Instagram Gets Physical In a Dozen Ways

Manifesting Instagram from digital cool into physical memory.

In a far more brilliant treatise that I could ever give, writer/designer/genius Craig Mod describes the process of transforming digital content into physical goods as “going from boundless to bounded. A space without implicit edges to one composed entirely of edges.”

As digital whets desire, edges give us something to consume.

Reading Mod’s essay on bounding the techie process of building Flipboard for iPhone into a single, thick, eight-pound book – as opposed to the “ethereality” that the app is on your device – is advisable. In his own words: it is “an essay about recognizing and reorganizing our journeys that live largely in digital space.” One that begs the question: “What is the value in giving them edges so we may hold them in our hands and hope to understand, perhaps, the weight of the work we produce?”

See Flipboard for iPhone The Book below:

In the case of Instagram, everyone’s favorite app that gives the most mundane of moments a filtration of coolness, a number of services have popped up that give weight to the world we archive, adding concreteness to the digital “thinness” populating our feeds.

Again, read Mod’s essay.

Here are a dozen of such services. Life, through the Sutro-colored lens of digital desire (it is always beautiful on Instagram) to physical, consumable edges.

Instagram Magnets from Stickygram

Instagram Tiles by ImageSnap

Instagram iPhone Case by Casetagram

“Location Based Photo Booth” by Instaprint

Postagram from Postagram Postcards (image via Jen May)

Instagram Coasters by Coastermatic

Instagram Stickers from Printstagram

Instagram Calendar from Keepsy (image via Wired)

Instagram Mug by Zazzle

Bamboo Shadow Boxes for Instagram by Hatchcraft

Canvas Prints for Instagram from Canvas Pop

Prints and Memory Boxes from Printstagram

The Socialmatic Camera (that could have been) from Indiegogo

K. Emily Bond

K. Emily Bond is the Shelter Editor at EcoSalon and currently resides in southern Spain, reporting on trends in art, design, sustainable living and lifestyle.