Until a couple of months ago I was an ex-smoker (for about ten years, though I'd occasionally bum one socially). Stupidly started again, while working on a maddeningly-difficult project, but never-mind my pathetic rationale...
After weeks of using my windowsill as an ashtray, I remembered that I'd acquired an Arne Jacobsen Stelton stainless steel ashtray a few years ago, so I dug it out, in the spirit of Production-for-Use (for all you "His Girl Friday" fans-).
What a delightful, elegant design! With a flick of the thumb, the top receptacle pivots effortlessly, dumping its contents out of sight to the canister below. Two simple pieces that function flawlessly. A joy. Perfect. Arne Jacobsen, what a stud.
Almost perfect
It's a nice design, but it IS flawed: There's no place to rest a burning cigarette. That's fine for contemplative or social smoking, but not so good for smoking while working.
What do you think of this design, by Marriane Brandt in 1924?
http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?object_id=3547&imageID=0
Au contraire!
While the Jacobsen Cylinda ashtray lacks the familiar channel that many designs have, its depth & shape allow a burning cigarette to sit, ignored, more stably even than the Brandt design. Gravity makes such a channel unnecessary.
The pivot's the real beauty part, though-- the force created by a half spin causes the top piece to revolve 2-3 times, completely emptying itself effortlessly. Plus, it's just a lovely thing to watch-- a stainless steel half-sphere spinning perfectly within a stainless steel cylinder.
Ah, you must...
Ah, you must have the small version. Mine's the large; if I try to lean a cigarette against the side of the bowl at an angle, it just falls in... And even if I didn't mind the filter getting coated in the crud that's left in the bottom of the bowl, the cigarette doesn't stay lit for long in there.
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