February 18, 2002

6:08 PM

Did the Microflat leave you with a bad taste? Does your New York, LA, or Sydney accommodations leave something to be desired? Or do you like something more round? If so, then try the TurnON, the new prototype by Alles Wird Gut. Be the first one on your block to sit in one of these bad boys.
posted by plemeljr (15 comments total)

That looks uncomfortable.
posted by Theiform at 6:11 PM on February 18, 2002

My fondest desire is to live inside of a giant hamster wheel.
posted by MrBaliHai at 6:14 PM on February 18, 2002

is it called TurnON because of the topless woman?

The rings don't really float my boat. But at least they look completely futuristic rather than boring old quasi-futuristic.
posted by Foaf at 6:19 PM on February 18, 2002

Microflat = coffin
TurnOn = round coffin
posted by victors at 6:21 PM on February 18, 2002

But why would you want to make 22% of your apartment, small as it is already, "dead space" you could never use? Or perhaps they have some way of turning it into clever storage.

Concepts like this will make sense on space stations or interplanetary ships, but we're a long way from being forced to use them on Earth.
posted by dhartung at 6:23 PM on February 18, 2002

Foaf, as long as you are looking at the topless woman, did you notice that the shower and the toilet are opposite from each other? So that if you rotated the wheel you could face an unpleasant situation?
posted by plemeljr at 6:29 PM on February 18, 2002

Fifth Element.
posted by SpecialK at 6:31 PM on February 18, 2002

I don't get it.

The leopard-print one is groovy, though.
posted by pudders at 6:44 PM on February 18, 2002

Concepts like this will make sense on space stations or interplanetary ships

Yup, the first thing that I thought of when I saw this was the centrifuge inside of the Discovery in 2001: A Space Odyssey.
posted by MrBaliHai at 6:45 PM on February 18, 2002

Okay, so...all the bizarro, blurry images aren't making any sense to me. Is this thing basically a tube of huge LifeSavers where you spin each room to where you'd like it?

Ummmm. So, what happens if you're "on the throne" "downloading some files" and someone decides to spin you?

What happens then, Dieter?
posted by ColdChef at 6:54 PM on February 18, 2002

Open the shower doors, Hal. Hal, open the shower doors please. Hal? Open the shower doors!
posted by mathowie at 7:16 PM on February 18, 2002

My fondest desire is to live inside of a giant hamster wheel.

I'd prefer a house made out of Lincoln Logs, myself.
posted by jonmc at 8:21 PM on February 18, 2002

1st Requirement For An Apartment:
The dwelling space must be more appealing than my college dorm room.

Scores so far:

Microflat 0, College Dorm Room 1
TurnOn -1*, College Dorm Room 1

* For ColdChef's insightful comments
posted by insomnyuk at 8:47 PM on February 18, 2002

I'd give the microflat a little more credit than a 0 when comparing it to my dorm room. But the TurnOn, while cool looking, is probably horrible to live in. And where do you put one of these things? On the sidewalk? You still need to rent a room big enough to hold the damn hamster wheel is what I would think. And if these people are so innovative, where in the world is my desktop supposed to go? I'm really trying to figure out how the whole "law of gravity" doesn't seem to apply here.
And personally, I still prefer doors and walls to protect myself from stalkers and the like. That's not to say I wouldn't wire my whole house with webcams, but that's not the point...
posted by jacobw at 9:29 AM on February 19, 2002

This would be cool ... if I was living in space. Then I could reorient myself while weightless within each module without having to spin the damn thing, or conversely, the spinning would actually generate gravity and I could walk around the thing, like the station in 2001. On Earth, however, not so much.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 10:35 AM on February 19, 2002