If It's Hip, It's Here (Archives)

Beautiful Beer Coasters With Witty Quotes For Letterpress Lovers.

This complete collection of 6 letterpress coasters with display stand by Nathan Mummert makes a great gift for the artisanal or craft beer enthusiast.

Each of the beautifully designed and eco-friendly coasters feature quotes from beer drinkers Jack Nicholson, Bart Simpson, Ben Franklin, W.C. Fields, Jim Morrison and Frank Sinatra.

Made in the USA, each printed piece is delicately handcrafted by a vintage 1960′s letterpress:

Designed for visibility, the 6 pub/bar coasters are well displayed by an eco-friendly premium bamboo stand, engraved with the Beer Press logo.

Price for the decorative and functional set and stand is $34.99

Buy them here

That Dad Who Colors In His Kids' Drawings Is A Wicked Tattoo Artist, Inventor, Philanthropist and Environmental Activist.

We could all use a dad like Fred Giovannitti. Heck, we could all use a friend like him. An inventor and philanthropist, tattoo artist and environmental engineer, Fast Company has profiled him, he has spoken at TED and now he's become famous as a Dad for coloring in his childrens' drawings.

Fred Giovannitti (aka Redditor Tatsputin) trades his quiet, rural Delaware lifestyle for 10 days per month as a high-end tattoo artist in glamorous Las Vegas, Nevada at Tatlantis Allied Arts and Sciences.

above: some examples of Fred's incredible skin art

By digging deep to reveal common interests, Fred believes we can form personal bonds between ourselves and our teammates/partners/clients, allowing us to connect with each other’s personal history and develop ideas that have the ability to take on lives of their own. Giovannitti uses this philosophy to draw inspiration for each project he takes on, and the relationships he has shared with his client have led to many successful ventures—from spiritual enrichment to ocean cleaning innovations. In the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, inventors were called upon to develop a mass-scale oil cleanup solution. Fred responded by co-developing an oil-cleanup device at Southern California's VorTek Recovery Solutions.

above: Fred's daughter and son and the first drawing of theirs that he colored in.

The constant traveling to Las Vegas led him to use this time as a personal challenge to see how much he could fill per flight into a single page in his sketchbook. He begins each drawing at take off and ceases upon landing. He posts the results on one of his two Instagram profiles, Mile High Moleskine and his personal Instagram Profile at It's Pronounced Jovaneti.

One of his latest collections of 'Airborne Art' is that of coloring in his children's playful drawings. The compelling side by side images have been making the rounds all over the internet and I simply couldn't resist posting the pics here for you as well. Some of them he drew in with colored pencils, others were done on an iPad:

On the iPad:

images courtesy of imgur and Fred's instagram feeds, information courtesy of his own website, TED and Fast Company

You can follow Fred on Twitter at @FredGiovannitti

The Gift Gamers Will Gobble Up: Chocolate Space Invaders.

Fruition is a small batch Bean-to-Bar Chocolate Workshop in the Catskill Mountains of New York and Shaloon is a design studio in Brooklyn, NY. Together they created the Chocolate Invader.

This collaborative effort between Fruition Chocolate and Shaloon brings us delicious small batch chocolate made in the shape of a classic video game character from Space Invaders, an arcade video game developed by Tomohiro Nishikado and released in 1978.

The Chocolate Invader, which weighs 50 grams, is created with with Single Origin 66% Dark Chocolate crafted from Costa Rica Cacao and Peruvian cocoa:

The beans are sorted by hand to remove any foreign materials or less than perfect quality beans. Each batch of chocolate invader is made from beans from one region. The genetics, climate, and post harvest processing effect the final flavor of cocoa beans from every region, yielding unique flavors from origin to origin.

The beans are then slowly roasted and then the shells are removed.:

The cocoa is mixed with evaporated cane juice and cocoa butter:

The cocoa is ground in a granite melangeur for 4 days. When complete, its texture is extremely smooth and the flavor is nuanced and in balance. The mill uses two 40 pound granite wheels to refine the particle size of cocoa until grittiness is no longer detected on your palate.

Once finished, the chocolate is tempered and molded into invaders. Tempering is the process by which chocolate is warmed and cooled to specific temperatures in order to induce the propagation of stable cocoa butter crystals. Proper tempering will allow the chocolate to set shiny and have its characteristic snap.

The design was produced on a CNC (computer numerically controlled) machine to create the mold. The metal plate was then used to thermoform plastic, creating the molds they used to shape the chocolate into an invader.

The Chocolate Invader was designed in 3D CAD. You can download the STL model for their chocolate invader here at Thingverse

The Three Bar Gift Set:

three 50 gram 66% dark chocolate bars
- invader mini-poster
- invader sticker
- invader postcard
- joy of eating 69 pixels
$20, buy it here

2-Bars + Laser Engraved Box:

- two 50 gram 66% dark chocolate bars
- limited edition engraved wood box
- invader mini-poster
- invader sticker
- invader postcard
- joy of eating 46 pixels
$18, buy it here

Fan of Space Invaders?
Then you'll want to check these out:

The Space Invaders Watch:

http://ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com/2012/08/more-space-invaders-watches-with-price.html

The Space Invader's Couch:

http://ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com/2012/11/much-to-many-gamers-delight-igor-chaks.html

The Space Invader's Rings:

http://ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com/2012/05/sterling-silver-space-invaders-rings-in.html

Limited Edition 'Wants vs. Needs' Venn Diagram Watches from Mr. Jones.

Let me start by saying that the limited edition watches from Mr. Jones always sell out quickly. So, if you like this unusual timepiece, I suggest you jump on it now, since it's limited to 100 pieces only.

Unisex/Mens:

Ladies:

Both Mens/Unisex and and Ladies styles:

Wants vs Needs comes in two sizes: a smaller ladies-specific case as well as this larger unisex size. This watch is produced in an edition of 100 pieces, with each watch individually numbered on the case back.

Unisex Watch Box by artist Camilla Meijer
The Unisex or Mens watch comes in a MJW presentation box, with specially commissioned design by artist and illustrator Camilla Meijer:

Women's Watch Box by artist Fanny Shorter
And the women's watch comes in a MJW presentation box, with specially commissioned design by artist and illustrator Fanny Shorter:

The hands on this watch are in the form of two circles, one circle is labelled "what I want" and the other "what I need". As the circles move to mark the time, they form a Venn diagram.

The shifting relationship that the diagram depicts between "wants" and "needs" is a way for us to think about the changing nature of our own desires and their fulfilment.

The watch is a tool for questioning ourselves - how does the diagram reflect the relationship between our own wants and needs at any given time?

Specs:
Case: 316L stainless steel
Mechanism: Ronda 513 quartz movement
Strap: Black leather with red stitching
Width (3 o'clock to 9 o'clock): 37mm
Height (from lug to lug): 46mm
Waterproof: 5ATM
Guarantee: 12 months
Smallest strap diameter:150mm
Largest strap diameter: 205mm

Shop for the Wants vs. Needs watches here

A Jet Ski and a Yacht Had A Baby! Check Out The New 2014 Jet Capsule.

The Jet Capsule is a small, aerodynamically designed customizable egg-shaped fiberglass boat designed by Pierpaolo Lazzarini of Lazzarini Design that has evolved much since it's initial concept in 2009.

The Killers have shared their latest charity Christmas single, Christmas In L.A., whose proceeds will benefit the Global Fund to Fight AIDS. This is the eighth year that the Killers have partnered with (RED), the AIDS awareness organization founded by Bono and Bobby Shriver, to produce a Christmas single.

Directed by Kelly Loosli (who is the program director of BYU's animation program) , the mixed media five minute and 12 second music video casts Owen Wilson as a melancholy out of work actor who is dreading December 25th in Los Angeles. I'm not sure if this is odd or perfect casting given Wilson's suicide attempt in 2007 , which everyone seems to have forgotten. The lonesome video also features actor Harry Dean Stanton (below with Wilson) and animation by Loosli's students at Brigham Young University.