They’ve made clothes from corn, steel, bamboo, Tyvek, and cork, but now New York design duo DDCLab turns its eye to glass. Savania Davies-Keiller and Roberto Crivello, recently named lifestyle creative directors at New Balance (for whom they created 2008’s Inside collection), last week launched the Reflective 420, an update of a 1970s New Balance sneaker that employs a lightweight, stretchable, 3M material composed of tiny highly reflective glass beads. This run’s limited to 60 pairs, at $498 a piece, but there’s a slew of more affordable kicks in the works—for which shades won’t be compulsory. Available at DDCLab. (212) 226-8980 or www.ddclab.com

Danish industrial designer Klaus Rath’s elegant cotton canvas bread bags for Stelton were a hit in 2006, and his Take-Away Tray for the Copenhagen-based manufacturer ought to be no exception. Its stripped-down design offers a perfectly poised solution for serving even the most cumbersome items: nonslip rubber prevents clumsy spillage and a deceptively angled yet perfectly balanced stainless-steel handle lets you carry with one hand while serving with the other. When not in use, the  handle folds neatly into the base for easy storage. Available at MoMA; $120. www.momastore.org

Cristiana Giopato worked for years under Patricia Urquiola; now part of the Milan-based duo Giopato + Coombes, the Italian designer proves she’s inherited Urquiola’s delicate way with porcelain. Her Hula Hoop for Industreal is a tower of sixteen lopsided discs that can be stacked partly to form a wine chiller and fully to hide the empty bottle, turning the whole thing into a twisting, modular vase; $615. www.industreal.it

Muuto's Plus salt-and-pepper mills, by the Oslo-based trio Norway Says, remind us of old-school stacking rings for kids, but quality craftsmanship turns them into something more like Memphis than Mattel. Made from stained and lacquered beech wood, the white dispenses salt, the black, pepper, and a multicolored tower has separate grinding chambers for both. www.muuto.com

In her painting, Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes fashions collage-like canvases by applying paint to plastic sheeting and then pressing it onto a surface. With Horto, an upholstery textile created for Maharam in the design studio's first collaboration with a painter, Milhazes used a similar technique, layering abstract florals and geometric forms on a flat weave to create a complex, pop-inspired print. www.maharam.com

Formed in 2005 by three repatriated Greeks—who count London’s Royal College of Art and Central St. Martin’s among their alma maters—the Athens-based Greece is for Lovers specialize in products that poke fun at their Hellenic heritage: hermaphrodite candles; a lightning bolt–shaped letter opener “to rip through hate mail with the stealth and fury of Zeus,” as the designers put it; a leather-sheathed longboard that keeps feet in place via gladiator-like straps; and their latest, Slice Me Nice, a marble cutting board with built-in mortar and pestle whose paddle shape calls to mind the wooden beach bats so common along the Mediterranean seaside. Made of water-jet cut Greek marble, Slice Me Nice is available at the trio’s storefront shop; $504. www.greeceisforlovers.com

Because there are few things more appetizing than a naked man and woman with nine cyclops heads, the free-spirited Mexico City firm DFC—who also showed a dubious set of glass pipes at this year's New York International Gift Fair—have commissioned an illustrated Disposable Place-Mat Pack by local emerging artist Mauricio Limón. The look is Dzama meets Darger, so it's almost more tempting to put them on the wall than on the dinner table. Available at The Future Perfect; $55 for a set of 60. www.thefutureperfect.com or www.dfcasa.com

You wouldn't expect a super-strength, cast-iron casserole to be called Ding, but Office for Product Design's squat dish for local brand Jia Inc in fact owes its name to the ancient Chinese bronze cooking vessels that inspired it. Although Ding retains the essence of traditional Chinese cookware, the Hong Kong–based duo tweaked the design to meet modern cooking requirements: A three-legged, trivet-like base keeps the pot aloft for tableside cooking or is removable to provide a flat cooking base. Contact manufacturer for price. www.jia-inc.com

We've seen plenty of designs for death, but not too many that contemplate eternal life. Eindhoven-based duo BCXSY's Forever! collection includes plastic trinkets gilded in gold, octagonal silicone trivets that depict the food chain, and the Infinity Aquarium, which finds goldfish swimming themselves silly inside a torqued geometry—objects that not only explore the concept of eternity but also the disposability and lifecycle of design itself. Contact designers for price. www.bcxsy.com

A collaboration between German designer Bernd Benninghoff and Craig Bond of New Zealand's Candywhistle yielded Stix, a family of colorful electro-welded "baskets" that slot directly into their shelves' pre-cut grooves—no screws or brackets required. Shown here with matching Pedro stool. Contact manufacturer for price. www.candywhistle.co.nz