no compromises on either.

What We Like

A reversible left module that physically changes thumbstick layout is a feature category that the DualSense and DualSense Edge both entirely ignore.
Five-stage Clutch Triggers with hair trigger mode offer trigger precision that Sony’s pro controller doesn’t come close to replicating.

What We Dislike

The breadth of customization options means real time must be invested in the companion app before the hardware’s full potential opens up.
Wireless operation runs through a USB dongle rather than Bluetooth, adding a setup step that console-first players may find less convenient.

5. HexGaming Phantom Pro

Most controllers on this list ask for a trade. Usually, it’s haptic feedback, adaptive triggers, or both — the two features most central to what makes the DualSense feel like a DualSense. The HexGaming Phantom Pro doesn’t make that trade. Built on genuine Sony DualSense internals, it keeps adaptive triggers and haptic feedback fully intact. What it layers on top is everything Sony declined to include: Hall Effect joysticks, four tactile back buttons with a precise clicky actuation, adjustable trigger stops, and a physical toggle that switches between adaptive and digital trigger modes on the fly — shifting the same controller between immersive single-player feel and FPS-optimized speed without any software interaction. It’s the controller Sony had the components to build and chose not to.

The detail work is thorough. Eight interchangeable thumbsticks — concave, domed, and extended — let players configure grip geometry to their actual hand shape rather than an assumed standard. Digital triggers travel 1.5 to 2mm before actuating, delivering mouse-click response times for FPS gameplay where that matters. Six swappable profiles handle game-specific configurations on the fly, and the standard version includes a DriftFix system that lets axis deviation be corrected within a 0.12 range without hardware replacement — a calibration tool no stock controller offers. The controller ships as a complete kit with a carrying case and a charging cable. For players unwilling to give up what makes the DualSense good, this is the only way to also gain what it consistently gets wrong.

What We Like

Sony internals mean adaptive triggers and haptics are fully preserved — the only controller on this list that doesn’t require trading them away.
A physical toggle between adaptive and digital trigger modes is a genuinely smart addition that no competitor, first-party or third, provides.

What We Dislike

The base price of $229 is a high entry point, and the Hall Effect configuration — the one worth choosing — costs more.
No dedicated 2.4GHz wireless connection is a gap for players who prioritize wireless performance above the Bluetooth standard.

The DualSense Didn’t Lose. It Just Has Real Competition Now.

Sony built something worth building. The DualSense’s haptic system and adaptive triggers still represent a design vision few peripherals have matched on those specific terms. But hardware doesn’t hold its position by standing still, and in 2025, the third-party market demonstrated it doesn’t have to wait for Sony to move first. TMR sensors, Hall Effect triggers, physical modular reconfiguration, multi-stage trigger calibration — these aren’t experimental features on concept renders. They’re in production, reviewed, and on shelves.

These five controllers are what’s available right now. Whether the priority is maximum input precision, mechanical longevity, total configurability, or keeping every DualSense feature while gaining everything it withholds, the answers exist. The default option is still a good one. It’s just no longer the only one worth considering.

The post 5 Best Third-Party PlayStation Controllers That Actually Beat Sony’s DualSense in 2025 first appeared on Yanko Design.

This €289 Add-On Turns Your €49 Billy Bookcase Into a Standing Desk

Over 120 million IKEA Billy bookcases have been sold since 1979, according to the famed brand. One rolls off the line every five seconds, and at least one is probably within arm’s reach of wherever you’re sitting right now. For most of its 46-year existence, the Billy has been a passive piece of furniture, a storage object that holds books, plants, and the occasional decorative object nobody remembers buying.

Berlin-based designer Michael Hilgers, however, looked at that same bookcase and saw a workspace hiding in plain sight. This gave birth to the STECKRETÄR, a folded steel panel that plugs directly into the Billy’s existing shelf pin holes and folds down into a compact standing desk. No tools, no drilling, no hardware. The name is a portmanteau of the German words for “plug in” and “secretary desk,” which sums up the interaction neatly.

Designer: Michael Hilgers

Made from 2mm recyclable steel, the STECKRETÄR arrives powder-coated in a fine-texture finish across colors like reseda green, mustard, nougat, and rust red. These aren’t neutral tones that blend into the Billy’s usual white or birch exterior but deliberate accents, meant to be seen. The work surface measures roughly 750mm x 330mm, enough for a laptop and perhaps a notebook beside it, though a mouse would be pushing the boundaries of the available real estate.

The scenario where this makes the most sense is familiar to anyone living in a compact apartment. You probably already own a Billy because almost everyone owns a Billy. You need a workspace that doesn’t permanently eat into your floor plan. The STECKRETÄR folds flat against the bookcase when not in use and swings down when you need to answer emails, sketch something out, or take a quick video call while standing.

A few practical considerations temper the appeal. The Billy must be wall-anchored before installation, a step many owners skip and one that involves actual drilling. The work surface offers no integrated power outlet or lighting. And standing is the only option here, since the desk height depends on which row of shelf pin holes you choose along the Billy’s tall frame. IKEA itself now sells a pull-out desk add-on for the Billy, but that version is particleboard and a different interaction entirely, one that slides out rather than folding down.

Hilgers frames the product as a reflection on “the blurring of work and private life” and “the creative reinterpretation of the everyday,” which is a lot of conceptual weight for a folding desk. Whether the STECKRETÄR is a functional home office solution or a limited-edition design statement about mass production probably depends on how you feel about paying €289 to transform something you bought for €49. Either way, it might be the first time anyone has looked at a Billy bookcase and seen potential beyond storage.

The post This €289 Add-On Turns Your €49 Billy Bookcase Into a Standing Desk first appeared on Yanko Design.

This 40-Pound Robot Dog Can Carry 143 Pounds of Cargo

Robot dogs have been having a moment for a few years now. From Boston Dynamics’ Spot strutting through construction sites to viral videos of four-legged machines dancing to pop songs, the quadruped robot has gone from fringe sci-fi concept to a fixture of the modern tech conversation. But most of what we’ve seen has felt like proof of concept, interesting to watch but not quite ready to show up and do real work. Unitree’s new As2 feels like the machine that finally closes that gap.

Unitree, the Chinese robotics firm behind the popular Go2 robot dog, just unveiled the As2, and the spec sheet alone is enough to make you stop scrolling. At about 18 kilograms, roughly 40 pounds with its battery included, the As2 is compact enough to move through tight spaces, yet built to handle a standing payload of up to 65 kilograms. That’s more than 143 pounds sitting on top of a 40-pound robot, which is genuinely impressive and a little hard to picture until you actually see it in action. For continuous walking with a load, it handles up to 15 kilograms and keeps going for over 13 kilometers. Its battery, a 648Wh, 15,000mAh unit, gives the As2 more than four hours of runtime when unloaded, covering over 20 kilometers. For an industrial robot, that’s a serious range.

Designer: Unitree

Speed-wise, it hits over 5 meters per second, roughly 11 miles per hour, which is faster than most people jog. It can climb stairs up to 25 centimeters high, tackle slopes at 40 degrees, and mount vertical platforms as high as 50 centimeters. The torque output sits at approximately 90 N·m with a torque-to-weight ratio of about 5 N·m/kg, driven by low-inertia inner rotor motors paired with industrial-grade crossed roller bearings. The engineering here is dense and deliberate. This isn’t a toy built to look capable; it’s a machine built to actually be capable.

What I find most interesting about the As2, though, is how Unitree is positioning it. The tagline is “Compact Size, Industrial Capability,” but the word they keep coming back to is “companion.” That’s a deliberate choice, and it tells you something about where the company sees this going. The robot dog market has largely split into two camps: big industrial machines that feel cold and utilitarian, and smaller consumer products that are more novelty than anything else. The As2 seems to be genuinely trying to live in the middle, built tough enough for real environments with an IP54 weatherproofing rating and an operating range from -20°C to 50°C, but designed with a level of approachability that suggests Unitree has a broader audience in mind.

The platform is also open, which matters more than it might seem. The As2 supports large AI models for what Unitree calls “embodied AI interaction,” essentially giving developers the tools to build autonomous behavior on top of the hardware. The EDU model can even be expanded with an NVIDIA Jetson Orin NX, which opens the door to more complex AI applications. GPS and 4G are built in, though disabled by default. It runs on an 8-core CPU and comes in three configurations, AIR, PRO, and EDU, each scaled for different use cases from general exploration to full industrial deployment.

What strikes me about the As2 is that it represents a shift in tone for robot dogs as a category. The conversation around this technology has often leaned either dystopian, think surveillance and military use, or dismissive, as if legged robots are just expensive novelties. The As2 doesn’t entirely escape those conversations, but it does reframe them a bit. A machine this capable, this portable, and this open as a development platform has real potential in search and rescue, agriculture, infrastructure inspection, and logistics. The vision of a robot companion that is genuinely useful rather than just impressive is within reach, and the As2 is one of the better arguments for it.

Whether Unitree can translate this hardware into widespread, practical adoption is a different question entirely. But as a statement of where robot dogs are heading, the As2 is worth paying attention to.

The post This 40-Pound Robot Dog Can Carry 143 Pounds of Cargo first appeared on Yanko Design.

Pocket-sized Unix UX-1519 NEOM power bank is your reliable go to gadget

Power banks rely heavily on utility and the portability aspect, so much so that virtually all of them look like a knock-off version of the trusted offerings. Many of these power banks are MagSafe compatible for handy use, while others bump up the battery capacity, fit for power users. Still, most of the available options go for the proven form factor.

The Unix UX-1519 NEOM power bank is different as it takes industrial design into the mix of solid functionality, often customary to a battery bank. If you are already wondering this is a cool concept, the power bank is a real product in fact. The 10,000mAh battery bank for your power-hungry gadgets delivers 22.5W fast charging for compatible devices, never letting you down when on-the-go.

Designer: Unix

This retro modern gadget for your suite of gadgets fits well in the industrial design-inspired universe. That makes it the perfect fit for your existing devices, carrying the same vibe. Imagine a Nothing phone, a Teenage Engineering synthesizer, a Casio Flare Red G-Shock watch, and this power bank to complete the daily driving arsenal. The power bank has a high-density Lithium Polymer battery, which is longer lasting and less susceptible to blasts and fires.

UX-1519 NEOM comes with a Type-C output cable, which doubles as a carry loop. This small detail adds so much value to this already value-for-money gadget. The cable in question supports 12V/1.5A and outputs up to 12V/1.67A for fast charging of your gadgets. It also comes with a USB output port with smart power management to charge two devices simultaneously. To top it off, the power bank has the in-built S-Power smart chipset that ensures stable performance and discharge efficiency. Multiple safety protocols are in place to prevent overcharging, voltage surge or current drops.

The accessory measuring 7.5 × 6.5 cm has a distinct squarish form, unlike other power banks. It has a digital display screen on the top right corner to show the current battery level. According to Imran Kagalwala, Founder and CEO of Unix, “The industrial design reflects that intent, drawing from systems that powered critical infrastructure, while the technology inside meets the expectations of today’s fast-charging ecosystem.” UX-1519 NEOM is priced at a modest $21, which is worth every penny given how this power bank performs, safety and of course the looks.

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Top 5 Japanese Kitchen Knives Under $200 That Professional Chefs Use at Home – Not the Ones They Recommend for Commission

Most knife recommendations come with a quiet asterisk. A brand deal, a commission link, a product sent to a chef’s PO box before the review goes live. What gets left out of that conversation is what the same chef keeps in the drawer at home — the blade they reach for on a Sunday morning when nobody is filming. Japanese knives occupy a rare space where craft, material science, and design intersect, and choosing one well changes the way you cook in ways that are difficult to articulate until you’ve experienced it.

The five knives on this list were chosen for what they do rather than how loudly they market themselves. Some are visually striking in ways that stop you mid-prep, others are quietly exceptional tools that earn no attention but demand all the respect. All of them sit in a price range that rewards cooks who pay attention. Under $200, the Japanese knife category is genuinely competitive, and every pick below earns its place through steel quality, blade geometry, and the kind of design honesty that paid recommendations rarely manage.

1. Black Kitchen Knives

Seki, Japan, carries centuries of blade-making heritage that predates the modern kitchen entirely. The same region that once shaped swords for samurai now produces knives for home counters, and Yanko Design’s pitch-black series makes that lineage feel entirely current. Crafted from molybdenum vanadium steel with a titanium coating, each blade arrives in a matte black finish that is as functional as it is striking. The coating isn’t cosmetic theater — it contributes to durability and surface longevity while making the knife one of the most visually distinctive tools you can introduce to a kitchen without overhauling anything else.

Available in Santoku, Gyuto, and Petty styles, the series covers the full range of tasks that most home kitchens genuinely require. Each blade is crafted individually by a craftsman using a full-scale double-edged grind, which means the cutting geometry is precise rather than approximate. For anyone who has spent time thinking carefully about the objects they interact with daily and expecting those objects to have a point of view, these knives deliver it plainly. Food prep becomes something more considered when the tool in your hand looks like it was made with intention. That shift in feeling is not trivial.

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What We Like

The titanium-coated black finish is striking and purposeful, contributing to durability rather than just aesthetics.
Each blade is handcrafted individually, giving it the qualities of a bespoke object rather than a factory product.
Three blade profiles available mean there is a version here suited to nearly every cutting preference.

What We Dislike

The dramatic visual identity demands deliberate care and proper storage to preserve the finish over the years of use.
Titanium-coated surfaces can show wear differently from bare steel if not cleaned and maintained with attention.

2. Sakai Takayuki KUROKAGE VG10 170mm

KUROKAGE translates to “dark shadow,” and the name earns its credibility from the first moment you pick the knife up. Sakai Takayuki’s fluorine resin coating on the VG-10 blade creates a surface that food simply refuses to cling to, and that quality changes the pace of prep work in surprisingly immediate ways. The hammered concavo-convex texture of the blade reinforces the non-stick effect physically, creating a topography of dimples that reduces contact between steel and ingredient. Pair that with a VG-10 core hardened to 60-61 HRC, and the edge retention consistently outperforms most knives at twice this price range.

Where the KUROKAGE separates itself further is in the details surrounding the blade. The half-rounded octagonal wenge wood handle with a buffalo horn ferrule signals genuine consideration for how a knife is held over time, not merely how it photographs. Each knife is hand-sharpened before leaving the factory, which means out-of-the-box performance is immediate. There is no break-in period, no first session on the whetstone to get it where it should have arrived. For cooks who want a knife that performs as though it were made with a specific user in mind, this is the closest that experience gets at this price.

What We Like

Fluorine resin coating paired with hammered dimples creates food release that genuinely speeds up the rhythm of prep.
VG-10 steel at 60-61 HRC delivers edge retention that outlasts chrome molybdenum alternatives, including the respected MAC non-stick line.
The wenge wood and buffalo horn handle is refined in a way that feels earned rather than decorative.

What We Dislike

The Teflon finish requires careful storage and non-abrasive cleaning to avoid surface damage over the years of heavy use.
The matte tones of both blade and handle show fingerprints more readily than polished steel finishes do.

3. Yoshihiro VG-10 16-Layer Hammered Damascus Nakiri 165mm

Vegetable-forward cooking has a dedicated tool, and most people discover it far later than they should have. The Nakiri, with its flat rectangular edge and full blade contact along the cutting board, makes push cuts through anything from dense root vegetables to ripe summer tomatoes faster and more precisely than any standard chef’s knife allows. Yoshihiro’s 16-layer hammered Damascus version, built around a VG-10 core, adds a visual dimension to that functionality that turns the blade into something genuinely close to an object of craft. The hammered surface reduces friction during each cut, preventing food from sticking and maintaining a clean, fluid motion through the board.

The Western-style mahogany handle extends to the full tang, giving the knife a solidity that feels well-considered for sustained daily use. Certified for commercial kitchens and handcrafted by master artisans, each blade carries Damascus layering that produces a pattern unique to that specific knife. No two are exactly alike — a meaningful distinction in an era of mass production. Whether you’re moving through greens for a salad or working down a pile of root vegetables for a slow braise, the Yoshihiro Nakiri makes even the most routine prep feel like something worth approaching carefully and with the right tool.

What We Like

The 16-layer hammered Damascus pattern is genuinely beautiful, with layering unique to each blade.
The flat Nakiri edge creates more consistent and precise vegetable cuts than a standard chef’s knife profile allows.
Full tang mahogany handle delivers solid balance and structural durability across extended prep sessions.

What We Dislike

The Nakiri is a specialist vegetable blade and is not the right choice for someone seeking a single all-purpose knife.
Damascus finishes require mindful maintenance to preserve both the edge geometry and the layered surface over time.

4. Tsunehisa VG1 Nakiri 165mm

Most knives in this price category top out at VG-10 as their steel of choice, and for good reason — VG-10 is excellent. The Tsunehisa VG1 Nakiri makes a more ambitious material decision. VG-1 steel, enriched with carbon, chromium, cobalt, molybdenum, and vanadium, offers a level of edge retention and sharpness that positions it as a meaningful step above the standard category offering. For a cook who sharpens their own knives and understands what they are working with, the reward is a blade that holds its edge through longer prep sessions before it asks to be returned to the stone.

The design of this knife is deliberate in its restraint, and that restraint is its strongest visual statement. There is no hammered finish, no Damascus drama, no surface treatment that distracts from the blade itself. What remains is the clean rectangular profile of the Nakiri geometry, engineered precisely for vegetable work, and a blade that carries the quiet confidence of a tool that knows exactly what it is. For kitchens that value precision over performance, and for cooks who find more satisfaction in a blade that earns attention through cutting rather than appearance, the Tsunehisa makes an entirely compelling case.

What We Like

VG-1 steel goes beyond what most competitors in this price range offer, making it a genuinely elevated material choice.
The clean, architectural aesthetic feels intentional and considered rather than understated by default.
Enrichment with cobalt, molybdenum, and vanadium produces exceptional hardness and long-term structural durability.

What We Dislike

The higher hardness of VG-1 steel can make the blade slightly more brittle than softer stainless alternatives if used carelessly on hard surfaces.
The restrained design will leave buyers expecting visual drama feeling underwhelmed by appearance alone.

5. SOUMA (Fujiwara Kanefusa) FKM Santoku 180mm

Every list of knives needs one that a seasoned cook would recommend to someone they genuinely care about, rather than someone they want to impress. The SOUMA FKM Santoku, formerly known under the Fujiwara Kanefusa name and recently rebranded without changing what has always made it reliable, is that knife. Made from AUS-8 molybdenum vanadium stainless steel, it delivers cutting performance, rust resistance, and ease of re-sharpening in a combination that makes daily kitchen use genuinely uncomplicated. The Santoku profile, with its tall blade and rounded tip, moves through meat, fish, and vegetables with equal ease and no change in technique required between tasks.

The black pakkawood handle and stainless steel bolster keep the visual profile composed and professional, and the bolster is positioned to distribute weight exactly where the hand expects it during longer prep sessions. This is the knife that sits beside significantly more expensive blades in the same kitchen without apologizing for its price. For first-time buyers of Japanese knives who want something honest rather than showy, the SOUMA FKM is the answer that experienced cooks would give if they weren’t being paid to say something else. Reliable, well-built, and priced in a way that leaves room to build further as the relationship with good knives deepens.

What We Like

AUS-8 stainless steel is genuinely easy to sharpen and maintain, making it accessible without feeling like a compromise.
The tall Santoku blade handles meat, fish, and vegetables with equal competence and no adjustment in grip or technique.
Black pakkawood handle and stainless bolster give it a clean, professional appearance in any kitchen setting.

What We Dislike

AUS-8 steel won’t hold an edge as long as VG-1 or VG-10, so it requires slightly more frequent attention on the whetstone.
The intentionally understated design lacks the visual presence of the other knives on this list.

The Sharpest Decision You’ll Make in the Kitchen

Japanese kitchen knives are one of the few purchases where the return on investment is felt with every single meal. Each knife on this list was chosen because it earns its place through material quality, considered design, and a level of performance that changes the way you move through a recipe. Whether you gravitate toward the visual authority of the KUROKAGE, the Damascus craftsmanship of the Yoshihiro, or the pitch-black confidence of the Yanko Design series, the difference a well-chosen blade makes is immediate and lasting.

The specifics of which knife fits best depend entirely on how you cook. A Nakiri for kitchens that treat vegetables as the main event, a Santoku for cooks who need a single versatile blade that handles everything without fuss, and the Yanko Design series for those who believe that every object on the counter should carry as much intention as the food being prepared on it. The list starts here. Where you go next depends on what you find yourself reaching for first.

The post Top 5 Japanese Kitchen Knives Under $200 That Professional Chefs Use at Home – Not the Ones They Recommend for Commission first appeared on Yanko Design.

This 7-Device Charging Station Glows Like a Lamp and Replaces One

If your bedside table looks anything like most people’s, it’s basically a charging graveyard. There’s a phone, a smartwatch, a pair of earbuds, maybe a tablet, and enough cables to qualify as a fire hazard. The whole setup is functional, sure, but it’s also the kind of thing you instinctively hide behind a lamp so guests don’t judge you. Nova, a concept by designer Parth Amlani, thinks there’s a much better way to handle all of this.

The idea behind Nova is simple but surprisingly rare: instead of designing yet another flat, forgettable charging puck, Amlani went for something you’d actually want to display. The result is a wide, trapezoidal charging station with a sculptural, almost pyramidal silhouette, two open horizontal bays running through its body, and a warm copper accent strip along one side. Put it on a nightstand, and it looks more like a decorative object than a piece of tech hardware.

Designer: Parth Amlani

What makes Nova genuinely clever, though, is that its translucent body doubles as a soft ambient light source, glowing warmly from within when the room goes dark. That means it can replace your bedside lamp entirely, or at the very least make a strong case for doing so. It stops being something you plug in and forget about, and starts being something that actually contributes to how a room feels at night.

The charging hardware underneath all that thoughtful design is no slouch, either. Nova can power up to seven devices at once, with four 15W wireless pads for phones, a 5W pad for earbuds, a 3W watch puck, and two retractable USB-C cables rated at 15W each for anything else that needs a wire. Those retractable outputs are a genuinely useful touch, handling the odd peripheral without leaving a permanent cable draped across your table.

It’s also worth noting that Nova is much further along than the average design concept that looks great in renderings and never gets built. Amlani took it through full manufacturing refinement, including injection-moulding-ready geometry, a snap-fit structure, and a removable back panel for servicing.

The biggest open question is whether its ambient glow is bright enough to stand in for an actual bedside lamp or whether it just adds a nice atmospheric accent. That distinction will matter a lot to anyone hoping to clear some clutter from their nightstand. For now, though, it’s one of the more original answers to a problem that most charging products are content to completely ignore.

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