London Design Festival 2011: London designer Oscar Diaz has redesigned the pen pot so there's no need to tip pens all over the desk or jam your fingers down the side to retrieve a paper clip or pencil sharpener that's slipped to the bottom.
The silicone Pen Pal has teeth round the edge to hold pens upright while a shallow dish in the centre contains smaller items.
Diaz will present the product for Spanish company Doiy as part of an exhibition called Barcelona Design meets London at The Vyner Studio during the London Design Festival next month.
Diaz first appeared on Dezeen in 2009 with his Ink Calendar that uses the capillary action of ink spreading across paper to display the date. See all our stories about his work here.
Check out more stories about stationery here.
The information below is from Oscar Diaz:
Pen Pal by Oscar Diaz
Pen pal is a simple pen stand made of silicone. Observing pen holders and improvised pen pots I realised that many small objects are difficult to access when they are mixed with pens of different sizes.
Usually the smaller items fall into to the bottom, which makes them unreachable and they end up taking much of the available space.
Pen Pal proposes to have fewer pens, but have all of them accessible. The central can hold clips; pins and other small objects while the conical holes allow placing pens of different diameters all around the cavity.
It keeps everything accessible avoiding having to turn your pen pot upside down to find a clip.
Produced by: Doiy
Product name: Pen Pal
Year: 2011
Materials: Silicone
Dimensions: 31 x 96 mm diam.
"Barcelona Design meets London" at The Vyner Studio.
Designers: Oscar DÃaz, Tomás Alonso, Aloy Mas, Causas Externas, Out of Stock and GR
Organized by: GR Industrial Design, The Vyner Studio, BCD (Barcelona Centre de Disseny)
Sponsoring: Estrella Damn, Viña Zorzal