Camera freak and fellow PauseTalker Tim Rudder has made available a t-shirt he designed featuring a rather detailed illustration of the classic Rolleiflex 3.5 Tessar camera — you can order one online here. Next up is the Canon A-1.

While checking out DesignTide yesterday, I quite enjoyed the booth for the AWA brand — that’s the collaboration between Nosigner and the Tokushima Wood & Bamboo Industrial Cooperative Society Confederation — with some new pieces on show, including the Cartesia drawers (above) and the Unit set (below).

Hoto Fudo is the bulbous building pictured above, currently in construction in the town of Fujikawaguchiko, and set to house a restaurant. It was designed by Takeshi Hosaka Architects — see this Designboom post for more images of the project.

Anyone who has tried to find some free wi-fi spots in Tokyo will know just how big a deal this is: Starbucks is set to offer free wi-fi in 94 of its stores in Japan starting November 1, with plans to expand after that. Tokyo web workers rejoice. Via Jason Jenkins.

Update: The service may not be as free as I had hoped, and may be limited to customers of NTT’s Flet’s.

Update 2: Some good news — it’s been confirmed that the service is indeed free.

Update 3: Well, looks like we were wrong. The service is indeed only for customers of Flet’s and Mzone — here’s the press release from Starbucks.

How’s this for a promotion: Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds opens in Japan on November 20, and the distributor is offering a money-back guarantee during the first four days of release. This means if you leave the film within the first hour of the film, you get your ticket refunded. Not a bad way to promote the film. Via Japan Probe.

Photographer Joji Shimamoto is showing works at Fireking Cafe in Yoyogi Uehara until the end of the month.

It’s been a good month for fellow PauseTalker James Kay, with his Tokyo-based game studio, Score Studios, finally launching its official website, as well as their first few iPhone apps, which includes the sheep herding game Flock It (above).

Nosigner has produced the art direction and naming of Soco Coco, an interesting project from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry with the purpose of supporting small and medium-sized enterprises.

They utilize the SME with a shop space to distribute their goods in an environment with well established commercial facilities. The purpose of the project is to introduce the products to a wider range of customers and therefore to extend the distribution. For the SME it is an opportunity to get supported and to connect with commercial facilities.

Nosigner‘s beautiful packaging for Kanpyo Udon has won the Platinum Award in the food category of the prestigious Pentawards package design competition.

Not only that, but his TRUSS bookshelf (below) — part of AWA, a new brand produced in cooperation with the Tokushima Wood & Bamboo Industrial Cooperative Society Confederation — is the recipient of a Good Design Award.

The current show at the 21_21 Design Sight is “The Outline: The Unseen Outline of Things,” an exhibition of works by Naoto Fukasawa and photography by Tamotsu Fujii. It runs until January 31.

• Yes, it’s that time of the year again, Tokyo Design Week is just around the corner, this year kicking off on a Friday instead of the traditional Wednesday, running October 30 to November 3. Best way to find out about everything that’s going on is to pick up the guides to the events — they should be popping up around town soon — and of course to check out the official event websites: DesignTide, 100% Design Tokyo, Tokyo Designers Week, Swedish Style, and Design Touch.
• So instead of “Happening in Tokyo” event posts, time to start some “Happening in TDW” ones. I still don’t know how much I’ll be able to take in because of my back (it’s much better, if still painful at times), but I’m still going to try and sample as much as I can.
• Currently I’m most looking forward to the DesignTide opening party on Friday night (although I believe it’s not a public event). It’s always a good opportunity to get a first glimpse at everything, and chat up the attendees.
• More of a pre-TDW event, this month’s PechaKucha Night in Tokyo (Vol. 66) happens this Wednesday (October 28), and it will of course have a TDW flavor to it. This will also be the first PKN I attend in quite a few months, so happy to be able to join up with team PKN again.
• Berlin’s DMY will be participating at DesignTide, with products and prototypes from 14 Berlin-based designers.
• Designboom presents Hermès Paris: “A design adventure from high-quality bags to helicopters and yachts, an online graphic competition for the upcoming tie collection and the world preview in Tokyo of new high-tech suitcases. A presentation of the most recent development inside the Hermès design department, and a Q&A with design director of Hermès Gabriele Pezzini conducted by Birgit Lohmann (Designboom).” It happens at the design conference/forum space at the 100% Design Tokyo venue in Jingu Gaien on October 31 (12:00-13:00).
• And of course, don’t miss the Designboom Mart, again a part of 100% Design Tokyo.

Kenya Hara designs the identity for next year’s Setouchi International Art Festival.

Great furniture design by Nobuhiro Teshima dating back to 2006: the Mobile Dining stowaway table. It not only folds away, the height is also adjustable. Via Boing Boing.

Created for Kyouei‘s “Rain” exhibition during the Taiwan Design Expo ’09, the Endless Rain Record does just what its name implies: plays the sound of rain endlessly — the grooves on the vinyl form a circle.

Something else I should have posted ages ago: the release of Takayuki Fukatsu‘s TiltShift Generator for iPhone (it was previously released as a desktop app). I’m a huge fan of all of Fukatsu’s iPhone photo apps, and have been having fun with this one as well.