For anyone that knows me, this collaboration was a no-brainer.  Unless by some strange reason you found yourself here because of my lost dog posters, you already know that I repurpose original Atari 2600 & Sears video game cartridges into wallets. The simple beauty of the wallets would not have been possible without the design guidance of my roommate, spawn-mother and wife, Phetnikone.

A Mass Art graduate in fashion design, she has been selling her handbags in Boston boutiques since 2005. Naturally, with the release of the wallets, she created a special line of wristlets to accompany my wallets. More details after the preview pictures.

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Out of all the strangeness borne of the Atari cartridge wallet adventure, the robopube motherball stands out. I’d like to say I named it, but in its presence the name cannot be denied. As the first batch of ~1200 games began the wallet repurposing process, the springs began to snag each other as I threw more into the box. After a couple hundred of springs were added to the box, the snagged mess formed itself into a round shape. By the time the entire lot was processed all of the springs had taken on a new existence.

The spring starts in a V shape with the tension loop at the bottom and both points are barbed half-circles. Multiply this by a thousand and you have a melon-sized ball of antique tetanus-bearing metal, ready to sink a jabby tip into flesh with every touch. Oh, sure, we had a hoot with it at first, but then the ugly truth became clear: one by one, each spring must be removed to be fashioned into the wallet money clips. As easily as the motherball is ready to jab it is twice as unlikely to let a piece of itself go.

Before I began the painful experience of separating the springs from the motherball, I realized if the wallets succeed and I need to process more, I’ll never have a batch as large as the one I had at that moment. The photos from that lone moment of motherball appreciation adorn the background of this website as well as my twitter profile picture.

I’m not a machine. I don’t want to be a machine, either. They’re too needy, asking too many questions. Can I open this, where should I save this… the questions never stop.

Unlike the questions, I do stop, but not often. Between the full-time day job, the baby, wallet construction, eBay resales and dodgeball, the blog somehow became lost in the shuffle. Instead of writing a ton of crap,I’ll simply summarize the wallet news…

I’ve been working with a group of students for marketing, including a live-action commercial to be filmed this weekend with a Ms. Pac Man costume. Another batch of wallets will be ready this weekend as I begin inserting magnets into the next batch, which includes the big names like Asteroids, Combat, Pac Man and Space Invaders. Atari cartridge wallets will be combined with custom wristlets designed from the included game in a collaboration with Phetnikone Nokham. You can click here to preview the first wristlet, Berzerk.

Time to go match chips up with their newly-finished wallets.