minimalsites.com - Minimal Web Design Gallery and Minimalist Community

Lifework - Herman Miller – Inspiration: Graphic Designer Theo Rosendorf:

I’m not even sure where to begin with the massive level of ninja-level cool on full display here. First, look at that office. Just look at it! Next, check out this snippet:

I have a server which gets backed up redundantly. Network user accounts get backed up to the server automatically, so adding a new MacBook is just a matter of logging in to the server with it. My music is on the server too—all 100 days of it.

Like I said, ninja. Go read the whole thing. Get inspired.

(Submitted by Kristian Tølbøl Sørensen)

All I need when writing my bachelor’s science thesis for hand-in next week. My 27” iMac has served me well, allowing me to write the LaTeX code on a full sized window to the left, while having the full sized PDF result shown on the right. It’s like having two monitors, but with less clutter on the desk. Oh, and the low-tech pen and paper? Still indispensable for sketching out equations and models.

Everything you need. Nothing that you don’t.

As you know, in the last few weeks my family and I cleared out our possessions, and moved to a new city. We’re loving San Francisco, missing our loved ones on Guam terribly … but the most interesting thing to me has been the idea of starting afresh.

We’re in a new city, a blank slate for us, and we’re allowed to reimagine our lives. That’s a scary thing, because as humans we cling to the familiar, find comfort in routines and in what we’re used to. We can handle change, but usually in smaller bits. Drastic changes, at the scale of everything we know, are difficult to handle.

It’s also a wonderful thing, because a fresh start means you have nothing tying you down, nothing stopping you from creating the life you want.

It’s painful, in that we left behind the people we love the most. It was like tearing off a limb, except that you can live without a limb … living without these loved ones isn’t so easy. I don’t recommend it to anyone else, but I also know that we will grow as people because of this experience, and become stronger for it.

We’ve gone car-free, which is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. It’s almost impossible to do on Guam, for many reasons, though we did manage to go car-lite while we were there. Today, we walk and take transit everywhere, and it’s easy. We plan to get bikes soon.

We purposely moved to a spot that’s near everything we need: groceries, a library, bookstores, restaurants, hardware store, bakeries, lovely parks, buses and trains. We could have lived cheaper or nicer if we were further away from everything, but we chose to be in a denser area, more walkable.

We are buying most of what we eat at farmer’s markets and in bulk bins, to reduce packaging and processed foods, both better for our health and the environment. We’re still working on this, but already it’s been a dramatic improvement.

We run in parks, sprint up hills, walk everywhere, eat fairly healthy, do bodyweight exercises whenever and wherever we feel like it, play in grass fields. We’re getting healthier and fitter than ever before, and we love it.

We have very little. And that’s perfect.

It’s a fresh start. We’ve only begun to imagine the possibilities. It’s not home yet, but we’re going to make it the home we create.

I wanted to wait until the whole series was up before posting about this one. My good friend Randy Murray has posted a weeks worth of Tech Buying Tips that I can get behind and are very much in the spirit of “what we believe in”. I urge you to read them all:

Tech Buying Tip: Buy Refurb

Tech Buying Tip: Adopt An Early Adopter

Tech Buying Tip: Review the Accessories Before You Buy

Tech Buying Tip: What To Do About Extended Warranties

Tech Buying Tip: Buy Stock Before Buying The Gadget

Spock, designed by & devos" href="http://couvreurdevos.com/" target="_self">Couvreur & Devos, is a light that is stylishly minimalistic yet highly versatile. Lighting designers always seem to push the limits of technology, and this beautiful LED is no different.

The LED disc contained within Spock is only 12mm thin, which is impressive, but not nearly as captivating as its specialized hinging system. The disc is allowed to rotate within its enclosure practically 360 degrees without the presence of any wires or cables sticking out. The light can also be attached to a railing system, which means you can pretty much shine light in any direction you please.

I don’t know what I like more about Spock: its clean aesthetic, or its diverse functionality; either way, this light truly stands out from the norm.

Compass is a stylish compact folding stand that lets you use your iPad in two different modes. First, as an easel, Compass displays iPad in both portrait and landscape modes. Second, flip open the secondary leg and Compass now holds your iPad at the perfect angle to let your fingers fly across iPad’s onscreen keyboard.

TwelveSouth unveils its latest product and, just like the rest, it is a thing of beauty.

Magic!

The black Magica and his sister, the white Magica2, will make anyone look twice. Their designer, the Italian Davide Conti, replaced two legs with plexiglass to create the illusion of an impossible balance.

The Magica’s are not in production yet, so manufacturers: give Davide a call!