How often is it that you find yourself using your qwerty keyboard and wishing for a full length old-school keyboard with all the number keys and dedicated Page Up, Page Down keys? As someone who uses After Effects frequently, I find myself wishing for an attachment or a magical extension that would make those keys appear at my disposal. With designer Jonathan Welch’s innovation, I don’t need magic to improve my workflow, we have the Lyka keyboard for it!

The Lyka Modular Keyboard by Jonathan Welch piques our interest for a number of reasons. Not only does it come with a pretty minimal aesthetic, it also uses a unique concave pattern on the keys allowing your fingers to land on them confidently, giving you the ability to type easily while looking at the screen. What’s more, the Lyka comes with a modular build (reminiscent of the plug-and-play design seen in Roli’s music products). That modular build is the exact solution for my keyboard woes – use the simpler QWERTY keyboard for our everyday work, manage your desk space efficiently and when I need the additional keys, use the Lyka’s extension to attach and expand my keyboard, allowing me to work on my videos like a pro!

The idea behind Lyka’s modular makeup is simple. When you don’t need the extra bunch of keys, clip it off and you’re back to the compact QWERTY keyboard. I imagine designer Jonathan has a few modules up his sleeve too… a touchpad perhaps… or compatibility with Roli’s musical blocks, or a touchscreen like extension for quick note-taking or sketching down ideas when needed. Needless to say, we are excited and we can’t wait for more extensions to jazz up our desk with the Lyka keyboard!

Designer: Jonathan Welch