#HTE

Rethinking Commonplace Objects: Dissim is a Lighter You Can Invert

In younger years I carried a Zippo everywhere, and considered it a perfect object–until I got a job at a restaurant, where I had to light dozens of votive candles at the start of each shift. The ability to light downwards would’ve saved a lot of time, spilled wax and burnt fingers.

Enter the Dissim lighter, which has been designed for both upright and inverted use.

The product page also features this cutesy, unnarrated design story that looks like a Hollywood montage sequence of how a scriptwriter imagines product designers work:

At $48, the Dissim ain’t cheap–you could buy two or more Zippos for that much)–but it does something the Zippo can’t. With gift-giving season coming up, I’ll put this in the category of Thing I Wouldn’t Buy for Myself But Would Buy Someone Else as a Nice Gift.