OOOMS: A Stick Full of Data

(jiří macek) In case you are fed up will all the high-tech nerd flashcards and long for authentic data carriers, drop into the Dutch OOOMS studio. Although it only offers sticks, it is brilliant.

Guido Ooms and Karin van Lieshout, aka OOOMS, met at the renowned Design Academy in Eindhoven, from which Guido graduated in 2000 and Karin one year later. Guido is allegedly the one who has his head in clouds with incredible ideas; Karin sees to the implementation of these ideas thanks to her sense of reality. Their portfolio is worth looking at not only because of their original USB memory sticks, whose technological intestines are put into the individually selected parts of sticks from various trees. The design process merges here with the discovery process. Each piece of the stick is a memory of a story, a witness of forest life, and a record of the work of time, insects, and weather. Even though this is just a container, it is very important because it is something you use every day while you work.

OOOMS works with everything what ranks among the contemporary design essences, as promulgated by the Design Academy in Eindhoven. Concept, humor, re-design, reflection of handicraft traditions, design of a story – none of these are a far cry for OOOMS. A carpet by OOOMS is a witness of a bloody accident; a porcelain dildo is decorated with a Delft-blue picture of a milkmaid; the Expect cabinet seems to crumble in your hands; glasses turn into Glassbulb Lights.

“Do you know the feeling when you do not want to take a look at something, but you still do?” say the designers with regard to the Road Kill Carpet, designed with an abstract record of events that are better to be forgotten.

A section of a road with a fox that has been run over seems to represents the dark side of their work. The tender stick would then represent the light side. Among these two poles, one can find many remarkable objects with beautiful stories. Or shall we say that they are romantic, actually?

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