Tag gorgeous

It isn’t often that you see brutalism as a design style being used outside architecture… but this sculptural speaker is a different beast entirely.

Designed to look like it was chiseled out of actual concrete, “TheSoloist. Sounds.” from Takahiro Miyashita was crafted with the vision of being the absolute centerpiece of your living room. Outwardly, it’s an homage to New York’s Flatiron building, standing at an impressive 43 inches tall with a dizzying amount of detail. Behind that exterior, however, is a 7-speaker setup designed to output a whopping 2000W of audio power, loud enough that its engineers promise “spectacular sound pressure that can be felt directly on the skin.”

Designer: Takahiro Miyashita

Before your ears experience TheSoloist. Sounds.’s audio, your eyes are treated to one of the most beautiful speakers they’ll ever see. Now in the realm of speaker design, TheSoloist. Sounds. is far from traditional. It doesn’t boast your standard acoustic chamber, audio grill, or showcase the drivers. It looks entirely like an artistic representation of New York’s architecture emerging from a block of concrete, but under that facade hides all of the audio magic. The sculpture can be split into two halves, the upper chiseled section and the lower, which arguably house the mid/high, and the woofer drivers respectively.

The lower section sports two 6.5″ woofers, while the upper part of the speaker houses two 3″ mid-range and three 1″ tweeters, covering a frequency range of 20Hz ~ 25KHz. The speaker pulls 2000W of power, and outputs an impressive 110dB of audio. The entire unit comes crafted from faux concrete, weighing 55lb (24.9 kilograms)… which does feel deceptively light for its nearly 4-foot stature.

Recreated for a second edition after the first one sold out, TheSoloist. Sounds. sports an eye-watering $$6,345.32 price tag… but that makes sense just given the amount of effort and intricate detail that went into the exterior as well as its inner hardware. That being said, TheSoloist. Sounds. isn’t for the discerning audiophile. It’s made for people who want an expressive statement piece to dominate their interior spaces – something this brutalist speaker does exceedingly well!

Acer’s latest announcement at CES 2024 has quite a bit in store for gamers. From game-ready 5G Wi-fi 7 routers to some rather whopping displays (including even a 3D one), the company is making some significant strides forward. The unveiling of its new lineup of Predator gaming monitors introduces a series of models designed to cater to a diverse range of gamers’ needs, each combining innovative technology with high performance.

Designer: Acer

Acer Predator Z57

Let’s begin with the crown jewel, the Predator Z57 – a 57-inch behemoth, curved to wrap your vision in a MiniLED display. But Acer didn’t stop at size. They doubled down with a dual UHD resolution of 7680×2160 at a smooth 120 Hz. This colossus offers a 32:9 aspect ratio, making it feel like you’re not just observing the game; you’re part of it. With VESA DisplayHDR™ 1000, the colors and contrasts are so vivid they’ll make reality seem dull. And if the immersive experience isn’t enough, its 1000R curvature, picture-by-picture, and picture-in-picture modes ensure multitasking is as seamless as your gameplay.

Acer Predator Z57

But perhaps you’re seeking something a bit more traditional, yet no less groundbreaking. Enter the Predator X34 V3. This 34-inch curved MiniLED display brings you an ultra-wide QHD resolution of 3440×1440. Its 1500R curvature is like a gentle embrace, ensuring no enemy lurks just out of sight. With a 180 Hz refresh rate and a 1 ms response time, every moment is a fluid transition, with no room for lag or ghosting. It’s not just about speed; it’s about experiencing every detail in a symphony of colors with its DCI-P3 94% color gamut and VESA DisplayHDR™ 1000.

Acer Predator X34 V3

Now, for those who live in the fast lane, Acer’s OLED models, the Predator X39 and Predator X34 X, are the perfect pick. These 39-inch and 34-inch titans offer UWQHD resolution at up to 240 Hz refresh rates. But it’s the 0.01 ms pixel response time that makes these monitors a dream for the fast and the furious gamer. Their 800R curvature and DCI-P3 99% color gamut deliver a visual feast, while the VESA DisplayHDR™ True Black 400 ensures the darkest blacks and brightest whites. And for the marathon gamers, they’re Eyesafe 2.0 Certified, so your eyes are protected even during those all-night campaigns.

Acer Predator X39

Across this lineup, Acer integrates features like AMD FreeSync Premium™ to address screen tearing and stuttering, ensuring smoother gameplay. The inclusion of a USB Type-C 90W PD port and a built-in KVM switch reflects a thoughtful design, aimed at providing convenience and flexibility to users.

Let’s talk brass tacks – pricing and availability. The Predator Z57, the flagship of this fleet, will start at USD 2499.99. For the OLED aficionados, the Predator X39 and Predator X34 X are priced at USD 1499.99 and USD 1299.99, respectively. And for those seeking that perfect balance of performance and price, the Predator X34 V3 is an enticing option at USD 899.99. These technological marvels will start gracing desks in North America and EMEA in Q2 2024, with China getting a head start in Q1 2024.

Acer Predator X34 X

With its simple form factor and dual-shade wood construction, Oakywood’s MagSafe iPhone Stand/Charger has an aesthetic quality similar to the kinds found in Japanese and Scandinavian homes. Fondly known as ‘Japandi’ (an obvious portmanteau of the two words), the design style is characterized by cleanliness and minimalism that eschews materialism and clutter. With its Japandi-inspired style, Oakywood’s MagSafe iPhone Stand adds a touch of rustic beauty to your table, with a design that looks sophisticated but feels familiar thanks to the use of natural materials like Oak and Walnut wood.

Designer: Oakywood

The stand’s two-part design features a powder-coated aluminum base with a wooden ‘tray’ on top. The hefty aluminum base gives the stand its stable design (while also allowing it to function as a paperweight of sorts) while customers have a choice between a light oakwood or dark walnut wood upper, complementing their table setup.

The stand comes with an empty slot that lets you weave your MagSafe charger in. Once put in place, it becomes a nifty magnetic charging dock for your iPhone that you can either use as-is, or detach the MagSafe charger to use as a horizontal charging mat (shown above).

When used in the ‘stand’ mode, it angles your phone at a precise 25°, making it easy to view while also triggering the iPhone’s new Standby Mode – a feature unveiled in the latest iOS 17 update.

If you don’t want to use your Oakywood MagSafe iPhone Stand as a charger, the company sells a magnetic puck that you can slide into the stand, allowing it to work as merely a docking station without the charging facility.

The folks at Oakywood pride themselves in embracing nature as a material and a source for their designs. The use of wood feels antithetical to the metal and glass build of your iPhone, but it brings about a certain warmth to your tabletop, allowing it to become a standard fixture in your workplace. Besides, the entire thing weighs roughly 700 grams (1.5 pounds), making it a rather heavy accessory that doesn’t feel cheap in the slightest.

Oakywood sustainably sources its wood from America and Poland, also pledging to plant one tree for each product sold, thus ensuring a circular economy of sorts that helps reduce the effects of deforestation while turning wood into a renewable resource. You can grab your MagSafe iPhone Stand in three color options – a Light Oak, Dark American Walnut, or a Black Solid Oak that’s the darkest of the lot, matching the powder-coated Aluminum base.

DJI is usually known for producing top-tier camera drones like the DJI Mini 4 Pro. It also makes the DJI Osmo Pocket, a mini action cam built into a gimbal you can fit in your pocket (as the name suggests). On October 25, the DJI team officially released its newest Osmo Pocket 3 camera, catering to vloggers on the move with a 1 inch CMOS that can do some pretty wild things in a relatively tiny package. The most immediate draw is its ability to record 1080p footage at 280 frames per second and 4k footage at 120 frames per second in slow motion mode, or record 10-bit HDR footage at 4k60. Those two features mean it can expertly capture intense action in one shot, and then capture sweeping vistas in the next shot with eye-watering color depth.

Designer: DJI

Buy it now on Amazon

It also has a 2 inch OLED touchscreen that rotates between landscape and portrait mode, letting you switch between widescreen and vertical aspect ratios. PCMag mentioned those touch controls are responsive and easy to find, letting the reviewer easily set up face tracking mode and switch between zoom modes. In general, reviews skew positive, with The Verge singing the new device’s praises despite a $170 price hike over its predecessor. To be clear: the DJI Osmo Pocket 3 comes in at an MSRP of $519, but it sounds like its sizable upgrades plus its compact form factor make it worth that price.

DJI itself had a few interesting comparisons to make between the Osmo Pocket 3 and earlier versions. For instance, the company claims it can charge to 80% in 16 minutes, versus the Osmo Pocket 2, which evidently took about 48 minutes to reach the same level of charge. TechRadar corroborated this figure, saying, “The recharge speed is unbelievably quick, with a full charge achieved in only 32 minutes, less than half the time of the Pocket 2. This is even more impressive considering that 80% battery is reached in just 16 minutes.”

However, the new gimbal camera isn’t perfect. It sounds like it struggles with minor overheating issues during filming, and it may not be rugged enough to withstand the adventures its small size suggests it would be optimal for. This is due to its vented design (which is supposed to offset overheating) according to PCMag’s Jim Fisher, who noted that it isn’t weatherproofed and thus probably wouldn’t be great to take into a large body of water or to a particularly dusty location.

Still, it’s an exciting new toy for videographers and — like DJI recommends — vloggers who want to take high-quality footage on the go.

A perfect blend of the old tradition with a new vision.

Designed originally as a visual language exercise, this Ferrari EV charger really does get the heart and engine racing. The charger pays tribute to Ferrari’s roots with a design language that borrows from the curvilinear surfaces of its own cars. The charger’s body is a standing tribute to the Dino 246 GT, visible through the charger’s main module, which looks like the iconic car’s top view.

Designers: Sungmin Hwang & PDF Haus

The Ferrari EV Charger does a stellar job of capturing the aerodynamics of the Italian company’s cars. The charger, shaped like a vertical column, comes with an incredible amount of detail located at the eye level. Its iconic red hue is visible from a distance, and as you pull up, you notice the smooth form, the carbon fiber detailing, and the iconic prancing horse logo. Arrive at the pump and it identifies your car once you plug the port into your car’s inlet. The pump greets you by name, using a backlit LED panel right under the horse logo, before your car’s battery is replenished.

The charger’s incredibly intuitive to use, and comes with just two buttons. One to prematurely stop the charging process, and another to wind or unwind the port’s long cable.

While your battery’s being replenished, the Ferrari EV Charger also does a quick diagnostic check on your car, giving you updates on your battery health, range, driving stats, tire pressure, etc. The charging procedure effectively also troubleshoots your car for you, so you’re aware of anything that may need servicing. Meanwhile, Ferrari’s notified too, just in case you ever need their assistance.

The overall design of the EV Charger evokes the same emotions as you’d get from a Ferrari itself. The charger looks iconic, dependable, aerodynamic, and exciting. It’s easy to locate and easier to use, making owning an electric Ferrari a dream. In June, it was reported that Ferrari was building a $4.6 billion dollar EV factory right in the town of Maranello, where it produces all its cars. This new facility will entirely be responsible for Ferrari’s new fleet of upcoming EVs, as the Italian automotive giant hopes to go carbon neutral by 2030.

It feels almost like destiny that Apple launches great products, but leaves the onus of designing great accessories to third parties. Sandmarc is one such company that’s benefitted greatly from this arrangement, rising to prominence for their pro-quality photography and videography accessories for the iPhone… but the company isn’t stopping there. After designing some of the best-in-class camera lenses and filming rigs for the iPhone, Sandmarc is giving the Watch Ultra something it truly deserves – a great complementary strap/band.

Not everyone who owns the Watch Ultra buys it because of its high-endurance sports and training features… so the idea of having a watch strap designed for trekking or deep-sea diving doesn’t really appeal to the average consumer who just wants to be able to flaunt their high-end smartwatch. In comes Sandmarc’s Apple Watch Ultra Band, an Oyster-style band made from grade-2 titanium with just the right color and finish to match the Watch Ultra perfectly. Slip the band on and it honestly looks like it was designed by Apple, and turns your extreme smartwatch into the luxurious-looking haute timepiece you need it to be! After all, who in their right state of mind would want to wear a silicone band into a boardroom meeting, am I right?!

Designer: Sandmarc

The luxurious Grade-2 titanium band quite literally turns your Apple Watch Ultra into a Rolex or Tag Heuer-style haute timepiece. Its finish matches the slight champagne color of the Watch Ultra perfectly, blending in so well you’d think Apple designed the band too.

The band’s wide body complements the Watch Ultra’s large-ish design perfectly too, doing a far better job of visually integrating with the timepiece than any of Apple’s own watches. After all, it isn’t purpose-built for function – it’s purpose-built for fashion.

Machined from grade-2 titanium with a scratch-resistant glass film coating, the watch band is lightweight, waterproof, and just as durable as the Watch Ultra. The entire band measures 190mm (7.48 inches) and weighs 2 ounces (57 grams), being nearly 40% lighter than its stainless steel counterparts. Each band relies on stainless steel connectors that allow you to attach it to the Watch Ultra, and the band also ships with an adjustment tool that lets you remove one of the Oyster-style links to fit your wrist perfectly.

The Sandmarc Grade 2 Titanium Watch Ultra Band starts at $199, which shouldn’t sound like much if you already splurged $799 on the smartwatch, to begin with. Each titanium band is also rigorously tested at a third-party lab for quality and chemical analysis, so the bands can endure everything the Apple Watch Ultra was designed for… whether it’s a lavish boardroom, the snowy tundras, a desert trek, or even the depths of the sea!