Forget Google. We’re talking Googie, the space-age architectural style that blazed briefly but brilliantly across the United States during the 1950s and 1960s. 

When there's no time to panic, turn to this minimalist clock containing emergency supplies (including a thermal blanket). Good for surviving an apocalypse. Or even just a cold day. 

If you find mornings heavy-going, this could be your thing. You can program this concrete barista to brew your coffee while you're still in bed. 

Some Swedish architects are designing homes set against cliff faces, and they’re using birds’ nests as inspiration. 

The brainchild of an inventive disability advocate, this handsome globe – containing raised continents and braille – is getting digitised for a new generation. 

An Italian widow decided that one grave just didn’t cut it for her dearly departed. So she got a whole complex built, complete with concrete, bronze, glass, ebony and ivory, granite, brass, copper and marble.

When post-war US car designers were given free rein to create their dream automobiles, they came up with jaw-droppers like these. (And one of them contains a 30-coat paint job, which owes its sparkle to real crushed diamonds.)

Melbourne-based digital inventor Mond Qu once made a model island so lifelike, it tricked Google Earth and National Geographic into thinking it was real.

Gilded arches, slabs of marble, glittering chandeliers… Moscow’s subway stations? No, we’re not jealous at all.