Teapot Designs

Just started reading Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things by Donald A. Norman, the author of the famous and often recommended The Design of Everyday Things (my poor copy sits on the shelf collecting dust waiting to be read). Norman opens his newest book with a discussion of three teapots he has. He doesn’t use them, but they each tell a story. One is impossible to use (see picture in book below), one is a classy glassy Michael Graves design and one is unusual.
Norman says when we like the look of an object, we’re more willing to overlook its flaws to use it rather than switch to something with no flaws and an ugly design. I think flickr.com is a good example of this from a web site perspective. It isn’t so much about flickr’s look-and-feel, but many of the non-designers, everyday Internet users understandably find the site difficult to use.
flickr.com gained a reputation in the world of web design and IT — the kind of people who find their way around the more difficult to use sites — that many flocked to it because of what friends and colleagues told them.
Norman talked about a beautiful set of tools from his childhood that his friend showed him. The friend was excited by his collection while Norman immediately recalled his negative experience with the tools. Enough time had passed for his friend to overlook the negative experience he had with the tools. So when he came found them, he saw them as a collectible rather than something he struggled to use. Had those negative experiences been more recent or memorable, would he have bought the set?
What objects do you have that aren’t the easy to use, but you overlooked the flaws because of their beauty?