From open.edu, learn about six key movements in design history: Gothic Revival, Arts and Crafts (below), Bauhaus, Modernism (above), American Industrial Design and Postmodernism.

You can watch them all here.

via Open Culture.

From PBS Digital Studios’ Inventors, meet Ernest Nussbaum, inventor of the Practicello. Be sure to check out the entire series.

There are more inventions and more instruments on this site, as well as the must-see trailer for the documentary Landfill Harmonic. 

Mathematical calculations created with touch and sound… and the help of an Arduino board, contact microphones and solenoids. The Knock Knock was designed by Khalil Klouche as a concept for the “Touch!” exhibition at Lausanne’s Museum of Design and Contemporary Art (MUDAC) in 2012. 

Knock on the different operators and it knocks back the answer. Watch. And then check out more inventions of one kind or another.

via Design Boom.

Meet Mantis, an all-terrain hexapod walking machine built by inventor Matt Denton and a team of six.

This 2.2-litre Turbo Diesel-powered, British-designed and -built walking machine can be piloted or remote WiFi-controlled, stands 2.8 metres high with a five meter working envelope and weighing in at just under two tonnes.

The Mantis took four years of research, design, building, and testing, and cost “hundreds of thousands of pounds” to make. It’s for rent as an entertainment vehicle, but Denton hopes to showcase it at science fairs. Read more at the BBC.

via Boing Boing. 

Related vids:A smaller hexapod and more robots.

If you’ve ever wanted a cabinet with secret compartments — and we’re talking about a lot of secret compartments here — then you’re going to like videos from the Extravagant Inventions: The Princely Furniture of the Roentgens exhibit that was at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art (October 30, 2012–January 27, 2013).

One of the finest achievements of European furniture making, this cabinet is the most important product from Abraham (1711—1793) and David Roentgen’s (1743—1807) workshop. A writing cabinet crowned with a chiming clock, it features finely designed marquetry panels and elaborate mechanisms that allow for doors and drawers to be opened automatically at the touch of a button. Owned by King Frederick William II, the Berlin cabinet is uniquely remarkable for its ornate decoration, mechanical complexity, and sheer size.

In addition to the Secretary Cabinet above, there’s also a writing desk, a rolltop desk, and an automated Marie Antoinette music player.

via Doobybrain.