Dumbing Down DIY

A propos of Todd Oldham and modernist innovation, and Duchampian transformations of the everyday into art, and the depressing packaging of creativity into neat little kits, I give you the DIY Anni Albers Strainer and Paper Clips Jewelry Kit. At Urban Outfitters. Part of a line of products, many now marked down to $4.99 This is cheaper than if you bought the parts at the hardware store like Albers did. This is also the dumbing down of the DIY movement. Yes, you have to thread those washers on a string yourself, but what else did you do? Click and ship.

I have long been meaning to try a washer necklace myself (instructions here at The Small Object)—Oldham features this very necklace as an inspiration piece in Kid Made Modern, but instead has kids make a version of her bobby pin necklace using mardi gras beads, a trinkety project — but I would have gone to the hardware store and browsed the different sizes of washers, perhaps used some of that ribbon that I picked out of the crush of wrappings after Christmas (I never buy new ribbon). My result would have been derivative, sure, but I would have made it my own. UO isn’t offering that option. If you read the website’s fine print, this is a product licensed by the Albers Foundation. Is this the only way?

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By Alexandra Lange

Alexandra Lange is an architecture critic and author, and the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winner for Criticism, awarded for her work as a contributing writer for Bloomberg CityLab. She is currently the architecture critic for Curbed and has written extensively for Design Observer, Architect, New York Magazine, and The New York Times. Lange holds a PhD in 20th-century architecture history from New York University. Her writing often explores the intersection of architecture, urban planning, and design, with a focus on how the built environment shapes everyday life. She is also a recipient of the Steven Heller Prize for Cultural Commentary from AIGA, an honor she shares with Design Observer’s Editor-in-Chief, Ellen McGirt.