Rolu is a minimal design created by Osaka-based designer Chiaki Murata of hers for Metaphys. Rolu functions as an on-the-go memo holder with a single brass bar holding down the paper. There are perforated edges along the length of the paper in increments of 10cm each, perfect for taking down directions, to-do lists, or grocery lists. The design is influenced by Metaphys’ popular Corda pen, and uses the same material and production process. The design comes in white, black, and orange.

I’m the type of person who still likes to use pen and paper for taking notes and checking off to-do lists. Rolu is an efficient and elegant solution to scribble down ideas and musings. Functionality aside, the design is beautifully minimal, yet uniquely sophisticated and mysterious. At first glance, it takes a second to figure out how Rolu functions, and then it all makes perfect sense.

Doesn’t it frustrate you when you put the pen on side of your desk after writing and it falls down because of elevation to one side or a little nudge from hand? Surely it does and it can affect your concentration.

For this very reason Tonboenpistu has come up with a pen called Yulasha, having counter-weight at the end so that it doesn’t topple over even on the steepest of elevated desks or hardest nudge possible. In a way it sticks to the table or desk applying the principle of roly-poly. The pen will cost 315 Yen ($3) and will be available for purchase from tomorrow so you better get your hands on it.

The pen has an embedded weight of 6.5 grams on one side of the axis of the pen body which helps keep this pen firm on any surface without the danger of toppling over as gravity pulls the weight down and thereby preventing from any unwanted rolling over.

In 2004, just as their firm was achieving international notoriety, SANAA principals Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa were commissioned to build a small home in Tokyo.

The client asked for a house built for socializing, and the architects responded by with a design for five leafy, open “living rooms.” To complement the unusual succession of spaces, they designed a slender, inconspicuous birch chair that could function in nearly any situation. Its unusual ergonomics made it instantly recognizable, with two iconic “bunny ears” that ostensibly relieved pressure on the spine. It was also remarkably narrow–at around 14.5” wide, it was really more of a stool than a chair.

SANAA’s one-off was soon picked up by Maruni Wood Industry, a Japanese manufacturer of wood furniture, where it’s since seen immense commercial success. Last year the company even produced a limited run of Mini and Minimini sizes, with seat widths of 9.5” and 7”, respectively, and again, the chairs sold out. This year, the company is trying a different angle. A wider one, specifically, with a seat two inches broader than the standard size. Some speculate that the wide version is targeted towards the, uh, more obtuse American market.

The politics of the American figure–we’ll say form–inspires numerous reactions here at home: some (wrongly) argue for the preservation of the right to poor life decisions, while others indicate the larger systemic social issues at play, advocating for new or amended policies not skewed toward some misplaced (and uninformed) libertarian ethos or influenced by corporate profiteering. Clearly, it’s a difficult topic to broach, yet one which has so singularly defined how we and everyone else perceives the shape of America.

“There’s nothing I’m particularly conscious of,” writes Sejima on Maruni’s website. “But I’m aware that my work is sometimes thought of by people from other countries as being distinctively Japanese.” Though she’s clearly talking about more than the proportions of the chair, it’s interesting that it was necessary to re-imagine the chair for the American market. Both original and wide sizes were exhibited last spring at the Canadian Center for Architecture, as part of an exhibit called Imperfect Health, examining medicine and illness through design. The idea, as John Hill first noted, was to draw a wordless comparison between Japanese and American physical standards.