Vanessa Chew, milk crates, furniture from waste, and more.

In honor of our 125th post (woohoo!), I thought I’d give you a little insight into how people discover this blog. Though search engines are by no means our biggest drivers of traffic, the search engine terms with which people end up finding us are pretty interesting and rather enlightening:

“vanessa chew” elemental form (Thanks, Vanessa and fans!) is in the lead: see Out of place and happening now (in Manhattan).

milk crates and crates, with a variety of words attached to them, also account for a solid chunk of finds: see Reconsidering the milk crate.

Searches like furniture from waste, how to make furniture from waste, “how to” “cardboard bookshelf” diy, and product new ideas for furniture from waste have definitely motivated us to write more posts like: Why not… make some furniture?, Furniture of waste., and  The art of (actual) waste.

July 18′s daily design idea is we want to know what ideas, problems, and solutions you’re searching for. Leave a comment or email us if there’s something you want help finding.

Learn more about images above at elemental-form.com, madedesign.ca, and charleskaisin.com.
Thanks to Bret Thorn for the idea for this post.

Reconsidering the milk crate.

It’s been a while since milk crates were used solely for transporting milk. They’re common enough in contemporary home furnishing and storage to be sold at the Container Store in a variety of colors. Cratemen are a famous kind of street art. There’s even a blog dedicated to the diversified “milkcrate lifestyle,” which sometimes includes posts about innovative milk crate furniture.

Chandelier featured in Apartment Therapy

Starting June 11, you’ll be able to see another beautiful example of milk crates in action at FIGMENT NYC on Governors Island. The Living Pavilion, pictured below, was the winner of FIGMENT’s first ever City of Dreams Pavilion competition.

Living Pavilion by Ann Ha and Behrang Behin

April 21’s daily design idea is re-think milk crates as a design material.