Web goes down the toilet

New lease of life for toilet roll

An internet toilet roll browser and a net-enabled chopping board are among cutting edge designs at the Ideal Home Show.

The show, which runs at London's Earls Court exhibition centre until 6 April, is home to a variety of strange gadgets.

Brunel University design graduates came up with five of the 15 products showcased in the Future Concepts gallery.

Design graduate Andrew Cubitt has taken the humble toilet roll and turned it into a hi-tech news and information service.

A unit installed in front of a toilet on the cubicle wall provides up-to-the-minute information on products, stocks and shares and lottery results.

People can even print off the information on a standard toilet roll.

Net on the chopping block

Chopping board that can inspire chefs

Although many products profess to be embedded internet devices, they are often little more than PCs packaged in other cases, such as a fridge door.

Brunel graduate Charly Ingrey-Senn hopes his internet-enabled cutting board will be different.

It contains a microprocessor-controlled system capable of browsing the web.

It can download recipes and display them on a screen within the board itself providing inspiration for even the most uncreative cook.

For sun worshippers, there is the solar-powered sun lounger, designed by Damian Poole.

It rotates in unison with the movement of the sun providing people with the much-sought after perfect all-over tan.