Tag Archives: Extension Cord

This Portable Power Strip Clamps to Table Edges and Charges 3 Devices

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Working from wherever you can find a seat means accepting certain frustrations, and outlet hunting is near the top of the list. Extension boards solve that at home, but they’re designed for rooms rather than bags, and dragging one to a café or shared studio means arriving with a coil of cable that becomes someone else’s problem. Power infrastructure hasn’t caught up with how people actually work.

Xtend is a personal charging extension concept built around one challenge: making power access portable without making it awkward. The guiding claim is “Power access shouldn’t be bulky,” which is fair when most extension boards still feel designed for a fixed office and are never reconsidered. The concept answers with a compact, desk-edge device you carry rather than leave behind.

Designer: Parth Amlani

Rather than a strip on the floor where cables become trip hazards, Xtend clamps to the table edge and creates an elevated power zone right where you’re working. That’s the main behavioral shift, and it matters. It keeps cables off the ground, reduces accidental unplugging when someone shifts their chair, and gives the whole setup a predictable home, whether you’re there for twenty minutes or a few hours.

A manual retractable wire manages the cable when you pack up, addressing tangles at the source rather than relying on cable ties or zip pouches. The table attachment uses a selfie-stick-inspired locking mechanism for adjusting and securing the device to different desk edge profiles. That’s not a small detail, because portability only works if setup and stow are both quick.

Of course, attaching to a desk edge only matters if it handles what you’re actually charging. Xtend is set up for three devices at once, a top-facing outlet for a laptop charger, and USB ports on the side for phones or smaller devices. That mix reflects how people actually charge at a shared desk, one large draw and a couple of smaller ones, rather than forcing everyone to compete for a single wall strip.

Xtend treats power the way people already treat other portable tools, as something that belongs in a bag and works anywhere. Extension boards have been a room infrastructure for decades, but how people work has changed. A small device that attaches to a desk edge, charges three things, and retracts its own cable before you leave suggests that the power strip category is ready for a rethink.

The post This Portable Power Strip Clamps to Table Edges and Charges 3 Devices first appeared on Yanko Design.

Wood-enclosed power supply box is designed to be seen

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Power strips and extension cords are now an unavoidable part of modern life. Unless you have custom-designed furniture, there will always be cases when you have too few power outlets or ones that are too far from your desk to matter. Unfortunately, these power supply accessories haven’t exactly evolved in terms of design, or at least most of them still look like appliances from the 90s rather than anything that fits modern aesthetics. Hiding these power sources has become an important part of the so-called cable management problem, which is often a source of tension and headache for some people. There are, thankfully, a few that try to embrace more pleasing designs, like this power supply box that thinks outside the box, pun intended, so that you don’t have stress over hiding it and instead proudly show it off on your desk or shelf.

Designer: OFS

Genuine wood isn’t often used as a material in many electronics, mostly because of its poor thermal handling, making it warp and deform over time due to heat. That and it’s a potential fire hazard, making it unsuitable for many devices. That doesn’t mean, however, that it can’t be used as a chassis or covering in a safe manner, especially if it can significantly change the character of a product from utilitarian to humane.

The Willow Power Supply is one such design that employs the warmth and natural beauty of wood to uplift the image of an ordinary extension cord from a tool to a decorative object. While most power strips and extension cords are painfully hidden behind or even under desks, Willow stands proudly on top. More than just boasting rights, however, this also means quick and easy access to those essential ports for your computer and devices.

Willow is available in a combination of beech or walnut shells and clear or black power boxes, though the best combination is the beech and clear or white box since it clearly brings out the beauty of the wood complimented by the minimalism of the power supply. The box itself has very little detail save for the outlet and ports in front and the braided cord coming out of its back.

While the Willow Power Supply might delight as an aesthetic product, it might disappoint as an actual power supply. There is only one power outlet, one USB-A port, and a lone USB-C port, a very basic and perhaps inadequate number for today’s needs. At $250, it does give off a feeling of being more like a designer product than one that’s made for power users, more for casual use than heavy-duty workstations. Either way, there is little doubt it adds a bit of accent to any workspace, especially matching minimalist designs with wooden furniture.

The post Wood-enclosed power supply box is designed to be seen first appeared on Yanko Design.