You know what nobody talks about enough? How absolutely boring our TVs have become. Seriously, when did we all collectively decide that every television needs to look like the exact same black rectangle? Walk into any electronics store and it’s just rows and rows of identical screens, differentiated only by size and price tag. But here’s the thing: it doesn’t have to be this way.

Cordova Woodworking just dropped something that’s getting design nerds and retro enthusiasts equally excited. They’ve created a modern TV cabinet that looks like it time-traveled from the 1960s, and it’s honestly perfect. Picture those gorgeous wooden television sets your grandparents might have had, the ones that looked like actual furniture instead of electronics. Now imagine that same aesthetic, but designed for your flat screen, soundbar, and PlayStation.

Designer: Cordova Woodworking

The timing couldn’t be better. We’re living through this interesting moment where mid-century modern design has gone from niche collector territory to full-on mainstream obsession. You see it everywhere: the tapered legs, the warm wood tones, the clean lines that somehow feel both retro and contemporary. But most of that MCM-inspired furniture is either absurdly expensive vintage pieces or cheap knockoffs that fall apart after six months. This TV cabinet hits that sweet spot of authentic design with actual quality craftsmanship.

Let’s talk about what makes this piece special. It’s built from solid sapele wood, which is this beautiful African hardwood with rich, warm coloring that develops an even better patina over time. The cabinet is sized for a 32-inch TV, which might seem small if you’re used to wall-sized screens, but it’s actually perfect for bedrooms, home offices, or cozy living rooms where you don’t need to feel like you’re at a movie theater.

But here’s where the design gets really clever. The lower section has dedicated storage for a soundbar, plus ample space for gaming consoles and all those accessories we accumulate. No more cord chaos or devices balanced precariously on whatever surface is nearby. Everything has its place, and it all stays hidden behind that beautiful wooden facade. It’s the kind of thoughtful functionality that makes you wonder why every TV cabinet isn’t designed this way.

The whole project recently got featured on Hackaday, which noted how the design captures that iconic mid-century aesthetic that manufacturers used to prioritize. Back then, TV sets were statement pieces, central to the living room’s design. They were furniture first, electronics second. Cordova Woodworking’s build video shows the entire construction process in a fully equipped modern workshop, and watching it is genuinely satisfying if you’re into craftsmanship.

What’s particularly cool is that they’re offering the design in multiple ways. You can commission a custom piece directly from them (they’re open to custom inquiries about finishes and specifications), or if you’re handy with woodworking tools, you can buy the PDF plans and build your own. The plans include both metric and imperial measurements, complete materials lists, and detailed dimensions for every component. It’s a nice touch that makes the design accessible whether you want to buy finished or DIY.

This feels like part of a bigger shift happening in how we think about technology in our homes. For the longest time, the goal was to make everything sleek and minimal and black. But minimal doesn’t always mean beautiful, and there’s something really refreshing about seeing tech integrated into furniture that has warmth and personality. The sapele wood brings this organic quality that makes your space feel lived-in and intentional rather than like a showroom.

The cabinet works in so many different contexts too. Obviously it’s perfect for anyone decorating in a mid-century style, but it also looks great in eclectic spaces that mix eras, or even in more contemporary rooms where you want one standout vintage-inspired piece. It’s that rare design that’s specific enough to have real character but versatile enough to work in different settings. At the end of the day, this is furniture you’ll actually want to keep. Not something you’ll replace in a few years when trends change, but a piece that gets better with age. And isn’t that the kind of design we should all be investing in?

The post Why Your Boring Black TV Deserves This Retro Wooden Upgrade first appeared on Yanko Design.

Before flat screens colonized every wall and surface, televisions had personality. They came in wild shapes and bold colors, designed by people who believed consumer electronics could be sculpture. The JVC 3100R Video Capsule, produced throughout the 1970s, exemplified this philosophy. Its pyramid form and space-helmet aesthetic made it a favorite among collectors of “space-abilia,” that peculiar category of objects inspired by Apollo missions and science fiction films.

Enter DocBrickJones, a LEGO builder who has recreated this vintage icon in remarkable detail. His LEGO Ideas submission captures everything from the angled white body to the frequency gauge on the control panel. The project needs 10,000 supporters to be considered for production, but it’s currently sitting at just over 200. For anyone who appreciates when design took risks, or when LEGO tackles interesting real-world objects, this pyramid-shaped tribute deserves a closer look.

Designer: DocBrickJones

The original 3100R combined a 6-inch black and white CRT screen with an AM/FM radio in a package that could transform. Collapsed into pyramid mode, it functioned as a radio. Truncate that pyramid by opening the top section, and suddenly you had a television. The design language borrowed heavily from the cultural moment: the black and white color scheme echoed Saturn rockets, while the pyramid geometry nodded to San Francisco’s Transamerica Pyramid skyscraper, completed just a year before the 3100R hit shelves. This was 1972, when the Apollo program still dominated headlines and anything vaguely space-themed sold like crazy. JVC understood the assignment.

What makes DocBrickJones’ LEGO version impressive is how he’s translated analog curves and slopes into a medium that fundamentally works in right angles. The angled faces of the pyramid base use carefully placed slope bricks to maintain clean lines. The blue-tiled screen sits recessed behind a dark gray frame, complete with speaker grills and control dials. There’s even a telescoping antenna in light gray and a brick-built power cable trailing from the base. These details matter because they demonstrate an understanding of what made the original compelling: the interplay between smooth surfaces and functional elements, the visual weight of that wide base supporting a delicate screen assembly, the contrast between the pristine white body and the technical-looking control panel.

The current LEGO Ideas lineup skews heavily toward nostalgic tech objects. The Polaroid OneStep camera, the classic typewriter, even the Atari 2600 have all found success by appealing to adults who remember when consumer electronics felt tactile and specific rather than generic and touchscreen. The 3100R fits this pattern perfectly, maybe even better than some approved projects. It represents a specific design philosophy from a specific moment when optimism about technology translated into physical form. You looked at a 3100R and thought about the future, even if that future was technically just watching grainy UHF broadcasts.

LEGO Ideas operates as a democratic platform where fan-created designs compete for official production. Submit a project, gather 10,000 supporters within a set timeframe, and LEGO reviews it for potential manufacturing. The newly minted JVC 3100R build currently sits at 207 votes and needs to hit the 1,000 vote margin to reach the next stage, which means there’s plenty of runway for this design to find its audience. Voting costs nothing beyond a free LEGO account, and successful projects get produced as official sets with the original creator receiving royalties and credit. The platform has launched everything from the Saturn V rocket to the Medieval Blacksmith, proving that niche appeal can translate into mainstream success. If you want to see this space-age pyramid sitting on store shelves next to other design-focused sets, the voting link lives on the LEGO Ideas website. The 3100R deserves a second act, this time in brick form.

The post The JVC Pyramid TV That Defined Retro Futurism in the 70s Now Wants to Be a LEGO Set first appeared on Yanko Design.

The original Wallpaper OLED from 2017 felt like a sci-fi prop, impossibly thin but tethered by cables and living in carefully staged rooms. CES 2026 is where LG brings that idea back with the OLED evo W6, a Wallpaper TV that now calls itself true wireless, nine-millimeter-class thin, and ready to live in actual homes instead of just concept apartments with perfectly curated shelves and no hint of where the clutter went.

The W6 moves all inputs and processing into a Zero Connect Box that can sit up to 10 m away, sending 4K video and audio wirelessly to the panel. The TV itself becomes a sheet of OLED that mounts flush to the wall, with no visible ports or cables, so the usual tangle of consoles, set-top boxes, and sound systems can hide in a cabinet across the room or behind furniture instead of snaking up the wall.

Designer: LG

A living room with big windows is where most TVs struggle, fighting reflections and glare all afternoon. The OLED evo W6 leans on Hyper Radiant Color Technology and a panel that earns Reflection Free Premium certification, combining Brightness Booster Ultra, up to 3.9 times brighter than conventional OLEDs at peak, with the lowest reflectance in LG’s lineup. Daytime viewing does not require blackout curtains or strategic seating, which changes how the TV fits into daily routines.

A movie night brings the α11 AI Processor Gen3 into focus, with its 5.6 times more powerful NPU and Dual AI Engine. Instead of choosing between smoothing noise and preserving texture, it runs parallel algorithms to do both, keeping film grain and skin detail intact while cleaning up compression artifacts. The image stays crisp without looking over-sharpened or plasticky, even on older content pulled from streaming libraries that were compressed years ago.

The hours when nobody is actively watching are where Gallery+ turns the OLED evo W6 into a canvas for more than 4,500 visuals, from cinema stills to game art, plus your own photos and generative AI pieces, all paired with mood-matched music. The TV stops being a black rectangle and becomes part of the room’s atmosphere, changing with seasons, gatherings, or whatever you feel like seeing when you walk past between tasks or while cooking dinner.

A late-night gaming session is where the OLED evo W6’s 4K 165 Hz support, 0.1 ms response time, and compatibility with NVIDIA G-SYNC and AMD FreeSync Premium matter. Auto Low Latency Mode kicks in, input lag drops, and the same panel that showed impressionist art earlier now handles fast shooters or racing games without tearing or ghosting, making the Wallpaper TV feel less fragile and more like a serious multi-purpose display.

The LG OLED evo W6 pulls together LG’s 13 years of OLED work, true-wireless experiments, and AI processing into something that finally behaves like the wallpaper TV idea always promised. At CES 2026, it reads less like a stunt and more like a sign that the next wave of TVs will be judged not only on how they look when they are on, but on how gracefully they disappear when they are not.

The post LG’s Impossibly Thin 9mm Wallpaper TV Goes Wireless at CES 2026 first appeared on Yanko Design.

A television spanning 130 inches diagonally creates immediate questions about physics, aesthetics, and whether something this massive can exist as anything other than spectacle. Samsung’s answer at CES 2026 involves treating the R95H Micro RGB model as architecture rather than appliances, borrowing design language from gallery easels and luxury retail interiors to create what the company describes as an “extra-large window” that transforms room perception. The display sits on angular metal supports that create a triangular footprint, making the enormous panel appear suspended rather than heavily grounded. At just 35.7mm thick based on Samsung’s technical specifications, the screen maintains a profile impossibly slim for something measuring nearly 11 feet corner to corner.

Samsung revived its Timeless Frame concept from 2013, refining the original bold outlines into thinner borders that house integrated audio components while maintaining visual distinctiveness. The frame contains Samsung’s Eclipsa Audio system, solving the practical challenge of speaker placement for ultra-large displays while preserving the aesthetic of a unified object. When wall-mounted, the frame’s lower edge meets the floor rather than floating at eye level, reinforcing the window metaphor while distributing the weight more safely than traditional TV mounting. The Glare-Free coating becomes essential at this scale, preventing the massive reflective surface from mirroring the room and destroying contrast.

Designer: Samsung

The “Micro RGB” name is the key to the great visuals. Instead of using a standard white or blue backlight and then filtering it through quantum dots and color filters, this panel uses microscopic, individual red, green, and blue LEDs as the light source. This means color is generated directly at the source, which is a fundamentally cleaner way to do things. It’s how they are hitting that claimed 100% BT.2020 color gamut, a spec that display nerds have been chasing for years. This direct emission approach eliminates multiple layers of conversion that can introduce impurities and reduce color volume, resulting in purer, more vibrant hues that pop off the screen with an almost unnatural vivacity.

Of course, the easel stand, while gorgeous, demands a colossal footprint. You aren’t tucking this into a corner of your apartment; you are designing a room around it. The angular legs extend far from the screen to keep the whole assembly stable, meaning it occupies a significant amount of floor space both in front of and behind the panel. This is a television for lofts, galleries, and homes with minimalist, open-plan layouts where it can be appreciated as a sculptural object. The alternative wall-mount option, which has the base of the TV resting on the floor, is equally bold. It is a deliberate choice that forces you to treat the display as a permanent architectural feature, a commitment that most people are not prepared to make for a piece of technology.

Ultimately, this 130-inch beast is Samsung planting its flag. With OLED technology becoming the benchmark for contrast and black levels, Samsung needed a halo product to prove that its LCD-based technologies could still lead the pack in other areas, specifically color volume and peak brightness. The R95H is a brute-force demonstration of engineering prowess, a statement piece that screams technological dominance. While very few people will ever own this specific model, the underlying Micro RGB technology is the real takeaway. We will see this tech trickle down to more mainstream sizes like 55, 65, and 75-inch models in the near future, which means the advancements in color purity we see here will eventually land in living rooms that don’t require a special permit for delivery.

It is an absurdly beautiful, and almost certainly astronomically expensive piece of hardware. And that is precisely what makes it so fascinating. It pushes back against the trend of electronics trying to be invisible and instead makes the television a focal point of design and conversation. It’s a beautiful object that forces us to reconsider how a screen can interact with a physical space, moving it from an appliance to a piece of deliberate, functional art, sort of like the Serif TV, but on a much grander scale.

The post I saw Samsung’s 130‑inch Micro RGB easel TV at CES 2026 and now regular screens feel tiny first appeared on Yanko Design.

Museum curators don’t typically collaborate with television manufacturers, but LG Electronics recruited them specifically to develop the Gallery Mode for its new Gallery TV launching at CES 2026. This specialized display mode optimizes color accuracy, brightness levels, and glare reduction to reproduce the visual texture of original artworks with exhibition-quality fidelity. The screen automatically adjusts to changing ambient light throughout the day, maintaining clarity whether morning sun floods the room or evening darkness sets in.

LG’s approach combines the Alpha 7 AI Processor with MiniLED display technology to deliver 4K resolution suitable for both traditional television content and fine art reproduction. The audio system features AI Sound Pro with Virtual 9.1.2ch capability for immersive surround sound simulation. Customizable magnetic frames attach to the slim, flush-mount design, with one frame type included and additional options sold separately. The Gallery+ service provides access to over 4,500 pieces of content spanning fine art, cinematic scenes, game visuals, and animations, though the full library requires a monthly subscription while a free light version offers limited access.

Designer: LG

Here’s the thing that Samsung probably saw coming from a mile away. LG finally decided the art TV market is worth serious attention, which means the category has officially graduated from novelty to legitimate product segment. The Frame has been sitting pretty much unchallenged for years while TCL and Hisense tossed their hats in the ring, but LG entering changes the competitive dynamics entirely. They’ve got distribution channels, brand recognition, and display technology chops that make this a credible threat rather than an unassuming Frame competitor.

The MiniLED implementation with the Alpha 7 processor tells you LG is positioning this above budget competitors. They’re using actual processing power to handle the museum-curated Gallery Mode instead of just slapping a matte filter on a standard panel and calling it art-ready. The anti-glare treatment combined with automatic ambient light adjustment means the TV actively works to maintain image quality as your living room lighting shifts from breakfast through sunset. That’s the kind of engineering detail that separates premium products from cheap imitations trying to ride a trend.

What I find genuinely interesting is the content library breadth beyond traditional fine art. Including cinematic scenes, game visuals, and animations alongside classical paintings suggests LG understands their actual customer base better than the “sophisticated gallery atmosphere” marketing copy implies. People buying these TVs want options that match their personality, whether that’s Monet or concept art from their favorite video game. The generative AI image creation and personal photo display features push this further into customization territory, which makes sense given how much interior design flexibility drives purchases in this category.

The subscription model will be the real conversation starter though. LG offers a free light version but gates the full 4,500-piece library behind a monthly webOS Pay subscription. No pricing details yet, but this fundamentally changes the value equation. You’re buying the hardware and then paying ongoing fees for content access, which works great for LG’s recurring revenue goals but might frustrate consumers expecting a one-time purchase. Samsung doesn’t charge monthly fees for art content on the Frame, so LG is betting their library quality and refresh rate justify the subscription model. We’ll see if consumers agree when the real pricing drops at CES next week.

The post LG Collaborated with Museum Curators to Bring the Gallery TV to CES 2026 first appeared on Yanko Design.

Before flat screens and streaming services, television sets were hulking pieces of furniture that commanded respect and curiosity in equal measure. FMDavid’s LEGO Ideas submission celebrates these beloved artifacts with a build that goes far beyond surface level nostalgia, diving deep into the mechanical heart of what made these cathode ray tube televisions actually work.

The exterior immediately transports viewers back several decades with its mint green housing, classic rabbit ear antenna, and the unmistakable SMPTE color bars displayed on its gently curved screen. Remove the back panel, however, and the true engineering achievement reveals itself. Every major component of a vintage television has been faithfully recreated in brick form, from the deflection coils wrapped around the CRT neck to the colorful wiring snaking between vacuum tubes and capacitors along the chassis floor.

Designer: FMDavid

And that’s what’s so fascinating about this build – the inner guts. Most retro TV builds in LEGO form stop at the cabinet and screen. Slap on some rabbit ears, throw in a color bar pattern, call it a day. FMDavid apparently decided that approach was for amateurs. The real story here happens when you pop off that back panel and discover what amounts to a miniature engineering degree compressed into approximately 200 square studs of space. The cathode ray tube dominates the interior volume exactly as it would in an actual 1960s Zenith or RCA, which tells me this builder actually studied reference material instead of just vibing on childhood memories. Those deflection coils wrapping around the tube neck aren’t decorative. They’re positioned where they’d actually sit in a functioning set, using what appears to be copper-colored flexible elements or possibly custom printed tiles to simulate the electromagnetic coils that would bend electron beams across phosphor screens at 15,734 times per second.

This build works as both display piece and educational tool. The SMPTE color bars on screen are a nice touch that any broadcast engineer would immediately recognize. Those bars weren’t just pretty patterns. They were precision test signals containing specific luminance and chrominance values that let technicians calibrate everything from color temperature to sync pulse timing. The curved screen profile captures that subtle convex bulge of real CRT glass, which existed because a flat surface would implode under atmospheric pressure once you evacuated the tube interior to near-vacuum conditions. Physics demanded that curve, and FMDavid respected it.

The exterior styling nails the mid-century aesthetic with that sage green cabinet color and brown wooden legs angled outward in classic Danish modern furniture tradition. Those aren’t just legs, they’re cultural signifiers of an era when televisions were statement furniture pieces that families planned their living rooms around. The two control knobs on the right panel would’ve been your channel selector and volume control, back when changing channels meant physically walking across the room and turning a mechanical detent switch through twelve discrete positions. No endless scrolling through 500 cable channels, just ABC, NBC, CBS, and maybe PBS if you were lucky.

The component density here feels right for a television set from the tube era without overwhelming the interior space. Real TV sets from the 1960s packed dozens of components into their cabinets, handling everything from IF amplification to horizontal output to audio processing. FMDavid’s arranged the internal elements so you can actually see the relationship between the major systems. The vacuum tubes reminiscent of the old-timey technology, the transformers with their ribbed heat sinks sit where you’d expect them, probably using modified tile or plate stacks to create those distinctive cooling fins that prevented components from cooking themselves to death during long viewing sessions. Those cylinders at the bottom represent capacitors, which in real sets would filter high voltage DC and store energy for the horizontal deflection circuit. Get a capacitor failure in a vintage TV and you’d lose either your picture width or your vertical hold, sending the image rolling endlessly up the screen. Heck, there’s even the RCA output on the back, with the yellow and red for left and right audio channels, and a white for presumably the video.

The build currently sits at 1,136 supporters on LEGO Ideas, which means it needs another 8,864 votes to hit the 10,000 threshold for official review. That’s how the Ideas platform works. You need 10,000 people to vote for your concept within a limited timeframe, then LEGO’s internal review board evaluates it for commercial viability, piece count economics, licensing considerations, and market fit. FMDavid’s got 418 days remaining to gather those supporters. If you want to see this hit production shelves, head over to the LEGO Ideas website, create a free account if you haven’t already, and cast your vote. No money required, just a few clicks to tell LEGO this deserves manufacturing consideration alongside other fan-designed sets.

The post This LEGO Retro TV Build Shows You How Cathode Ray Tubes Actually Worked first appeared on Yanko Design.

Home cinema has never been this affordable. The TCL Projector C1 brings 120-inch screen entertainment to your living room for just $199, making it cheaper than the AirPods Pro, which sounds wild considering one’s a tiny pair of earbuds and the other’s an entire cinema in your house. This isn’t a stripped-down compromise either. The projector packs Google TV, automatic focus, and a built-in battery into a portable package.

What makes this pricing remarkable is the complete feature set TCL has managed to include. Most projectors at this price point require external speakers, lack smart TV capabilities, or need constant manual adjustments. The C1 combines all these essentials in one device. You can set it up anywhere in your home, cast content from your phone, and enjoy Dolby Audio without buying additional equipment. For the cost of a mid-range streaming device, you’re getting an entire home theater system.

Designer: TCL

Click Here to Buy Now

TCL just launched their C1 projector in the UK for £249.99, though Americans get a fairly sizeable price slash of $199. I keep staring at that number trying to figure out where the catch is. You can project a 120-inch image for less than a pair of premium wireless earbuds. A full-size screen that dwarfs even the most absurdly large televisions, available for impulse-purchase money. And there isn’t some limited Black Friday offer anywhere – this is the MSRP on the box.

Obviously they cut corners somewhere. The projector outputs 230 ISO lumens, which isn’t the brightest out there by a fair mile. Yes, you can still watch movies and shows just fine, the only real caveat is that you’ll need absolute darkness – simply drawing one curtain in the afternoon won’t cut it, and watching a game with the lights on may prove to be less than satisfactory – but hey, two hundred bucks. Spend a few more on blackout curtains and you’re good. The LCD panel delivers 1080p natively with 4K support, and you need about 2.5 meters of throw distance to hit that 120-inch maximum.

Google TV comes baked in, which matters more than it should. Most cheap projectors force you to plug in a Chromecast or Fire Stick, adding another $50 and another remote to lose between your couch cushions. Netflix certification means proper app support instead of janky workarounds or browser-based streaming that buffers at the worst possible moments. Auto-focus and keystone correction handle the setup pain points that make most people abandon projectors after one frustrating evening. I’ve spent twenty minutes adjusting focus wheels on projectors that cost ten times this much, so having it happen automatically feels like cheating.

TCL included a 60 Wh battery, which gets you through a two-hour movie without trailing extension cords across your living room. Weighing 1.8 kilograms means you can actually carry this thing around from your living room to your bedroom. The integrated adjustable stand folds into the body instead of requiring a separate tripod purchase, and you can even rotate the C1 to face your ceiling for in-bed entertainment. HDMI and USB-A ports cover the basics, Wi-Fi 5 handles streaming without constant buffering, and Bluetooth 5.1 lets you pair actual speakers because that 8-watt built-in option with Dolby Audio support exists purely for emergencies. Nobody’s watching Dune on an 8-watt speaker and pretending they’re satisfied.

Projectors have always occupied this frustrating middle ground where cheap ones are genuinely terrible and good ones cost mortgage payment money. You either bought a $79 pico-projector that barely functioned or dropped $2,000 on something that required a dedicated room and professional calibration. TCL figured out that most people just want to watch movies on a big screen without taking out a loan or earning an engineering degree. The brightness limitations mean this won’t replace your main TV for daytime viewing, but it turns movie nights into actual events instead of just sitting on your couch scrolling through Netflix for forty minutes. Gaming on a 100-inch screen changes how you experience everything from racing games to sprawling RPGs. Your living room becomes the place where people actually want to gather instead of everyone staring at their phones in different corners.

Two hundred dollars removes most of the decision-making anxiety. You can buy this on a whim and if it doesn’t work out, you’re not crying into your pillow about wasted money. Although, considering TCL’s track record, this one might actually work out to be as good as, if not more reliable than, a 50″ smart TV that may cost 4-5x more.

Click Here to Buy Now

The post TCL’s $199 Projector Puts a 120-Inch Screen in Any Room (And Costs Less Than AirPods Pro) first appeared on Yanko Design.

TVs keep getting brighter and sharper, but the viewing experience is still broken up by small, annoying tasks. Getting up for a drink, fiddling with lights, or pausing mid-scene to adjust the volume. These micro-interruptions chip away at immersion more than we admit. Come Together is a concept that tries to design around those gaps instead of just upgrading the panel, treating the home theater as a full ecosystem rather than a screen on a wall.

Come Together is a three-part home theater system made up of a Tower, a Base, and a Station. It’s meant to sit alongside a premium TV as an accessory, not replace it. The Tower handles drinks, lighting, and phone charging. The Base handles spatial sound and movement. The Station is a compact dock that cools, charges, and keeps everything ready for the next movie night.

Designer: Woojin Jang

Most of the time, the Tower sits as a calm black cylinder, but when needed, it rises up to reveal a mini fridge that can hold up to five cans. An optional tray on top can be swapped in for snacks. Adaptive mood lighting under the top disc syncs with what’s on screen, and the very top surface doubles as a Qi2 wireless charging pad for your phone, so it doesn’t die halfway through a marathon.

Instead of a static soundbar, the Base is a circular spatial sound unit with drivers arranged around its perimeter and a 3D ToF sensor for spatial awareness. It maps the room, figures out where you’re sitting, and quietly rolls itself to the best spot for audio. The drive system borrows from robot vacuums, but here the goal is better sound rather than clean floors or delivering drinks in an awkward dance.

The Station is a small, low-profile dock that the system returns to when it’s done. There, it recharges and cools the mini fridge for the next session. A simple display on top shows the time and the fridge temperature, giving you just enough information at a glance. The Station keeps the whole setup feeling like a single, coherent appliance rather than a pile of separate gadgets fighting for outlets and attention.

All three components share a cylindrical, black-glass aesthetic that feels more like high-end audio gear than robots. The Tower’s rising motion and glowing top give it a bit of theater without tipping into gimmick. The Base and Station stay visually quiet, so the TV remains the focal point while the system supports it in the background, both literally and in how it shapes the room.

Come Together shows how robotics might slip into home entertainment without feeling like sci-fi props. By bundling drinks, lighting, and spatial sound into a calm, coordinated system, it treats immersion as something you can design from end to end. For anyone who’s ever hit pause just to grab a drink, the idea of a home theater that comes to you is appealing.

The post Come Together Adds Rolling Speaker and Mini Fridge to Your Couch first appeared on Yanko Design.

Black Friday deals usually mean hunting for discounts on the same boring products everyone already owns. TV mounts that do the bare minimum, speaker stands that hold things up and nothing more, and entertainment furniture that treats lighting as an afterthought. It’s all functional enough, but there’s rarely anything that makes you excited about setting up your living room. Most people settle for whatever gets the job done, then spend years looking at the same bland hardware every time they sit down to watch something.

PERLEGEAR’s AuraFrame and SonicBeam collections take a different approach. Instead of treating mounts and stands as purely mechanical necessities, the brand integrates customizable RGB lighting that syncs with your music and creates actual ambiance. It’s the kind of upgrade that makes your entertainment space feel more intentional, turning functional hardware into something that enhances the entire experience. Heck, you might actually want to show off your setup for once instead of hiding cables and hoping nobody notices the generic black brackets holding everything together.

Designer: PERLEGEAR

AuraFrame Pre-Assembled TV Wall Mount

The AuraFrame wall mount handles TVs from 26 to 65 inches and up to 99 pounds, with full-motion articulation that includes 16.4 inches of extension, 45-degree swivel, and tilting between negative 15 and positive five degrees. That flexibility is standard for premium mounts, but the integrated LED light bars are what set this apart. You get 16 million colors, multiple lighting modes, and music sync that pulses in rhythm with whatever you’re watching or listening to.

Installation is refreshingly straightforward thanks to pre-assembled arms and a wall plate that cuts setup steps by about 30 percent. The mount also includes three height settings and leveling adjustments, so you can fine-tune positioning even after everything’s mounted. The reinforced steel frame and thicker articulating arms mean the thing holds your TV securely without any wobbling, which is reassuring when you’re extending a 65-inch screen nearly a foot and a half from the wall.

Click Here to Buy Now: $55.98 $69.99 (20% off). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!

AuraFrame Pre-Assembled TV Stand

For those who’d rather not drill into walls, the AuraFrame TV stand offers a floor-standing alternative that fits TVs from 32 to 75 inches and up to 110 pounds. The same RGB lighting system runs down both sides of the stand’s pillars, creating a backlight effect that’s controlled via app, remote, or in-line switch. The solid wood base adds a premium touch, and the entire setup feels stable enough to trust with larger screens.

What makes this stand genuinely practical are the 12 height configurations and the tilt and swivel adjustments. You can position the screen exactly where it needs to be for comfortable viewing, whether you’re sitting on the couch or standing in the kitchen. Cable management keeps wires hidden inside the stand’s frame, so you’re not looking at a tangled mess every time the lights are on.

Click Here to Buy Now: $109.99 $139.99 (21% off). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!

SonicBeam Speaker Stands with RGB Lighting

The SonicBeam stands won an iF Design Award for their minimalist double-pole design, which makes sense once you see them in person. They’re slim, clean, and designed to blend into modern interiors rather than dominate them. Each stand supports up to 22 pounds and includes two top plates, one specifically shaped for the Sonos Era 300 and a universal flat tray for other speakers like the Era 100, HomePod, or KEF models.

The built-in RGB lighting runs vertically along both poles, syncing with your TV or audio content to create a cohesive audiovisual atmosphere. You can control everything through the app or remote, choosing from modes like Pure Color, Rhythm Pulse, or Music Sync. The aluminum alloy construction feels solid, and the dual-side cable channels keep wires completely out of sight. It’s the kind of setup that makes you realize speaker placement can actually contribute to a room’s aesthetic instead of just being another thing to work around.

Click Here to Buy Now: $199.99.

AuraFrame Universal Swivel TV Stand

This tabletop stand is the most compact option, fitting TVs from 32 to 70 inches and up to 88 pounds. The tempered glass base and alloy steel frame give it a sleek, modern look, while the integrated RGB lighting offers the same customization options as the other AuraFrame products. Nine height levels let you position the screen between 18 and 24.5 inches, with tilt and swivel adjustments for finding the right angle.

Assembly takes about 10 minutes with no tools required, which is almost suspiciously easy compared to most furniture you’d buy. The pyramid-shaped structure keeps everything stable, and there’s enough room underneath for soundbars or media players. It’s perfect for bedrooms, offices, or anywhere you want a TV without committing to wall mounts or floor stands.

Click Here to Buy Now: $69.99 $99.99 (30% off). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!

Black Friday is one of those rare opportunities to upgrade your entertainment setup without immediately regretting the expense. PERLEGEAR’s lighting-integrated collection offers a way to do that while actually improving how your space looks and feels, not just adding more functional hardware that disappears into the background. Whether you’re mounting a TV, setting up speakers, or rearranging your living room layout entirely, having lighting that adapts to what you’re watching makes the whole experience feel more considered.

The post PERLEGEAR Black Friday: Home Entertainment Lights That Pulse to Music first appeared on Yanko Design.

Walking through Samsung’s Innovation Museum in Seoul, I stopped at this timeline wall that tracks television design from 1925 to 2018. And honestly, the proportions made me laugh. Look at a 1950s TV: tiny screen, massive wooden cabinet. Then jump to 2018: wall-sized screen, cabinet that basically doesn’t exist. The entire relationship inverted over ninety years.

What you’re actually watching is designers fighting physics, losing for decades, then suddenly winning so hard they had to figure out what to do with all that freedom. The story is written in wood grain, black plastic, chrome bezels, and eventually almost nothing at all.

When TVs Were Furniture

Those Wild 1950s Proportions

Here’s the thing about early TVs: they showed up as furniture first, technology second. Those 1940s and 50s sets had wooden cabinets that matched your dining room furniture because that’s literally what they were. Pieces of furniture that happened to have a cathode ray tube inside. The screen was maybe a quarter of the total object. The rest? Cabinet. Because back then, the cabinet was the design.

And this wasn’t just decorative. CRT technology needed insane depth for the electron gun shooting at the screen from behind. You wanted a 12-inch screen? Cool, budget 18 inches of depth for the cabinet. Designers had two options: make it look like furniture, or fight physics and lose spectacularly. They went with furniture.

The 1950 black-and-white sets in the museum look completely alien now. Tiny circular screens peeking out of these massive wooden boxes on turned legs, like someone stuck a TV into a colonial armoire. Control knobs the size of door handles on the right side. The screen wasn’t even the main event. You were buying a cabinet that let you peer into a little window.

Color Showed Up and Brought Heat Problems

Color broadcasting really took hold between 1966 and 1970, though 1968 is when it hit critical mass. And suddenly designers weren’t just managing depth anymore, they were managing heat. Color CRTs ran way hotter than black-and-white. The transistor breakthrough in ’66 helped, but you still needed serious ventilation engineered into these cabinets without making them look like they had vents everywhere.

That’s when black plastic took over. Wood cabinets disappeared fast, replaced by injection-molded polymers in dark colors. This looked “modern” and “tech-forward,” but really? Black plastic didn’t show heat stains. Didn’t crack from heating up and cooling down constantly. And it sent a clear message: TVs were technology now, not furniture pretending to be dressers.

The switch happened incredibly fast. By the late 70s, wood-cabinet TVs looked dated, like something your grandparents owned. Black plastic was everywhere, and the proportions started going wider, more horizontal. Everyone knew cable and video were coming, and those cinematic aspect ratios needed different shapes.

Design Shift Complete: TVs stopped trying to be furniture and started announcing themselves as technology. Presence through tech identity replaced presence through cabinetry.

Thirty Years in CRT Prison

Depth Was Everything

For three full decades, TV design was basically just “how do we deal with this cathode ray tube depth problem?” Physics didn’t care what designers wanted. The screens had to curve outward. The cabinets had to stick way out into your living room. You could go wider, sure, but you paid for it with even more weight and depth. You could try making flatter CRTs, but you could only flatten the edges a bit.

This era gave us the “traditional TV” look we all remember. Thick black bezels everywhere. That curved glass face. Speakers mounted on the front flanking the screen because there was literally nowhere else to put them. Control panels that moved from the sides to the front when remotes became standard. And always, always, that massive back end sticking out, forcing you to buy furniture specifically designed to hold it.

Projection TVs: Building a Bigger Prison

Projection TVs tried to escape starting in 1983, but they really hit mass adoption in the late 1980s through the 90s. The pitch was larger screens without the weight penalty. But here’s the problem: they just traded one depth issue for an even worse one. Those systems needed even more internal volume for the projection setup. Those 50-inch rear-projection sets from the 90s weighed 200 pounds and used internal mirrors to throw images onto the screen. They were incredible and ridiculous at the same time. Like, instead of breaking out of the prison, they just built a bigger one.

The Flat CRT Trick

The early 90s brought flat-screen CRTs with huge marketing hype, peaking around the mid-to-late 90s. “The curve is gone! Look, it’s flat!” But check out the museum examples and you’ll see the trick immediately: they flattened the glass front while keeping the same depth behind it. The electron gun was still back there firing at the screen. The vacuum tube still demanded its space and weight. They basically convinced the screen’s face to go flat, but the cathode ray tube body stayed stubbornly three-dimensional, still requiring that massive depth and adding even more weight.

This wasn’t a breakthrough, it was optimization within the same constraints. TVs got slightly thinner but way heavier because that flat glass needed more structural support. The look changed (flat faces felt more premium, more modern) but your living room footprint? Barely different.

Thirty-Year Pattern: Every attempt to escape CRT depth constraints just found new ways to work around the same physics problem. Designers were still prisoners.

When Flat Panels Detonated Everything

2001: The Year Depth Stopped Mattering

2001 didn’t just bring flat-panel displays to stores. It completely destroyed the design language that had been built over 76 years of CRT dominance. Suddenly depth wasn’t your destiny anymore. A 42-inch screen could hang on a wall like a framed picture. The Cabinet Era just… ended. Overnight.

And designers went kind of crazy with the possibilities. Early flat panels had these thick glossy bezels in chrome and silver, totally celebrating how new they were. Screens sat on sculptural stands that looked more like modern art than furniture. Some manufacturers added ambient lighting behind the panels. Others tried transparent stands to make screens look like they were floating. After decades stuck managing the CRT prison, designers had more freedom than they knew what to do with, and you could tell.

But the market optimized toward minimalism pretty fast. By the late 2000s, the bezel race was on: who could make the frame narrowest, the profile thinnest, the presence least noticeable. The whole design language shifted from “look at this amazing technology!” to “look at nothing but the picture.” Black became mandatory again, but for totally different reasons this time. Black bezels disappeared visually. Black cabinets receded into backgrounds. The goal was screen purity.

The Thinness Wars

When LED backlighting (using LEDs to light the LCD panel from behind) replaced fluorescent tubes in 2009, manufacturers could suddenly make panels under an inch thick. Samsung and others started measuring TVs in millimeters, showing profiles next to phones and coins for scale. They were advertising displays thinner than your smartphone.

This was design for spec sheets, not for actual living. A 55-inch TV at 7mm thick still needed a stand, still took up wall space, still dominated the room. But thinness signaled premium in ways that pixel count and refresh rate just couldn’t. It was tangible luxury: that feeling of holding something impossibly light that looks fragile but isn’t.

Curved Screens: The Last Gasp

Those curved TV experiments from 2013-2015? Last gasp of form-first design. Manufacturers claimed they created immersive viewing experiences, but curves were really just about standing out in a flattening market. They looked spectacular on showroom floors and kinda awkward in actual living rooms, where most people weren’t sitting in that optimal center position the curves were engineered for. The market rejected them fast. Not because they performed badly, but because they announced themselves too loudly.

Liberation Complete: The constraint-free flat panel era let designers experiment wildly, then the market optimized straight toward invisibility. The new design language was disappearing entirely.

When Screens Learned to Disappear

The Invisibility Paradox

By the mid-2010s, TV design hit this weird paradox. Screens were getting bigger and thinner, but the actual design goal became making them less visible. Samsung launched the Frame TV in 2017, literally disguising itself as wall art when powered off, letting you display artwork instead of a black screen. OLED panels (with self-illuminated pixels instead of backlights) let screens turn individual pixels completely off for perfect blacks, and they could blend into dark walls so well you almost can’t see them. Samsung’s QLED models used quantum dot technology for better color while staying ultra-thin.

This is honestly the most sophisticated design thinking in television history. It’s not minimalism just for the aesthetic. It’s considered absence. The screen becomes infrastructure. Present when you need it, invisible when you don’t. Stands got simpler, sometimes just a single center pedestal that makes the panel look like it’s floating. Some manufacturers ditched stands entirely, just assuming you’d wall-mount.

The materials shifted again: ultra-thin metal frames, sometimes in premium finishes, sometimes in matte black that absorbs light. No more plastic clunkiness. These are precision-machined objects. Industrial jewelry at living room scale.

When Screens Got Smart

That 2018 milestone on Samsung’s timeline (Smart Display with Bixby) marks another turning point, one that’s still playing out. These displays don’t just show content anymore. They listen, respond, anticipate. The design language is starting to accommodate this new agency. Ambient displays show info when you walk up to them. Voice interfaces don’t need any visible controls. Art Mode features (like on the 2017 Frame TV) turn your television into decoration even when you’re not watching anything, displaying curated artwork or your own photos.

This is TV as ambient interface, not passive screen. And it’s reshaping what matters in design. Brightness matters differently when displays need to work in bright rooms as decorative art. Color accuracy matters more when screens are showing photography and paintings. Thinness matters less than how well it integrates with your room lighting, furniture, and acoustics.

The Modern Mandate: Presence was everything in the 1950s. Now designers want screens to disappear until the moment you need them.

What This Whole Century Reveals

The Same Pattern, Every Time

Every major tech breakthrough in TV followed the exact same design evolution:

Phase 1 – Living With Constraints: Designers work within brutal limitations. Form serves function because function won’t let you do anything else. CRT depth, heat management, weight: these ran the show.

Phase 2 – Breaking Free: New tech eliminates a major constraint. Designers go wild experimenting. Possibilities explode everywhere. Some ideas work, most don’t. (See: curved screens, 3D TVs, transparent stands.)

Phase 3 – Settling Into Invisibility: The market optimizes toward restraint. The goal stops being “look at what we can do” and becomes “integrate seamlessly into life.” Design gets less visible even as displays get more capable.

We’re in Phase 3 of flat panel evolution right now, and maybe Phase 1 of whatever comes next: flexible displays, transparent OLED, holographic projection, or something that’s not even in Samsung’s museum yet because someone’s still inventing it.

Design Lessons Beyond TVs

What makes TV design evolution so useful to study isn’t the specific materials or measurements. It’s watching how designers respond to constraints changing over time. Depth was mandatory? Make it furniture. Depth became optional? Make it disappear. Screens need to justify taking up space? Give them ambient utility.

This pattern shows up way beyond displays. Every product category goes through these phases as tech matures. Smartphones already did. Laptops are doing it now. Wearables are just starting. Today’s constraint becomes tomorrow’s liberation becomes the refined standard the day after that.

Where This Line Goes Next

Samsung’s timeline stops in 2018, but the story keeps going. MicroLED promises thinner panels with better brightness. Rollable displays let screens literally disappear into furniture. AI integration will make displays context-aware, auto-adjusting to room lighting, viewing angles, content type.

The next evolution won’t be about thinner or bigger. Those races are basically done. It’ll be about screens getting smarter about when to show up and when to fade back. About surfaces that are sometimes screens and sometimes not. About displays that understand spatial context well enough to become true ambient interfaces instead of constantly demanding your attention.

TV design from 1925 to now traces this line from furniture object to ambient infrastructure. That line’s still moving. And honestly? The most interesting part is that we’re still figuring out where it goes.

The post When TVs Were Furniture and Screens Were Tiny: 90 Years of Getting It Backwards first appeared on Yanko Design.