Crafting can be great. But beware: crafting can also go spectacularly wrong. Fortunately for the benefit of those of us who might become so proud of having made something, anything, all by ourselves, that we are oblivious that the result is an aesthetic travesty, there are websites making a valiant attempt to document the legion of ways in which crafting can get totally out of hand. Before you pick up those needles or scissors or fire up the kiln or soldering iron, check out: Glitter Gone Bad; Handmade Gone Wrong; What Not To Craft, Homemade Hilarity; and Kraftomatic. The sturdy souls at CraftFail (previously) deserve special credit for documenting their own crafting mishaps, and Regretsy (also previously) and Etsy WTF will help you choose wisely from among Etsy’s hand-crafted wares. [more inside]
posted by orange swan on Nov 22, 2009 - 65 comments

The Good, The Bad and The Etsy. A blog highlighting the Good, the Bad, and the Etsy. [via mefi projects]
posted by Greg Nog on Jul 24, 2009 - 30 comments

Extraordinarily Weird But Beautiful Flowers, Apparently there are also ugly flowers.
posted by twoleftfeet on Jun 21, 2009 - 15 comments

His name is Ugly Bat Boy, and no, there's nothing wrong with him. He's perfectly normal.
posted by mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey on Feb 28, 2009 - 47 comments

Apparently, the president-elect is getting a new limousine. Details are sparse, but one thing is certain: it's damned ugly. [more inside]
posted by chuckdarwin on Jan 16, 2009 - 90 comments

A cute puppy (not Ugly) who hops like a bunny because she has no front legs is loved very much and given model airplane wheels.
posted by orthogonality on Jun 24, 2008 - 39 comments

A cat with no face is nonetheless loved very much. Let's be blunt, Chase the cat is a surprising creature. When she was only a few weeks old, she lost her face in a car accident. While this link isn't exactly NSFW by any use of the term, she is a disfigured cat - no face, no eyelids - and at first she's a little hard to look at. However, she is in no pain and she is obviously well loved and well taken care of. Chase is currently "employed" as a therapy cat, so that people can "feel just as great about themselves and realize that not everyone looks perfect and that is OK."
posted by Sticherbeast on Jun 23, 2008 - 81 comments

Ugly [single link photobucket post]
posted by orthogonality on Jun 22, 2008 - 146 comments

It's that time of year again, folks... don't forget to put in your vote for the World's Ugliest Dog. [more inside]
posted by miss lynnster on May 17, 2008 - 22 comments

Ugly Mickey. [via]
posted by Armitage Shanks on Oct 29, 2007 - 21 comments

Handbags of Horror High-fashion handbags: They're expensive and ugly. So ugly, in fact, that they could only have been inspired by monsters from horror movies. Radar compares and contrasts.
posted by Faint of Butt on Oct 3, 2007 - 23 comments

Six feet long, eight feet wide, bicycle tires all around, and 0 to 60 in four-and-a-half hours. Have any MeFites the courage to admit they owned one of these horrors of engineering?
posted by bwg on Aug 29, 2007 - 122 comments

There is no dog God.
posted by rob511 on Jun 22, 2007 - 36 comments

The 10 Ugliest Men In Heavy Metal History. Well, Metal was never meant for the beautiful people, anyways.
posted by jonmc on Mar 31, 2007 - 61 comments

It’s not too hard to create an eye-explodingly ugly site on MySpace. It’s rather more difficult to elicit beauty (or at least good taste) from the MySpace beast. But coder Mike Davidson has succeeded. You can find out he did it--and how to do it yourself--here.
posted by Iridic on Aug 23, 2006 - 67 comments

The Case of the Ugly Bride. They said she would be of fair complexion and able to speak English, but she wasn't - so the groom's family is suing the bride's relatives for fraud, deciet, conspiracy, unjust enrichment, violation of the Civil Rights Act, amongst other torrid claims.
posted by contessa on Jul 11, 2006 - 55 comments

There are plenty of contests whose purpose is to pick out the best looking dog, or flowers or various other things. But what about the ugliest? These sites and contests bring you the ugliest cars, dogs, celebrities (YMMV), buildings in Ann Arbor, MI, and those bastions of cuteness, babies.
posted by darsh on Apr 25, 2006 - 16 comments

Mocan and Tekin aren't sure why criminals tend to be ugly. Is it that ugly people make less money? Is it that they are given lower grades? Is it that people are just mean to them and they hate the world? Or does their asymmetry hint at psychological imperfections like criminal tendencies? Scientist have long suspected a connection between crime and physiognomy.
posted by missbossy on Feb 20, 2006 - 57 comments

Macramé: the craft that spawned a million eyesores As every family has its black sheep, so must the world of crafting have its irredeemable craft. Meet macramé, the ugly stepsister of crafting. In my recent search for a basic pattern I could use to redo a couple of old lawn chairs, every click revealed some fresh new horror. I searched on, thinking surely there must be at least one or two examples of attractive macramé products somewhere on the world wide web, but apparently not. There was nothing but bad jewellery, bad home décor items, bad chairs and really bloody awful owls. I tried approaching the technique with a designer’s mindset, seeing ugly things not as an end in themselves but as a design challenge. How could the patterns be improved? How could the technique and medium be used to produce something beautiful? Perhaps it was just the macramé cord and not the technique that doomed each project to aesthetic hell? But in the end, the craft defeated me. I declared it hopeless, decided to do my two lawn chairs in a plain cream and then retreat from the field before some disaster (possibly one involving a flaming owl) struck. However, that is just my opinion. Perhaps I just don’t appreciate that some people really need that homemade Christmas tree, or the perfect belt to wear while impersonating Elvis.
posted by orange swan on Jan 31, 2006 - 62 comments

RIP, Sam. Sam, previously discussed here, has gone to meet his maker. (Yes, the site could also win World's Ugliest Website, but have some sympathy, would you please?) And yes, he's real. The blog is a little more informative, and better looking...a little.
posted by OhPuhLeez on Nov 22, 2005 - 32 comments

Knitting Pattern Hall of Shame This site appears to be where all the really bad patterns get held up to all the ridicule they deserve. I’ll be kind and say that these designers must have meant well. After all, there must be a certain demand for that perfect pattern to make for the gay pride parade or your favourite knitting fetish bar or to get one through those days of abject self-hatred. Every designer has trouble remembering that not every woman is 5’10 and 115 pounds. And it’s really kind of heartwarming that they try so damn hard to sex up knitting. But knitters, before you make any of these, please remember a few basic rules: one’s knitting project should not land one on an endangered species list, give one retina burn or a heightened cholesterol level, or house more than six people. And if your boyfriend dumps you when you give him this for Christmas, rest assured that you’ll get custody of it. (via MonkeyFilter, courtesy Melinika).
posted by orange swan on Oct 27, 2005 - 27 comments

Sam, the World's Ugliest Dog
posted by 김치 on Aug 4, 2005 - 79 comments

Are you ugly or handsome? So Much for That Merit Raise: The Link between Wages and Appearance. Hey what about the phrase beauty is in the eye of the beholder?
posted by halekon on Apr 8, 2005 - 46 comments

On the mission to understand and communicate miracles of Life on Earth and the mysteries reaching beyond the stars.
posted by breezeway on Mar 7, 2005 - 5 comments

Fun with streetboxes.
posted by cmonkey on Nov 21, 2004 - 15 comments

Ugly Stickers and their "dark origins". (via tui)
posted by Ufez Jones on Mar 8, 2004 - 6 comments

Friday Fun: Heinous bridesmaid dresses. I haven't laughed this hard since the Weight Watchers cards. Make sure to peruse the Pucker contest roundup.
posted by MikeB on Apr 4, 2003 - 15 comments

The World's Ugliest Buildings
posted by yertledaturtle on May 10, 2002 - 49 comments