As much as pop culture evolves and changes, it never fades away from our lives! Whether it’s the latest Weeknd song, or the viral Netflix series Squid Games, pop culture is involuntarily and deeply embedded within our lives. And since so much of our time revolves around it, we decided to curate a whole collection of designs inspired by the popular culture today! From a Squid Game home security camera that guards your home and keeps you safe without any violence to Baby Yoda ears that function as a quirky little case for your Amazon Echo Dot – these eccentric yet exciting designs add a touch of pop culture into your everyday lives, and surround you with your favourite characters, shows, movies, and more! You can turn your ordinary old day into something fun with these few product designs. Enjoy!
The ruthless workers in the viral series, Squid Games, will now adorn the secure corners of our homes, as the security camera keeps us safe – well, a cliche of sorts. The rotating lens positioned right where the eyes of the character would provide a 180-degree view of the surroundings for complete security. The movement is actuated by motion and an audio sensor that sets the camera into action, tracking the movement. Since most security cameras attached to the servers can have access to all the inside activities when not intended by the user, the creators of this concept add a useful feature. To make sure there are no hacking attempts or unauthorized access to the footage, there is a privacy mask that physically blocks the FOV when the camera is not in use.
This friendly robot designed by VLND Studio has a strong vibe to it, the R2-D2 astromech droid influence in particular. While the acclaimed Star Wars robot served Padmé Amidala, Anakin Skywalker, and Luke Skywalker with reverence – the ARC BOT is the ideal mascot of human-robot relationships. This futuristic-looking bot is reminiscent of the delivery robots who serve their masters with the same devotion. ARC BOT is designed for internet portal NAVER LABS who already uses the robot in its headquarters building and now has plans to deploy the multi-robot intelligence system in its second head office building in Bundang, Gyeonggi Province. The building adjacent to the Green Factory in Jeongja-dong in Seongnam will be the first robot-friendly building powered by the artificial robot cloud (ARC) system. It will be a robotic army of ARC BOT AI robots connected to the cloud for efficient service.
I love coffee, I love Apple and I love Star Trek, and thereby I love the Elemental coffee machine because it combines ‘elements’ from them all! Torres takes a very stripped-back, modernist approach, with nothing hidden in terms of the machine’s function. You can see everything you need to make a good cup of coffee which adds clarity to the simple form. The interface is completely touch-based and therefore the UI had to be intuitive while still communicating movement as well as a sense of urgency. The UI is a homage to the ‘okudagrams’, an loving name given to the interactive and usually re-organizable displays found on control panels and computer interfaces in 23rd and 24th-century starships. It started with Star Trek and then spread to every sci-fi thing ever. The idea of integrating it here was to alleviate the comparatively long time it takes for filter coffee to brew, it almost gives the illusion that more is happening than there actually is.”I wanted to avoid the basic – almost traditional at this point – style of touch UI so I went with more of a sci-fi theme inspired by TNG LCARS, but actually, you know – usable,” says Torres.
With 590 pieces (including 6 faux Infinity Stones), this meticulously detailed LEGO Infinity Gauntlet definitely adds a Marvel-ous touch to your room (I had to make that joke. You know it). While LEGO’s Infinity Gauntlet doesn’t give you any sufficient superpowers, it’s definitely one of the most interesting pieces of pop-culture decor you can have in your room. Made from golden LEGO bricks, the gauntlet’s solid (which means you can’t wear it) and is slightly smaller than you’d expect… but LEGO makes up for it by incorporating movable joints into the fingers, which means the gauntlet can technically ‘snap’ its fingers.
The internet knows how to move fast, quickly flitting from one topic to the next, and this year we can all agree that the GameStop saga had everyone’s attention. It started with the Reddit group r/WallStreetBets banding together to take on hedge-funds that were targeting the share price of GameStop, a brick and mortar game retail store. While the hedge-funds had shorted the stock massively, an entire warrior-clan of Redditors decided to buy the company’s stocks, taking them so high that multiple hedge-funds went into severe losses. Far be it for a design site to discuss market speculation, but here at Yanko Design, we’re more captivated by these adorable vinyl figurines that were born out of this modern financial revolution! Say hello to Stonks and his alter-ego Stinks, two collectibles from Youtooz that stand at 5-inches tall and perfectly embody the pop-culture element of this movement. Clad in the classic suit and tie, while standing in front of an arrow chart that either indicates growth or decline (or a bull or bear run if you’re fancy), Stonks and Stinks are memes brought to life, and I honestly have never wanted something so ridiculous this bad!
Designed to be perhaps the most realistic working prototype of a lightsaber from Star Wars, the STARGLOW is best described as a vertical flamethrower. Just like the sabers from the hit sci-fi franchise, the STARGLOW comes as just a handle, featuring a button that turns its blade on. Press the button and a fiery beam emits from one end in either blue or green hues. The STARGLOW sabers come with a choice between blue and green flames – colors used by the Jedi, sort of also hinting at the fact that this device should be used for recreation and for good, not as a weapon. The hilts are styled to look very similar to the steampunk metal handles found in the Star Wars franchise, and come machined from high-strength aircraft aluminum, with two visual options – a polished metal finish, and an anodized gloss black finish.
Zeledón’s Coat Check Chair is truly an avant-garde representation of today’s wardrobe. Consider it a commentary on many things, from the consumerist culture, to a critique on cupboards, to even a reinvention of the mundane hanger into a product that has much more purpose, structurally, visually, and even emotionally. It manages to achieve all this while becoming a popular visual meme too. The Coat Check Chair is a winner of multiple design awards, including the coveted IDEA award and the Spark award. Flipping traditional furniture (and wardrobe) design on its head, the chair comes in a stainless-steel frame and even across different powder-coated color options. You can even choose the color of the hanger, giving you the feeling of choosing your furniture’s upholstery! The hangers can be used as seats, or periodically even in your wardrobe to hang your garments. When you’re done, slide them back into the chair, giving them more meaning, purpose, and visibility than they would get somewhere in a dark corner in your stuffy closet!
This is the Mclaren Can-Am car homage concept car, the brainchild of designer Yosuke Yamada who has reimagined the spirit of racing as a homage to the era when motorsports overtook football and baseball in popularity. The whole design of the racer is centered around aerodynamic performance to make the car run at top speeds without any airflow resistance. If you look closely at the back, there is a pneumatic cooling power unit that draws the air inside the power unit for extra efficiency and peak output. That’s well complemented by the supercharged aero wing for the funneling effect produced by the two blades. On the sides too, there is an aero turbine to accelerate the airflow for cooling and aerodynamics. Not surprisingly, the wheels are also aero optimized to make the racer glide through at stunning speeds. Yosuke has managed to culminate a unique interpretation of the McLaren design language with the apparent connection to the Can-Am racing cars with the sleek look to go with it.
Meet the Baby Yoda case by Otterbox, the studio that has brought us some great pop culture hits with their phone cases in the past! In a world where you give orders to your grey little Amazon Dot, you put on this little case and now you can actually converse with the Jedi master himself! Sitting on a beige base, the case is constructed “precision-fit, non-slip base” and is “engineered for optimal audio output.” But honestly, we would pre-order this just so we can add those tiny little ears to our voice assistant. The case is designed exclusively for Amazon Echo Dot 3rd Gen, this cutest little Master of the force promises to be an instant conversation starter for any home! If only Alexa could speak to us the way Master Yoda does, the fun will be having we.
In what possibly may be the most ingenious way to get kids to wash their hands more thoroughly and often, Slic3DArt’s Mickey Soap Dispenser Attachment turns that blob of foam into the silhouette of the most famous mouse in the world! The Mickey Soap Dispenser Attachment isn’t an officially licensed product from Disney, but is rather a clever fan-made product that retrofits onto most foaming handwash dispenser nozzles (although the designer recommends Bath and Body Works soap bottles). The attachment basically helps distribute the foamed handwash into three large blobs instead of one, making it resemble Mickey Mouse’s iconic circular head and ears (or Deadmau5, if you’re an electronic music aficionado). The 3D printed attachment is pretty simple to install and even simpler to use.