Oct
31

By

AI Lantern Speaker Designed to Reduce Anxiety With Light and Sound

Category: YankoDesign

Most home gadgets are designed for function, not feeling or emotional connection. Lamps and speakers fill their roles effectively enough, but rarely do they offer comfort or companionship during quiet nights or moments when you need a little extra calm to soothe anxiety. Finding a device that addresses both practical needs and emotional well-being remains surprisingly difficult in modern home technology.

Calmtern reimagines what a home object can be by blending a portable lantern with an AI speaker in one thoughtful package. It turns light and sound into a source of emotional support, making every room feel a little more welcoming and a lot more personal. The concept is simple yet powerful: bring comfort wherever you go in your home, whenever you need it most.

Designer: Hyun Jin Oh

Calmtern’s silhouette is inspired by classic lanterns, with a translucent upper body for soft, diffused light and a ribbed base that houses the speaker and controls. The integrated handle makes it easy to carry from room to room, hang on a minimalist stand, or set on a bedside table wherever comfort is needed. The portable form invites movement and flexibility throughout your daily routine.

The minimalist design, matte white finish, and lack of visible branding let Calmtern blend into any space seamlessly, from modern apartments to cozy bedrooms and hallways. The ribbed texture provides visual interest and tactile grip, while the clean silhouette feels timeless rather than trendy. It’s a device that looks as good on display as it does tucked away when not in use.

The lantern emits a gentle, warm glow that reduces anxiety and creates a cozy atmosphere perfect for late-night reading, winding down before bed, or simply making a dark room feel safe and inviting. Touch controls on the top panel make it easy to adjust brightness or volume without fumbling for switches or apps in the dark when you’re half asleep.

Calmtern is designed to move with you throughout your daily life and routines. Use it as a reading lamp beside your favorite chair, a bedside companion that plays calming sounds for sleep, or a portable speaker for music and podcasts in any room. The rechargeable design means it’s just as useful on a patio as in a hallway, and the gentle light is ideal for nighttime trips.

Beyond practical functionality, Calmtern is a calming presence that helps reduce feelings of loneliness or anxiety when living alone, making the home feel warmer and more inviting during difficult moments. The combination of soft light, smart sound, and intuitive controls creates a daily ritual of comfort and relaxation that goes beyond what typical smart home devices offer users.

The sculptural form and ambient glow turn Calmtern into a visual anchor for any room, sparking conversation and encouraging moments of pause in otherwise hectic days. For anyone who wants their home to feel as good as it looks while maintaining simplicity and emotional comfort, this concept offers a compelling vision of design where technology and well-being move together naturally.

The post AI Lantern Speaker Designed to Reduce Anxiety With Light and Sound first appeared on Yanko Design.

Oct
31

By

Waveshare MK20 Macro Keyboard Turns LCD Keys Into Creative Tools

Category: YankoDesign

For anyone who juggles creative projects, streaming, or multitasking throughout the day, a regular keyboard just doesn’t cut it anymore for complex workflows. Shortcuts, macros, and visual feedback can make or break your workflow, but most macro pads feel either too basic for serious work or too locked down to customize the way you actually need them to function properly for your specific use case.

The Waveshare MK20 macro keyboard changes the game with 20 mechanical keys, each topped with a full-color LCD display, a 2.8-inch secondary screen, and dual programmable knobs for precise control. It’s a control deck that’s as expressive as it is powerful, designed for users who want complete creative freedom over their workspace and workflow without compromising on build quality or functionality.

Designer: Waveshare

The MK20’s compact, square form is crafted from aluminum alloy with a 2.5D high-transparency acrylic lens, giving it a premium, sturdy feel that matches high-end keyboards and professional gear. Available in black or white finishes, it looks right at home next to professional monitors and mechanical keyboards on any creative desk. The build quality is immediately apparent, with satisfying tactile feedback and durable materials throughout.

Each 0.85-inch LCD keycap can display static images, animated GIFs, or even video snippets, letting you theme your deck for different apps, games, or moods throughout your day and workflow changes. The secondary 2.8-inch display up top shows system stats, weather widgets, or custom information at a glance. The 20-screen splicing feature lets you create panoramic backgrounds across all keys for stunning visual effects.

Two high-precision, anti-slip aluminum knobs can be programmed for volume, timeline scrubbing, zoom, or any function you need during work or play sessions. Both rotation and press actions are supported, making them perfect for creative software like Premiere Pro or Photoshop, where precision control matters most. The tactile feel and smooth operation make adjustments satisfying and accurate every time you use them.

The MK20 runs a dual-system architecture with a T113-S3 processor running Linux for complex display logic and a GD32 MCU running QMK firmware for zero-latency mechanical input. Macros, key combinations, and mouse control are natively supported in QMK, and the drag-and-drop theme editor means you don’t need coding skills to make it your own or share configurations with the community.

The keyboard supports dynamic theme editing, real-time data widgets like CPU temperature and network stats through LibreHardwareMonitor integration, and even AI voice interaction for hands-free control during busy sessions. Home Assistant integration lets you control smart lights, devices, or automation with a single tap. The feature set goes far beyond basic macro functionality into true workspace automation territory.

With a detachable 24-degree stand, USB-C connectivity, Kailh Box Silent switches for quiet operation, and hot-swappable keys, the MK20 adapts to any workspace setup seamlessly. Whether you’re editing video timelines, streaming gameplay, or automating repetitive office tasks, it brings both power and personality to your desktop without taking up excessive space or requiring complicated software installation procedures.

The Waveshare MK20 is a macro keyboard built for users who want complete creative control over their workflow and visual environment. With its LCD keys, dual knobs, and open-source foundation, it offers the kind of flexibility and personality that typical macro pads simply cannot match, making it a compelling upgrade for anyone serious about their desktop productivity and creative expression.

The post Waveshare MK20 Macro Keyboard Turns LCD Keys Into Creative Tools first appeared on Yanko Design.

Oct
31

By

Canva makes pro-design tool Affinity “free, forever”

Category: Design Week

Canva is making its pro-design tool Affinity “free forever” in a bid to upend the design software market.

The company announced today it is relaunching the tool with “substantial changes” that make Affinity “truly a competitive product against the incumbents in this space.”

And by making it free for everyone, Canva is clearly parking its tanks on Adobe’s lawn.

“When Canva launched, it was consciously trying to change the world, in terms of how non-experts could design,” Canva’s Duncan Clark, head of EMEA, explains. “We see this as changing the world for how experts, and potential experts, can design.”

Nottinghamshire-based Serif released its first app, Affinity Designer, in 2014, before adding Photo and Publisher tools. They refreshed the whole suite in 2022. Canva bought the company last year, in a deal reported to be worth $380million.

Affinity currently has five million downloads, but has added 1.5 million of those in the 18 months since it was acquired.

Adobe currently has more than 30 million paying users for its creative apps, but Clark believes the new Affinity is well-placed to take on its rivals.

The new app brings all of Affinity’s tools into “one powerful product with one universal file type,” which means users will no longer need to switch between different applications for different types of design.

“That was a fragmented experience,” Clark says. “With Affinity Studio, if you move between Vector and Pixel, the tools change, but you’re still in the same canvas.

“This is a breakthrough in how professional design tools are structured, and an architectural change that we deeply believe in. It feels very weird that it was ever separate.”

There is also a focus on performance and immediacy, to create what Clark calls an experience that “feels like an extension of your brain.”

The new Affinity website

Affinity is also rolling out a new identity, created by the in-house Canva and Affinity teams, in collaboration with Barcelona-based Twist Studio. The visual and verbal rebrand is designed to reflect Affinity’s move from challenger brand to part of the design establishment.

Many designers are wary of Canva, feeling that its mission – “to empower the world to design” – undermines the value of professional design work, and even takes jobs away from the industry.

But Clark says the two are not mutually exclusive.

“There’s always a fear, when a new technology brings capability to more people, that it might undermine the experts,” he says. “We don’t believe that’s true.”

“The role of the professional designer is more important than ever.”

He draws a parallel with computing, where democratisation of home computers made more people tech-savvy, and so, Clark says, changed and enhanced the role of computer experts.

“The role of the professional designer is more important than ever – as the taste maker, the craft expert, the person who can provide the visual layer on top of what everyone else is doing,” Clark says.

“But also we think there’s an amazing opportunity for those professional designers to become the enablers of the rest of the organisation – to create something beautiful, and help everyone use it in the right way.”

He says the new Affinity has been built to address professional designers’ frustrations with existing tools, “which we heard are overpriced and insufficiently innovative.”

And Clark says that by making the tool free, it opens up professional design careers to people who might have previously been priced out of it.

“There’s no catch, no stripped-back version and no gotchas,” Affinity CEO Ash Hewson says. “The same precise, high-performance tools that professionals rely on every day are now open to all, because creative freedom shouldn’t come with a cost.”

Adobe doubles down on AI

Canva’s move comes in the same week as Adobe announced a raft of AI innovations at its Adobe MAX conference in Los Angeles.

The new AI capabilities are designed to help creators, “work faster and take on more opportunities by expanding creative possibilities and removing time-consuming tasks and creative barriers.”

The announcements included a beefed-up version of its Adobe Firefly generative AI tools, with a particular focus on video. They are rolling out generative soundtracks and voiceovers, as well as improving Premiere Pro with an AI Object mask, and enhancing Photoshop’s Generative Fill.

Adobe is also giving users more choice to work with other companies’ generative models, like Google, OpenAI and Runway.

Perhaps most intriguingly, Adobe announced Project Moonlight, a cross-app AI agent designed to act as a creative partner and project manager, overseeing and connecting other AI assistants.

And not to be left out, Figma has also been making moves. It announced today it has acquired generative AI platform Weavy. As Figma Weave, it will, “build out image, video, animation, motion design, and VFX media generation and editing capability on the Figma platform.”

Figma also rolled out new releases at its Schema event this week.

“Quality and taste matter more than ever now that the boundaries between product, design, and engineering are blurring, and more people – and AI tools –contribute to the product development process,” Figma’s VP of product, Paige Costello wrote.

“Design systems have long been the key to driving consistency between design and production at scale. Now they have the potential to be not just a shared language for product builders, but also the translation AI needs to understand design and code. In this way, design systems are evolving from static standards into living systems that product teams can build on.”

The new innovations include extended collections, a more efficient way of managing multi-brand design systems, check designs, which smoothes the handover to developers, and make kits, which allow users to import asset libraries from Figma into Figma Make.

Together, the changes are designed to make it easier for teams to “scale their design systems across new paradigms,” Costello says.

Source

Oct
30

By

Hardware is the New Salt: Artificial Intelligence and the Edge of Intent

Category: Core77

Kirk James, Principal, CEO at Cinco

With every new technology platform or toolset, and with the general maturation of manufacturing alongside design and engineering, we’ve seen something subtle but powerful happen over the past few decades: deeper integration. Teams that once worked in parallel now converge. Those who thrive are those who can bring together supply chain thinking, manufacturing expertise, material innovation, and advanced engineering.

Consumer electronics brought out the best in this convergence, especially for electrical engineers. But I’d argue it was the mechanical designers who defined the interface, who built the shell between emerging technologies and the real world.

Editor’s Note: This essay is part of a new series exploring how AI is transforming the way physical products are imagined, designed, and built. Hardware is the New Salt will spotlight several thinkers and makers at the intersection of AI and product design and their insights into this dynamic technology ecosystem. This series is supported by Enzzo, who offers an AI-first product development platform created to support the next generation of builders.

On the design side, we’ve always chased that moment when an innovation doesn’t just give us better tools—it gives us more freedom. More expressive range. More opportunity to shape something meaningful.

Whether it was early CAD, SolidWorks, or modern simulation platforms, the deal was always the same: learn the tools deeply and you’ll unlock their potential. Fluency was the price of freedom.

Now something else is happening. The tools are changing—and so is the nature of fluency.

What we’re seeing with AI is a different kind of liberty. You don’t necessarily need to master a tool in the traditional sense. Instead, you need to engage with it intelligently. If you can articulate your intent—if you can curate a process—AI can help you realize ideas that once required years of technical training. That’s a profound shift.

It means a new kind of designer is entering the conversation. Not necessarily someone from a traditional technical background, but someone with imagination—someone who can guide AI toward outcomes that matter. And they’re achieving results. Compelling ones.

But it’s also confusing.

When someone doesn’t come from product design, it’s easy to jump too quickly into solutions that aren’t thoroughly thought through. You can generate something that looks viable, but has no real path to manufacture. Due to the complexity and potential of AI, even the most brilliant minds are adopting a phased approach, beginning with a careful exploration of its possibilities to ensure effective and responsible utilization.

We’re not at the point where AI can create a manufacturable product on its own. Not yet.

Still, the shift is fundamental. More people can now participate in design—and that’s a good thing. But we’re also witnessing a loss: specialized skills that were once rare are starting to feel like commodities. That’s the cost of automation. And we’re all going to feel it.

But the real opportunity isn’t just in what these tools can do today—it’s in what happens two, three, four generations from now. As our ability to curate and prompt improves, we’ll get closer to truly intentional results. Not just happy accidents.

That said, there’s value in those accidents. Early on, especially in branding, people loved the serendipity—put in a prompt, get something surprising back. Suddenly, you’re the editor, not the maker. That’s exciting. Serendipity reveals things we wouldn’t have found otherwise.

But if we rely too heavily on it, we get soft. We stop pushing. We stop refining. And then we don’t get what we intended—we just get what the algorithm gave us.

This applies in industrial design, too. Some interesting forms emerge from these tools. Yet, it still requires considerable effort to transform those forms into something that can be built. That gap is real.

The tools will improve. They’ll get smarter, more accurate, and more aligned. But adoption right now is messy. Chaotic. Everyone’s coming at this from a different angle, without shared standards or principles. It’s asymmetric and scattered.

The winners? They’ll be the ones who can bring order to that chaos. Who can tie systems together? Who can make the tools not just more straightforward to use, but better at understanding what designers want? Tools that align with creative intent, not just generative capacity.

And then there’s trust.

That’s the big one. Some people still have a gut reaction against AI-generated content—as if it’s less valuable, less “real.” That reaction isn’t going away anytime soon. But trust will come. It’ll grow when these systems start delivering reliably, when people see that creativity and AI can coexist, not in tension, but in collaboration.

We’re not quite there yet. But we’re getting closer.

About the author:
Inspired to help craft a new generation of design-driven brands, Kirk James formed Cinco in 1998 to help innovators connect big ideas to people who crave them. Since then, he’s been leading a dynamic team of strategic thinkers and designers working to bring 360° brand experiences to life, building brands that not only endure but keep breaking through year after year. Working with start-ups to Fortune 100, from C-Suite to the front line, he knows what it takes to drive affinity and growth. A designer at heart, he can’t resist a blank sheet of paper.

Oct
30

By

A Clever DIY Jig for Repeatable Lathe Work

Category: Core77

Alex Beloborodov is a Tbilisi-based custom furniture marker. Despite his experience with woodworking tools, he’s new to turning; and faced with a project that required him to make hundreds of the same leg on a lathe, he came up with a clever jig that provides real-time visual feedback on which parts of the blank need to be removed.

As he sneaks up on the profile, the relevant pieces of the jig fall away, signaling completion of that particular contour:

I imagine it was painstaking to set up, but super satisfying to use.

Oct
30

By

When Jewels Became History: The Lost Treasures of the Louvre

Category: DailyArt Magazine

The post When Jewels Became History: The Lost Treasures of the Louvre appeared first on DailyArt Magazine.

Oct
30

By

Rediscovering Catharina van Hemessen: The Story of a Renaissance Artist in 6 Paintings

Category: DailyArt Magazine

The post Rediscovering Catharina van Hemessen: The Story of a Renaissance Artist in 6 Paintings appeared first on DailyArt Magazine.

Oct
30

By

Halloween Monsters: What Our Fears Reveal About Society

Category: DailyArt Magazine

The post Halloween Monsters: What Our Fears Reveal About Society appeared first on DailyArt Magazine.

Oct
30

By

This 3D-Printed Soufflé Lamp Is Rising to the Top in Paris

Category: YankoDesign

You know that magical moment when a soufflé rises in the oven, all light and airy and impossibly delicate? That’s exactly the energy Paris-based AEREA STUDIO captured with their Soufflé Ceramic lighting design, and honestly, it’s the kind of piece that makes you want to rethink everything on your shelves.

AEREA STUDIO is both a design studio and Parisian brand creating collectible design pieces that blend innovation with artisanal craftsmanship. Founded by designer Camille, the studio draws inspiration from the golden age of design, specifically movements from the 1940s to 1970s, with a focus on creating pieces that combine quality, durability and innovation. But here’s where it gets interesting: they’re not just looking backward for inspiration. They’re using cutting-edge 3D printing technology to create pieces that feel simultaneously retro and futuristic.

Designer: Aerea Studio

The Soufflé Ceramic comes in multiple configurations, including table lamps and pendant versions, each one a sculptural object that commands attention even when switched off. The exterior features that signature matte, pale celadon finish with horizontal striations that are the telltale mark of 3D printing. These aren’t flaws to be hidden but rather design elements celebrated for their rhythmic, organic quality. Each ridge catches light differently, creating subtle shadows that shift throughout the day.

But the real surprise happens when you turn it on. The piece reveals a glossy, jewel-toned interior in vibrant shades of pink, red, orange, and purple that contrasts beautifully with the understated exterior. It’s like cracking open a geode to discover brilliant crystals inside. The colored glaze creates this warm, saturated glow that transforms the ceramic shell into something almost alive. When lit, concentric ripples on the interior become visible, spiraling inward toward the light source like a vortex of color.

What makes AEREA STUDIO’s approach so compelling is how they’re merging old and new. Their sculptural objects play with optical effects and unique textures to transform perception and redefine functionality, all within a sustainable design approach. In an era when “sustainable” often means compromising on aesthetics, they’re proving you can have both innovation and environmental consciousness without sacrificing beauty.

The 3D printing process they use allows for textures and forms that would be nearly impossible to achieve through traditional ceramics methods. Those horizontal ripples, the irregular edges, the way each piece feels both controlled and spontaneous? That’s the magic of computational design meeting artisanal sensibility. And because each piece is printed on demand, there’s minimal waste in the production process. The technology enables walls thin enough to let light pass through while maintaining structural integrity, something that would require exceptional skill and patience with hand-thrown ceramics.

The Soufflé Ceramic’s form itself is worth examining. It’s bulbous and asymmetrical, with gentle waves and peaks that make it look like it’s mid-rise, caught in that perfect moment before it collapses. Some versions are more rounded, others taper to a point like an onion dome. The opening reveals just enough of that brilliant interior to intrigue, creating a sense of discovery. It’s sculptural furniture that happens to be functional, rather than lighting that happens to look nice.

For collectors and design enthusiasts, pieces like the Soufflé Ceramic represent an exciting intersection of technology, craft, and artistry. They’re collectible not just because they’re beautiful or limited, but because they capture a specific moment in design history when digital fabrication became truly accessible and expressive. Twenty years from now, early 3D-printed ceramics from studios like AEREA will be the mid-century modern pieces of their generation.

If you’re looking to add some sculptural lighting to your space, or you just appreciate innovative design that pushes boundaries while staying grounded in craftsmanship, the Soufflé Ceramic deserves a spot on your radar. It’s proof that the future of design isn’t about choosing between technology and tradition. It’s about finding ways to make them rise together.

The post This 3D-Printed Soufflé Lamp Is Rising to the Top in Paris first appeared on Yanko Design.

Oct
30

By

A Gen-Z-Targeting Transparent Bluetooth CD Player

Category: Core77

Not bad for a company barely two years old. Kickback, an NYC-based electronics startup, makes this RETRADISC, a Bluetooth-enabled CD player. It came out last year, and has already been picked up by the MoMA Design Store.

The transparent player is aimed at the Gen Z and Millennial set who fully grasp the evils of smartphones, and would prefer to reach for something not connected to anything except their ears.

“Perfect for phone breaks,” the company writes. “CDs are your escape hatch from the digital chaos. With RETRADISC, you can finally put your phone down and let the music do what it does best – transport you somewhere else entirely.”

The anti-skip CD player runs $99.

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