Car bodies made by spider silk proteins, furniture made from fish scales, lightweight panels made of bamboo rings or light reflecting concrete: These are just some of the most striking examples of a…

Whether mussels, coffee granules, soya beans, flour or vinegar – designers are increasing looking to organic ingredients usually found in the kitchen in their search for new materials. And in doing…

Although Germany is one of the most densely wooded areas in Europe it is reckoned that in the future there will be a bottleneck with regard to the procurement of timber. Manufacturers are responding…

It looks as if our resource-wasting product culture is out of date. At present, designers are creating a new logic of manufacturing. They take their cue from the principle of plant growth, making…

Colors appeal, are calming, attract us or warn of danger. In intelligent surfaces they can even communicate with users. They respond to ambient influences, become transparent or change their shade…

Industrialized nations face enormous challenges as a result of the change in energy policy. At the same time there are a host of opportunities, especially for designers, who can start using new…

Aramid, glass and carbon fibers have long been used as reinforcement materials for plastics in lightweight vehicle design. Architects have recently discovered that they are suitable for realizing…

Bionics translates natural phenomena into innovative technologies and products. This branch of research became popular thanks to the lotus effect and other developments of biomimetic materials.

Lately wood can do more than just heat the stove. It removes pollutants from the air, remains resistant to the most varied of weather and moisture, is also flame retardant and even has a metal look…

Air-purifying mosses, foamed material made from mushrooms, lights made from algae fibre or water-resistant mosaic panelling made from coconut shells: Because of the shortage of resources, work is…

Cow stomachs, algae, sea-grass balls or camel hair: organic waste is very popular with material developers at the moment. Not only industrial manufacturers but also designers are amongst the…

The threat of supply bottlenecks for rare metals, oil and natural gas are at present one of the topics dominating the materials industry. And the exhibitors at K 2010 in Düsseldorf also primarily…

The Egyptians were using glass to make vessels and jewelry as early as 1500 BC. Nowadays glass has far more diverse applications, and moreover this traditional material is making waves through…

Light, flexible, high-tensile and recyclable is probably how best to summarize the qualities of textile materials, which made them suitable for use in technological applications. It seems that their…

Ever since Áron Losonczi made concrete translucent, our conventional idea of firm materials seems to have been turned upside down. Now, we are even able to make wood translucent, stone walls can…

Foams made of castor oil, biodegradable tableware of potato starch, plastics reinforced with carrot fiber. All of them use bio materials – a group of materials that has recently grown quite…

We are familiar with them as hand and pocket warmers, namely phase-change materials, which are also referred to as latent heat accumulators. They are capable of emitting heat to their environment…

For several years metal foams have provided designers and architects with inspiration for new applications in the lighting and interior segments. Hollomet has been using a new plant technology that…

At the Techtextil 2009 in Frankfurt, the European textile industry set out once again to reinvent itself by means of multifunctional textiles. Today's products are electrically conductive,…

In the mid-1980s the production of plastic components with special decor was revolutionized through the possibility of injection molding on foils. Today, InMold techniques are also applied to…

Resources like oil are becoming increasingly scarce and prices have risen, the demand for alternative materials is growing. Closed-loop sustainable materials find their way into the market.

The world of products seems to have lost its material properties. Many different areas of our lives have long since become virtual, stripped of materials. But recently their is a new group of smart…

Nanotechnology can lend conventional materials extraordinary properties – the possibilities appear to be limitless. Applications for paper can also be surprisingly expanded in this way. An overview…

In designing products today one should not limit oneself to the newest high tech and smart materials. Many designers today avail themselves of simple ideas and conventional materials, extract these…

Adhesives can do a lot more today than just stick two things together. They can be flame-resistant, electrically conductive – or even completely dispensable. At the moment textiles which adhere to…

Stone materials and concrete are among the oldest materials in the world when it comes to producing objects and buildings. Ultra-high-strength concrete, carbon fiber brick, nanotitanium dioxide: the…

Fabbers are nothing more than a further development of rapid prototyping, a generative technology that has been used to manufacture prototypes and simple tools since the 1990s. The article describes…

They can cut, weld, or harden - lasers are multifunctional tools that designers are increasingly using. There are now enough service providers who, for example, also offer laser cutting for small…

The question of which material is best suited to which product has become much more important to designers. Today, there are so many more new material developments available that they often comprise…

Plastics are light and flexible – which is why they’re in great demand when mobility is the order of the day. In the aerospace and auto industries, their use is rapidly on the rise. An ever greater…

Silver, titanium, diamonds – materials from which, above all, jewelry used to be made. Today, they play an ever greater role in the high-tech industry and also for designers. Their nano-structures…