The 1955 GMC L’Universelle Dream Truck
One of the most popular General Motors design concept models designed under the direction of Harley Earl was the 1955 GMC L’Universelle show van. The name “L’Universelle” is French and means “The Universal.” The model was a part of the Motorama shows during the 1950s, which created a huge buzz among crowds at the time. Continue reading »
This Guy Used A.I. To See What The Kids Of Famous Ex-Couples Would Have Looked Like
Sarah Jessica Parker And Robert Downey Jr
According to Hidreley Diao: “Celebrities are constantly breaking up and getting back together and then breaking up again. Some split-ups were met with huge disappointment from the fans, because of how amazing they seemed together or how cute they were. Some—long-awaited, usually because the relationship was toxic or even resulted in abuse. Congratulations to these celebrities or anyone who escaped a “relationship” like that. Continue reading »
Vintage Photographs of the Skiway Sky Bus Lift Used on Mt. Hood, Oregon From the 1950s
Using a modified city bus, a twin-engine design powered the wheels to turn cables in a pulley system that moved the tram back and forth above the slope. Continue reading »
Zipper Fastener Ship: Boat Shaped Like Giant Zip Puller Looks Like It’s Opening the Water
Japanese designer Yasuhiro Suziki has created a unique boat shaped like a giant zipper puller that looks like it’s opening up the water when sailing. Continue reading »
Before Seatbelts and Airbags: Terrible Photos of Car Accidents in the Early 20th Century
A car and train collision on the level crossing at Weasenham Lane, Wisbech, March 4, 1910
By 1950, almost every race-car driver used safety seat belts.
American car manufacturers Nash (in 1949) and Ford (in 1955) offered seat belts as options, while Swedish Saab first introduced seat belts as standard in 1958. After the Saab GT 750 was introduced at the New York Motor Show in 1958 with safety belts fitted as standard, the practice became commonplace. Continue reading »
The 1986 Oldsmobile Incas Had The Wildest Dashboard You’ve Never Seen
Plenty of automakers today release autonomous car concepts that look like an ultra-modern living room inside. The steering wheel isn’t there, or it folds away, there’s big touchscreens everywhere—you get the gist. But 34 years ago, at the height of wonderfully strange ’80s design exercises, Italdesign really went for it in the Oldsmobile “Incas” concept with this Knight Rider-looking getup. It’s definitely not your grandfather’s Oldsmobile. Neither will it be your grandson’s, sadly. Continue reading »
Energy-Saving Lighting System Turns Night Sky Purple in Sweden
For the past couple of months, residents of two small towns on the southern coast of Sweden have been experiencing a peculiar nighttime phenomenon – the sky turning a bright magenta. Continue reading »
Cool Vintage Photos of Victorian People Posing With Their Penny-Farthings
The penny-farthing, also known as a high wheel, high wheeler or ordinary, was the first machine to be called a “bicycle”. It was popular in the 1870s and 1880s, with its large front wheel providing high speeds (owing to it traveling a large distance for every rotation of the legs) and comfort (the large wheel provides greater shock absorption). Continue reading »
The Rhino: A Bizarre Experimental All-Terrain Vehicle, 1954
The bizarre amphibious four-wheeled vehicle called Rhino was designed by the Greek-American inventor Elie Aghnides. In the 1940s, Aghnides was watching a tractor laboring through New York City’s Central Park and figured he could combine the stability of a bulldozer with the speed of a car, and create an efficient, all-terrain vehicle. Continue reading »
Incredible Technologies From The Past That Just Look Odd Today
300 Year Old Library Tool that Enabled a Researcher to Have Seven Books Open at Once, yet Conveniently Nearby (Palafoxiana Library, Puebla)
Twenty years ago, you would have been the coolest kid on the block for carrying a Nokia 3310. But time flies and technological innovation accelerates along with it. Today, we live in a world ruled by touch screens, face recognition, and machine learning, so imagine what the technology was like a century ago, or two. Continue reading »
This Guy Transformed A 1961 VW Beetle Deluxe Into A Black Matte Roadster
The Volkswagen Beetle is one of the most iconic cars in automotive history. Sure, the classic Type 1 was considered a tad bit underpowered and technically unimpressive compared to its competition. However, what it lacked on the inside was vastly outweighed by its never-before-seen aesthetic—so much so that just by looking at it, you can’t help but smile. It’s a cute car! Continue reading »
“How Do You Want to Be Remembered?”: This Company Develops Biodegradable Coffins Made from Mushrooms
One company in the Netherlands created what’s come to be known as the Loop coffin made of mushroom mycelium that biodegrades in just 30 to 45 days. The creator, TU Delft researcher Bob Hendrikx, woked with funeral directors to learn as much as he could about the burial process before designing the coffin made of natural materials.
In our 200.000 years of existence, mankind has developed a relationship of parasitism with Mother Nature. Our current behavior results in resource depletion and ecosystem loss: in some places around the world more than 40% of the biodiversity has already been lost. Even after death we leave a scar on this beautiful planet. Mother nature has been leading the way for 3.8 billion years before us and can help us to do so in the future. What if we could participate in nature’s end-of-life cycle? Continue reading »
Stunning and Rare Images of The 1935 Adler Diplomat 8 Wheels
The Adler Diplomat is a substantial six-cylinder “limousine” built by the Frankfurt auto-maker, Adler. It was introduced in March 1934 as a direct replacement for the manufacturer’s Standard 6. Less directly the six-cylinder Diplomat also replaced the Adler Standard 8 since Adler’s large eight-cylinder car was discontinued in 1934 without a direct replacement of its own. Continue reading »
Urban Explorer Makes Fantastic Photos of The Abandoned Radio Station to Seek For Traces of Extra-Terrestrial Civilizations
Just another place reminding of the scientific past of the great country. The bank of the Volga river, Nizhegorodsk region, Russia and a radio astronomy observatory of the Scientific Research Radiophysical Institute built two years after the war, in 1947. Continue reading »
Leather Covered Toyota Crown XIV Sold in Moscow For $325,000
This was probably one of the wildest ads. The leather-fur car previously made at the order of a Russian oligarch to be presented to queen Elizabeth. Now it’s being sold in Moscow – perhaps, the gift was denied, and it’s not difficult to understand why… Continue reading »
Stunning Vintage Photos of the Panther 6, a Crazy 6-Wheeled UK Sports Car From 1977
The Panther 6 was a British six-wheel convertible produced by Panther in 1977. The car is powered by a mid-mounted 8.2 L (500 cu in) Cadillac V8 engine with twin turbochargers paired to a three-speed automatic transmission. Only two cars were made (one in black, one in white), both of which are known to still exist. Continue reading »
Japanese Artist Crafts Awesome Cyberpunk Demon Masks
Japanese Twitter user Shuka is a stop motion animator and “mecha designer” who specializes in crafting cyberpunk-themed items and accessories. The talented artist has recently gained some attention on Twitter for designing an awesome cyberpunk-themed Japanese demon mask! Continue reading »
During the Coronavirus Pandemic, Disinfector ‘Robots’ Were Hired at a Children’s Hospital in Russia
Modern problems require advanced solutions. In a child health care of Rostov small patients are met by such robots. The dummies made by the clinic’s employees measure body temperature and sanitize hands. If the temperature is high, the machine will give an alarming signal. Continue reading »
1959 Ghia Selene by Tom Tjaarda, an Amazing Concept From Future Past From Italy
A very talented man called Tom Tjaarda became one of GHIA’s main stylists, and he made a big impression with the 1959 Selene, a sort of super-sleek forward-control “people carrier”. Its follow-up, the Selene II of 1962, had a central driving seat and two rear seats facing backwards. Continue reading »
1960 Ford Spaceliner, a Vehicle That Looks a Bit Like a Spaceship From a Science-Fiction Movie
There was a time when bubbletop concept cars were all the rage, both in the design studios of Detroit as well as on the hot rod and custom car show circuit. They ranged from mildly modified factory cars to one-off, completely fabricated show machines with exposed engines and wild paint jobs. Guys like Ed “Big Daddy” Roth, Darryl Starbird, and Dean Jeffries made a name for themselves building these wild show cars in the late 1950s and well into the 1960s. Continue reading »
Old Soviet Ships Transformed Into Yachts for Millionaires
Some modern super-yachts used to look differently and perform basically military missions. They served interests of their native country and its people. Many Soviet yachts became the property of foreign buyers in the 1990s who bought them quite cheaply. Continue reading »
Meet Rachael, the World’s First Fully Automated Autonomous 3D Design Influencer on Instagram
Built with Unreal Engine 4, her capabilities are specially designed to create “likeable” images representing popular visual languages on the platform. Since May 2020, she has been posting to the Instagram account @rachaellic one new image per day. She will continue posting without any human intervention, as long as the computer she is running on is online. Continue reading »
Before Tesla, There Was Anadol, Legendary Turkish Dune Buggy
Turkey’s indigenous (but with an American Ford engine) Anadol Böcek (Bug), was designed by Jan Nahum of the Ford-Otosan corporation in 1975. The car was produced between 1975 and 1977, in a very limited production run of 200-or-so vehicles. Continue reading »
1981 SAAB 906 Turbo, Sweden’s 6-Wheeled Colossal With Full Variety of Gadgets
There aren’t a lot of six-wheeled cars out there and often they’re one-of-a-kind mods like this Saab 906 Turbo. It was built by designer Leif Mellberg and it’s the biggest Saab that was ever built. Continue reading »
Man from Belarus Aged 87 Made His Own Electric Car
Meet Mikhail A. Parkalov from a small agricultural town Chirkovichi, Belarus. This man does not want to depend on somebody and he does everything by himself. To build a two-storey house, to assemble a tractor within a couple of days – such a handyman. Recently he decided to take it a step further and follow modern environmental trends by making his own electric vehicle. Continue reading »
