Modern technology might sound better, hold more songs and be easier to use than the vintage stuff, but it sure doesn’t have the same visual impact as a classic phonograph. Fortunately with this iPhonograph you get the stunning classic style blended with the beauty of new technology. If you’ve got the skills, Instructables has the steps to make your own.

Link Via Geekosystem

Neatorama presents

New York Press Conference 1964
Reporter: Where you your haircuts come from?
George Harrison: Our scalps.

In their early years as a fledgling rock and roll band in the late 1950s and into the early 1960s, The Beatles each sported typical slicked-back, greased-up Tony Curtis/Elvis Presley type D.A. haircuts. In an early explanation as to the origin of the Beatles haircut, George was quoted as saying that he came out of the swimming baths one day, his hair had fallen down over his forehead, and he just left it that way.

The true derivation of the world famous coiffure is a bit more complex. In August of 1960, the newly-0named “Beatles” consisted of five members: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, bassist Stu Sutcliffe, and a newly-hired drummer named Pete Best. The band was hired to play as series of gigs in August of 1960 in Hamburg, Germany. It was there that they met two people who were to have a profound effect on their future careers as icon and trendsetters: Astrid Kirchherr and Jürgen Vollmer.

Kirchherr was a very original and creative photographer. One night she saw The Beatles play at a local club in Hamburg called the Top Ten Club (she was talked into going by her boyfriend Klaus Voorman and fellow artist and friend Jürgen Vollmer). Astrid, Klaus, and Jürgen struck up an immediate and close friendship with the five young, talented, and slightly homesick young rock and rollers. Also, Astrid and bassist Stu Sutcliffe almost immediately fell in love.

Using Jean Cocteau’s 1950 film Orpheus as her main inspiration, one day Astrid gave her beloved Stu a new haircut (it was also a style she had seen on many German boys at her college). She washed the grease out of his scalp and combed the locks straight down, over his forehead. Astrid recalled that she originally used the long combed-over cut on her boyfriend Klaus Voorman, to cover up his bog, floppy ears.

(Image credit: Astrid Kirchherr)

Although the exact dates are nebulous, it is indisputable that Stu was the first Beatle to sport the Beatle haircut on stage. When Stu came onstage to perform that night, John and Paul laughed hysterically and ridiculed poor Stu. Stu was soon to leave the band in early 1961 (he died tragically in April of 1962 of a brain hemorrhage at the early age of 21).

George was actually the first of the later famous Beatles to wear the Beatle cut. Astrid recalled (after Stu), “then George came along and asked me to cut his hair that way.” She added that “John and Paul couldn’t decide whether to have the different haircut.” When George came on stage with his hair combed forward in front of an audience at the Top Ten Club “the rockers gave him funny looks” and he combed it back the next day. This was in the early months of 1961.

George Harrison, before and after.

In October of ’61, John and Paul decided to take a spur of the moment vacation to Paris (one of john’s aunts had given him the princely sun of £500 for his 21st birthday). In Paris, they encountered their old friend Jürgen and asked him to give their hair the combed over treatment. According to Paul, “He (Jürgen) had his hair mod style. We said, ‘Would you do our hair like yours? We’re on holiday, what the hell, we’re buying capes and pantaloons, throwing caution to the wind.’ He said ‘No, boys, I like you as rockers. You look great.’ But we begged him enough. So he said alright. We sat down in his hotel and we just got it. The Beatle cut.”

The new Beatle cut was not without its early drawbacks.  Their road manager Neil Aspenall recalled, “The boys were an easy target for troublemakers who attended those early dates. Gangs would often make it a point of shouting insults at them. It was their childish way of looking for a fight or getting back at the Beatles because their girls thought so much of them.”

In August of 1962, drummer Ringo Starr was asked to join the band. Drummer Pete Best never joined John, Paul, and George in combing his hair in their new over-the-forehead look. His hair was too curly. When later asked why he never combed his hair into a Beatle cut, he replied, “They never asked me.” This bit of non-conformity, while not the entire reason, was probably one of the contributing factors when when the Beatles decided to give poor Pete the sack after two years of loyal drumming with them.

At the time, Ringo not only had a greasy swept-back haircut, he also sported a stylish beard. Ringo recalled John’s phone call to him, asking him to join the Beatles. “You can keep your sidies (sideburns), but lose the beard,” he was instructed. Early publicity photos, as well as Ringo’s picture on the Beatles’ first album Please Please Me, show Ringo clean-shaven, but still with a slightly swept-back coiffure.

By late 1962, the Beatle haircut was firmly established as an easily-recognizable part of the Beatles joint persona. In the early months of 1963, the band had already gotten used to being referred to as “the four moptops” by the British press. In September of 1963, The Beatles record “She Loves You” was played on Dick Clark’s popular dance show American Bandstand. According to Newsweek, when kids saw a photo of four long-haired kids, they just laughed. The record received a mediocre 73 rating in the “Rate A Record” segment of the show.

When they first came to America in February of 1964, TIME magazine referred to their hair as “mushroom haircuts.” Besides the obvious Beatles wigs, the Fab Four cottage industry also spawned Beatle hairbrushes, Beatle combs, and Beatle hairspray. Their then-controversial haircuts became fodder at every Beatle press conference.

John stated that he hadn’t visited an actual barber in years; George cut his hair when they were on tour and his wife Cynthia cut it when he was home. Ringo’s girlfriend Maureen Cox, a hairdresser by trade, cut his hair (the two married in February of 1965).

On the Beatles tour of Australia in mid-1964, two girls named Grace Ferrigno and Val Bahrens got to cut John, Paul, and Ringo’s hair in Melbourne (George was out at the time on a “scenic mountain drive.”) Later, the girls tried to sell the precious sheared locks of hair outside Festival Hall. They ended up making no sales. No one believed the hair was real.

Interestingly, when asked in an early interview about what his future goals were, Ringo stated, quite sincerely, that his dream was to own a string of hair salons. Although he led an incredibly successful life with huge accomplishments, this was one goal Ringo was never to achieve.

If you love race cars, then you might just like these fantastic Prada pumps based on the some of the most popular cars of the 50′s and 60′s. It’s a great blend between classic and modern styles.

Link Via Laughing Squid

“The problem,” says Jessica R. Metcalfe, a Turtle Mountain Chippewa and doctor of Native American studies who teaches at Arizona State University and blogs about Native American fashion designers at Beyond Buckskin, “is that they’re putting it out there as ‘This is the native,’ or ‘This is native-inspired’. So now you have non-native people representing us in mainstream culture. That, of course, gets tiring, because this has been happening since the good old days of the Hollywood Western in the 1930s and ’40s, where they hired non-native actors and dressed them up essentially in redface.

“The issue now is not only who gets to represent Native Americans,” Metcalfe says, “but also who gets to profit.”

Collector’s Weekly has an extensive article about the history of the trade in Native American style, and how the controversy is playing out today. Link -Thanks, Lisa!

Have you met Luna the Fashion Kitty yet? She is indeed the most stylish kitten around, with a full wardrobe of clothing, and BuzzFeed’s collection of photos of her is simply irresistible.

Link

Those of you who saw my Comic Con costumes post from this year already saw how many cute TARDIS costumes there were at the convention, but this TARDIS corset just might be one of the sexiest ways you can dress as a big blue box.

Link Via Geeks Are Sexy

I love how personal this photo-printed ribbon is. Sure you might have to look around for a while to find some actual film and a camera that uses it, but once you do, you can use the negatives to create your own unique and beautiful hair ribbon. Learn how to make your own over at the link.

Link Via Craftzine

Heather McDougal talked to 5th and 6th graders about how the ideal body image of women has changed over time, from the corsets of 100 years ago to the Photoshopped images of today. And the modern altered bodies and altered images are the hardest ideal to even consider living up to. As an example, contrast the image of Usula Andress in the 1962 movie Dr. No with one of Halle Berry in the 2002 movie Die Another Day.

The thing that disturbs me most about these two images is how our daughters must feel about themselves when they see them. The girls in 1962, seeing Ursula rising from the waves in Dr. No, knew that what they were seeing was a real woman, something they could aspire to (if that was what they wanted). Seeing Halle Barry, above, holds no such comforts, particularly when digital film has so much option for smoothing out those flaws. Such perfection is absolutely outside the realm of anyone who is honest with themselves. They might as well throw themselves against a brick wall, because you can’t live, and breathe, and be that perfect. It’s impossible, and our daughters know it.

When she presented the changing ideal image of men, she found fewer changes over time, but a difference between what men and what women consider ideal. Read the rest at Cabinet of Wonders. Link

Before I get started, I want to give a special thank you to WebEcoist and WebUrbanist, who provided a wealth of inspiration and research to this article.

Buildings

Starting on the big scale uses for leftover books, you can build entire structures with them. While Slovakian artist Matej Krén’s building inside The Museum of Modern Art in Bologna (above) may not be structurally sound enough to exist outside another building, the Yellow Pages building (below) might be able to hold its own in a storm. Students from the Dalhousie University Department of Architecture in Nova Scotia built the house using a few wooden and metal beams to hold the thick books in place.

Of course, even if a book building could survive the elements, it would soon become subject to destruction via mold and insects.

Home Insulation

Just because your home can’t be made completely from books doesn’t mean they can’t improve your home though. According to Joel Rickett, deputy editor of The Bookseller magazine, books are an excellent form of insulation, so even if you don’t want to read certain titles any more, they still can be useful for filling up bookshelves that line the exterior-facing walls of your home.

Bookshelves

Artist Jim Rosenau specializes in making bookshelves and book cases from old books. Why bother chopping down trees to make wood for these book holders when you already have all the materials you need in your pile of books to get rid of?

Desks

If you have a lot of books and need a desk, you’re in luck. All it takes to turn a bunch of books into desk is a nice heavy slab of wood or glass in order to press down on the volumes and give you a smooth writing surface. Both the Brunswick Bound bookstore of Melbourne (above) and the library at the Delft University of Technology (below) are equipped with these stylish and incredibly inexpensive desks.

A Couch

If you need a couch more than a desk, a lot of unwanted books and some tape can be used to make a couch that’s certain to get attention. While the idea comes from “Paper Man,” a Jeff Bridges movie where a frustrated writer uses unsold copies of his first book to create a new couch, the idea is entirely possible –the set designers used real books and packing tape to design the furniture.

A Chair

For something with a substantially smaller book investment, these paperback chairs by artist David Karoff are always a good option. He designed them for a Rhode Island bookstore called Myopic Books, so since they were made to be used by customers on a regular basis, they’re probably quite a bit more comfortable than the book couch.

Lights

“Light up your life with books” sounds like something you’d see on a cheesy library poster from the eighties, but in this case, it’s actually a decorating tip. While you can always buy a beautiful $550 book chandelier from artist Lucy Norman (above), it’s surprisingly easy to make your own less sophisticated model, like the one below, at home. All you need is a lamp shade, a lamp kit, a few hardcover books, a clamp and a drill. Shauna Smith Duty teaches you how in this article on Thrift Fun.

Ceiling Décor

While these books hanging from the ceiling may not provide any useful function, they do look really cool and will certainly make a home with really high ceilings feel a lot more personal and cozy. The original art installation is by Richard Wentworth, but if you wanted to adapt this to your own home, I’m sure some fishing line and a drill would be all you would need.

Christmas Tree

Why chop down a tree when you can make your own out of the same basic material? To be fair, most people couldn’t find enough green books to create a whole tree and even if they did, they might be disappointed with the lack of lighting and ornament options, but for the Gleeson Library at the University of San Francisco, the tree was a perfect holiday decoration.

Image via Shawn Calhoun [Flickr]

Planters

One of the coolest things about using a book as a planter is the fact that you’re using something that was once a living plant to provide care for another plant. I wish I could tell you more about these cool planters, but the company that makes them, Gartenkultur, is Italian and their website doesn’t have an English language version. Using the Google translator though, I was able to discern that they use some kind of insulating materials to ensure the plant can be watered without ruining the book.

Vases

Similarly, these book vases by designer Laura Cahill can be filled with water because hidden inside each papery base is a test tube for water collection. Miss Cahill also makes a great lamp out of book pages and a fun stool out of hard covers.

Clothes

If you’re not interested in decorating your home with books, what about your body? This stunning ball gown by Ryan Novelline is comprised of the covers of discarded Golden Books.

Jewelry

If you need some jewelry to go along with your new Golden Books dress, Little Fly has just the thing –rings, necklaces and more made from the laminated pages of discarded books.

Kindle Case

Are you afraid people will make fun of you for owning a Kindle? Do you hang out in bad neighborhoods where it’s best to hide your valuable possessions? Either way, Etsy seller BustedTypewriter’s carved out book that works as a Kindle case might be just the solution you’ve been hoping for.

3D Artworks

These days, most people are willing to acknowledge that the best part of a Pulp Fiction novel is the cover. Artist Thomas Allen took this idea to a whole new level by cutting and folding these covers and then shooting the images with a shallow depth of field. The result is a fascinating narrative that is even more artistic and vivid than the original artists could have ever hoped for.

Cutout Arts

Brian Dettmer uses a similar medium as Thomas Allen. Only instead of photographing the covers of books that he has moved into position, he instead cuts away at pictures inside of books until the many layers of pages form an all new image. The results are amazingly detailed and strikingly beautiful.

Art Canvases

When most people see a book, they see a series of pages that form a story. Mike Stilkey sees a blank canvas. While he doesn’t exclusively paint on book covers, some of his most eye-catching artworks take advantage of the unique canvases. The only problem I see with the art is how you would take it down if it needed to go to a new museum or to a buyer’s home?

Of course, you can always give your books away to Good Will if you don’t have the motivation to tackle any of these projects yourself.

Have any of you ever used your books for non-literary purposes? If so, please share your stories in the comments.

1. Etch-A-Sketch Skirt

The idea of this Etch-A-Sketch skirt by Etsy user SewOeno is pretty cool, but what really puts it over the top is the use of embroidery to create a picture that looks perfect for the subject in question.

2. Game Boy Dress

That same Etsy seller, SewOeno was also responsible for this exceptionally popular Game Boy dress.

3. Nintendo Controller Dress

For those who like old school Nintendo over Game Boys, you’re sure to love this awesome Nintendo controller dress by Liz Tan.

4. Mario Sweater Vest

This knitted sweater vest by Happy Seamstress is an accurate replica of a screenshot of the original Mario Bros game.

5. Mario Piranha Plant Scarf

With all the varying lengths of pipes that piranha plants grow in, this scarf by Technabob is a perfect materialization of the video game monsters.

6. Tetris Tube Top

Personally, my favorite old school game is Tetris, which is why I am totally in love with this sweet Tetris tube top by ZedishaLuxe. She also makes a nice one-shoulder dress in the same style and a Nintendo controller dress as well.

7. Tetris Dress

For those who like to mix their 1980’s video games with some classic vintage dress styles, then you might prefer this stylish Tetris dress created for A Dress A Day.

8. Missile Control Skirt

On a similar note, this poodle-style skirt by Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories features cities, missile trails and aiming crosshairs.

9. Long Cat Scarf

If you like to wear your geekery in meme form rather than gamer form, then you’d look quite chic and stylish in this sweet long cat scarf by Etsy seller xHezaChanx.

10. 3D Glasses Dress

There are plenty of people who argue that the whole 3D movie thing is a trend, but if you love 3D in all of its forms, then this dress by nicolelinder is a great way to show your interests to the outside world.

11. Pong Dress

Get ready to party with this sweet dress by artists Max Moswitzer and Magarete Jahrmann of the Ludic Society that actually lets you play Pong wherever you go.

12. Air Conditioned Shirt

For all you geeks out there who are tired of slaving away in a hot office, this USB powered, air conditioned shirt by Kouzi Ichigaya, an ex-Sony technician, is a great way to cool down. Of course, if you don’t happen to be near a computer, you can always power the fan using a few AA batteries instead.

13. Httpanties

With messages like “403 Forbidden” and “411 length required,” these naughty panties on ThinkGeek are a perfect way to express your programming geektitude in any situation.

14. Computer Wire Dress

When you want to show your techy undertones on the outside though, it’s probably a lot more socially acceptable to do it with a great computer wire dress like this one by Tina Sparkles.

15. Star Wars Crawl Dress

You can’t have any geek-related articles without mentioning Star Wars and this dress featuring the introductory crawl from the movie series. In case you’re wondering, the headband matches the rest of the outfit, reading, “In a galaxy far, far away.” The dress was created by a woman named Chenoa who is a friend of the guy who runs Chris Eng Says ‘Bwuh?’

16. Star Wars Corset

For a more sensual side of Star Wars, check out these sexy corsets by Evening Arwen that will make you look like a feminine Darth Vader or a svelte storm trooper.

17. Star Trek Corset

For the Trekkies, there are still plenty of sexy lingerie, just check out this gorgeous red-shirt corset that was sold on Etsy, but I can’t track down the seller that originally released it.

Do you guys have any favorite geek gear? If so, share it in the comments.

Update: Reader Contributions

Reader Geneva wanted to share her wonderful Wonder Woman scarf with us, and I’m very glad she did.

Melphistopheles wanted to make sure we included these great Star Wars bathing suits by Black Milk. While I love the R2D2, the C3PO one is great as well.

Keep the comments coming guys!

Do you still have piles of vinyl records you store for no reason? Here’s a cool and stylish way to re-use them: a vinyl record purse. Such things always look fashionable, I guess. Tasket Basket posted quite a few pictures of how she made this one.

Link – via diygadgets

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by annsmarty.

Any fan of low brow artist Mark Ryden will love this fashion work he paired with fashion designer Nagi Noda to create. The clothing line is called “Broken Label.”

Link Via Boing Boing

It may be a little mean and silly, but I think this cute little dead dog purse is fantastic. Only problem, it’s $317.

“Based on Paris Hilton’s discarded pet Tinkerbell is an upside down dead Chihuahua. This design capitalizes on the trend of carrying a small dog as a fashion accessory.”

Link Via Craftzine

“I certainly respect the Constitution,” Melton said, “but we have some issues that are much bigger than the Constitution.”

I know Neatorama tries to stay unpolitical, but it is crucial for all of us to stand up and declare our rights to sag our pants.

Link Via Boing Boing

I love this cute fan dress. Best of all, the fans are actually made from folded up junk mail and then sewn onto canvas. I bet you never thought all that crap you throw in the trash every day could be made so pretty.

Link Via Craftzine

Link

Good Magazine has a fantastic gallery of some of the best street art in the world. Some are sculptures and some are murals. The site paired up with Wooster Collective, a street art blog that has some great stuff and some just ok sauce.

Recycling can be so sexy. Creator Jolis Paons pleated, sewed and glued this entire dress by hand. It’s gorgeous, but I have to admit, I would hope my number wasn’t visible on it.

Link

If you’re a person who loves uneven tan lines, this sun tattoo is just the thing for you. At least if you get skin cancer, it will come in a pretty design.

Link

This cute, and suprisngly fresh smelling, purse is very well thought out. The bass-mouth opening is very clever and the scales are too authentic.

Link Via Craftzine

This stylish crocheted hat is just what the doctor ordered for the upcoming cold holiday nights.

Link Via CraftZine