Thanks Dezeen

The Applause Machines were featured on Dezeen this week. From this article many other articles were written, all complimentary and some very funny.

Laikingland...funny name?

LAIK / LAIKING: Verb: Yorkshire/Cumbrian (UK) word meaning ‘to play’: to engage in games or other activities for enjoyment rather than for a serious or practical purpose.- origin from Old Norse leika [to play].

LAND: Noun:1. the part of the earth’s surface that is not covered by water.2. a country or state. e.g. England and The Netherlands.

Martin and I along with most people from our region, have used this "Laiking" expression since we were kids. As it will continuously influence our products, we chose it to be a part of our Company name.

The above photos show a nice example of my kids Simeon (4 1/2 years) and Barnabe (nearly 3 years) "laiking around". Here's how "laiking" influences our products....

The boys are showing good drawing technique, aided by lollipop sucking concentration, to produce beautiful circular shapes. The templates used are "Old Macdonald and Wheels on the Bus" CDs. The size (120mm) is actually identical to our Wooden Base diameter, which is also shown above on our Orange Machine.

I don't know which CD Martin used for his original design... Some guesses might make for interesting comments...

Hot Ice, Amsterdam

The Applause Machines made their commercial debut on mainland Europe last week, with the first shipment on sale at Hot Ice on the Westergasfabriekterrein in Amsterdam.

The machines arrived a couple of days after the American presidential elections and Gerdur from Hot Ice, plans to send an Orange one (from the Netherlands) to congratulate Barack Obama.

We hope the Applause Machine will be put to good use applauding some pretty big and hopefully wise decisions made in the Oval Office in the next few years.

The Harley Gallery

The Harley Gallery took delivery of a full set of five Applause Machines today. They were so happy they put them straight on display and even painted the wall to match! Here you can see them sat in front of a rather beautiful Peter Blake collage. Did you know he once asked me for my autograph.

Foam Towers & Tin Can Showers

We had a fun time on Saturday evening at the Flipside Gallery in Eindhoven. The Applause Machines were on show for the first time in the Netherlands at the final evening of a Kinetic Art exhibition. The machines were enjoyed by the gallery visitors and put to good use, applauding the performances of Karel van der Eijk, Mario van Horrik & Petra Dubach and Guus Voermans.

You can see Mario above playing an accompanying guitar to the bubbling foam towers. The towers original idea came from Petra blowing a straw into a washing up bowl. They then proceded for 6 months to perfect the recipe of green dreft washing liquid, sugar, salt and many other secret ingredients.

The grand finale of the evening was Karel's performance which involved machines that popped balloons, vibrated jam jars, swooshed water cans, whistling wind pipes and finished with 200 tin cans falling on the sponge- cushioned-bucket-on- head protected artist from the shower above. Marvellous stuff! 

Finishing Table

Here is the finishing table at Laikingland. As you can see we are just completing a batch of Graphite Black Applause Machines in order to deliver to The Harley Gallery next week.

La Clapping Machine Rouge par Jules Crave

Here's some beautiful artwork that we received from Jules (8 ans.) He lives in Paris and is not just a budding artist but also a young entrepreneur.

When the Applause Machine was delivered he was so happy that he decided on a plan to get his next favorite colour.

His proposal to Laikingland is that he's shown it to all his class mates and if they (or their Mums and Dads) buy a certain number of machines, then his next machine is for FREE .... Merci beaucoup pour ton dessin Jules. Pour ta deuxieme machine, on va voir.

Photography Tips Welcome.

In the Summer and Autumn months we've been really busy investigating potential marketing and retail opportunities for Laikingland. I've visited some pretty fantastic galleries & incredible design shows, had lots of motivating feedback and "tried" to capture images of innumerable beautiful objects.

You'd therefore imagine that my blogging output would be considerable... Alas, it has not been so, as my photography skills of the afforementioned images, have time and again been found wanting.

Therefore, for my trip to the Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven I changed tactics. Leaving the guilty camera at home, I decided not only to meet the designer of my favorite object but also to ask him (or her) for some images of their work. And so here it is, the wonderful graduation project of Thomas Traxler from the Masters course at the Design Academy Eindhoven. It's a solar powered machine, that makes beautiful benches and lamp shades and in doing so captures the story of the weather the day the object is manufactured. For a movie and small explanation of the work check out this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ6d0_uS8iw. Big Applause to Thomas for his work and big THANKS for his above photo.

Photography tips to help for my next posting are very welcome. (Please add on the Blog Comments.)