The colorful Hoberman Mini Sphere comes out of the box looking like a futuristic Christmas-tree ornament. It's a cross between a ball and a star, and measures 5.5 inches across. But pick it up by any one of its dozens of plastic points and this amazing little feat of engineering, or imagineering, expands neatly into a lattice-like globe that's 12 inches in diameter. The inventor calls it a trapezoidal icosatetrahedron; you could also call it a Bucky Ball, but either way, it's a fascinating exercise in complex simplicity.

• Magically Expands from 5.5" to 12"
• Award Winning geometric expanding/contracting ball.