apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Over at ATNY Jill points us to one of Apartment Therapy's most valuable players, Curtis. The man behind the house that's not only been featured in Apartment Therapy Presents: Real Homes, Real People, Hundreds of Design Solutions, but in a handful of posts, has recently upgraded his baroque-style TV cabinet...

We know what's really been holding you back from building a wind energy farm in your backyard is the fact that turbines clash with the rest of your décor. Well, Philippe Starck is here to rescue the renewable energy industry with his Democratic Ecology.

The transparent mini-turbine, which comes out in September, can generate 20-60 percent of the energy needed to power a home for $633. Pramac, a company better known for oil and diesel generators, helped out with the technical details.

In keeping with this month's green theme, we found ten amazing items on Etsy, some of which are made from recycled or repurposed items. There are CD holders made from old calendars, USB drives made from vintage model cars, and a camera bag built with a trashed cassette tape. Enjoy...

Modding PCs and customizing peripherals is a thing we love here at Unplggd, but when we saw this leopard PC mod, we thought, when have you gone too far?

While absolutely impressive in its craftsmanship and creativity, that's a whole lot of leopard. Maybe parring down to just one of two modded components would make this DIY project a little less glaring. That said, the leopard lover who modded their PC has some great tips on how to upholster your PC. Find the right fabric and this could look super posh.

More photos after the jump...

Oh hellz ya! This Ikea Billy hack has our DIY loins a quivering!

More info after the jump...

It's been pretty horrendous here in New York of late. Hot and humid -- the ultimate combination for a sweatathon. While holding off on turning on the A/C we've been looking at Dvice's round-up of seven high-tech cooling solutions for the summer...

Wow! We never thought of using marble as a home office tabletop, but how elegant does it make that iMac look?! Man, you could feel high brow reading Perez Hilton if you were parked at this desk!

With three cats it's almost a second job to keep hair off all our gadgets -- we won't even show you what was happening under our keys when we scrubbed down our keyboard. That's why we think investing in an iCover may be a worthy price to pay to keep our monitors hair, dust, and smudge free...

Um, so we have a lot of remotes -- one each for our Pioneer amp, Philips DVD player, Samsung TV, and our Macbook. We lost our first Macbook remote when one of the kitties hid it somewhere, and well, we're constantly misplacing the others. Sure we could invest in a universal remote, but that would be much too easy.

Instead, what about this gynormous remote home? The Remote Buddy not only lets you vertically house all your pointers, but you can program it so that if you sit it down somewhere and then forget, simply press the color coded button associated with said remote and makes it buzz until you find it (honestly, I'm not quite sure how it does that).

Sure, it looks like something out of the 1985 Sharper Image catalog (R.I.P.) but it could be pretty handy in larger homes...

It was a fun week dontcha think? From inspirational looks at people's home offices and theaters to helpful info on converting your movie collection and building a media table, here's a look at what was hot this week.

And remember, Unplggd is looking for a few good techies. If you're as obsessed with tech and how it can mesh with stellar design drop us a line.

When I bought the new Blackberry Curve 8330 from Verizon last month I figured the smartphone’s syncing capabilities would be similar to Cingular’s Blackberry Curve – meaning, I wouldn’t have any problems. Boy was I wrong…

Ok, so this isn't a home, but the new headquarters for Germany's leading tabloid and Europe's largest newspaper Bild has some rad tech ideas. The upgrade was done by German architect trio KINZO, who took inspiration from spaceships and jet fighters...

We want! We want! Vintage will always be in when it comes to gadgets. There's something about the way things were made back in the day that make them look and feel so much more significant. This is especially the case with digital cameras, which rarely feel like more than a box of plastic.

And that's why we're in love with Rolleiflex's mini digital camera...

Eek! As if we all needed more tech guilt, now Greenpeace comes out with its list who the worst eco offenders in the gadget world. Nintendo bottoms out the list -- Wii-ACK -- because of a 6 percent increase in CO2 emissions due to increased demand. Who kicked green ass after the jump...

Today's New York Times features a Home & Garden story looking at David Bernardi Silver Lake Los Angeles home. The senior vice president of Imagine Entertainment, the production company started by Ron Howard and Brian Grazer, had his Spanish-style duplex renovated and built a media room whose walls are covered in inch-thick cork, typically found in recording studios. "It has a masculine, musky, charred aroma, like a smoking den," Mr. Haeg told the New York Times. Photo of the entertainment room, plus Bernardi's home office, after the jump...

We wanted to come up with a clever way to pick this week's giveaway winner, but we're fresh out of ideas after last week's picking. We opted to go the traditional route and asked a friend on instant messenger to pick a number between 1 and 492 (yup, we got 492 submissions!). After the jump the winner plus some images of outdoor theaters submitted by giveaway hopefuls like the image above from Alex, who says his favorite part of his backyard theater is, "The reaction of the audience"...

Last week we showed you Optimo's new handheld projector, but what we're really coveting is a concept from Won-Seok Lee. The B-Membrane features an omni-directional lens that lets you project onto any surface and at any angle. The device is designed to be a computer monitor, but can play CDs and DVDs via its built-in optical drive. The keyboard on the device, inspired by Kubrick's Hal computer in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, appears only when you need it.
More images after the jump...

In our celeb corner this morning we're taking a look at the gadgets some of the state's famous (and infamous) personalities have scored of late. Above are Paris Hilton and her BF Benji Madden leaving the Apple store with an Air for the lady and a Pro (Macbook Pro that is) for the lad. We love how nonchalant they look after putting down $3K. We usually leave the Apple store with a look of both euphoria and terror.

More celeb gadget news after the jump...

You're not paranoid if they're really after you. A recent New Scientist story brings our attention to the fact that more and more internet service providers are selling data of what sites you're visiting to companies who then crunch the data and sell the information to advertisers so that they can tailor ads to each user specifically. One such company, NebuAd based out of Redwood City, California has partnerships with 30 small ISPs, which amounts to about 100 million broadband subscribers.

Different privacy groups are asking congress to stop NebuAd, and other companies like it, from snooping, but in the mean time they may be watching and analyzing your every click. After the jump we give you tips on how to keep your clicks to yourself...

For those of us living on the east coast, the grocery delivery service Fresh Direct has made the chore of stocking up the fridge a little less annoying. Now, a new product and service ups the ante by providing a way to manage your shopping list before you send in your order...

Over at AT Chicago, Fall Cure member Moryse Heron has posted some sweet pics of her home. In a few of the shots we get a glimpse of her home office, which is packed with goodies, but it doesn't feel cluttered or disorganized in any way.

Ever since companies figured out they could make USB-powered doodads we've seen everything from USB powered lamps to USB mixtapes to USB powered butt coolers! Now Urban Outfitters has come out with a series of USB-powered accessories that have a rad retro aesthetic...

We're not big gamers, but at Digital Downtown earlier this month we found out an interesting tidbit about projectors and video games. According to Panasonic's rep, most projectors suffer a small lag time with video games. This is backed by a forum we found where a member complains about a noticeable fraction of a second lag time while playing Guitar Hero 3 on a Toshiba projector.

To deal with the annoying lag, Panasonic developed a projector that eliminates the pause. Their PT-AX200U, out now and available at Amazon for $1,300.