Niels Bohr's Atomic Model

In 1913 Niels Bohr sketched the atom as a nucleus with electrons on fixed orbits, and every chemistry classroom has been drawing it that way since. A century later the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen marked the anniversary with this mobile, designed in 2013 by Mette Høst, Charlotte Rosenbeck, Clive Ellegaard and Ole Flensted. A single nucleus hangs inside curved stainless-steel orbits that each turn on their own axis, so the electron shells drift in and out of alignment and never settle into the same configuration twice.

A piece of physics history you hang from the ceiling. At 10.6 inches across it reads as sculpture rather than toy, right for a study, a hallway, a desk corner, or the room of a kid who just learned what an electron is. A natural gift for a physics teacher, a chemistry grad, or anyone who still remembers the diagram from school.

Like every Flensted mobile it is assembled by hand on the island of Funen, Denmark, where the family workshop has made mobiles since 1953.

At a glance: Design: Mette Høst, Charlotte Rosenbeck, Clive Ellegaard & Ole Flensted with the Niels Bohr Institute, 2013 · Size: 10.6" × 10.6" (27 × 27 cm) · Materials: stainless steel, beech, plastic · Handmade in Denmark · Ships from Princeton, NJ