LAXO. The multifunctional chair. Designed by me.

Chairs, do you ever think twice about sitting on one? About what it looks like, how it functions and if its comfortable or not, and to be honest, most of us wouldn’t give a scooby because we have bigger fish to fry in this world of ours.

However there comes a time and place for such an interest. For some odd reason I have a big desire to design my own chair, not quite sure why; I just know I wanted to design my very own chair. So when we had a chance to write our own brief, I leaped at the chance of designing one. I wanted to pay particular attention to multifunctional chairs, the type you would find in a contemporary environment.

The brief

“The furniture company Vitra is looking looking to introduce a range of multifunctional chairs that can easily be implemented into domestic or commercial environments. The chair must be mass produced in high volumes and must also be stackable. The chair must have a distinctive contemporary appearance which promotes a shape that ensures freedom of movement.”

The images above and below show a few snapshots of the design process and the final outcome, which I have taken from the project. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment.

Bath toy Project

“Bath toy project”….Okay, I tried to give this post a much more interesting title, but it just wasn’t happening, and to tell you the truth either was the project really. If you have ever been given a brief that is out of comfort zone then you might have some idea of what I mean. So what was the brief  you ask? It was to design and manufacture a Bath Toy for an infant between the age of 0-36 months, which could be part of an existing range, in this case it was WOW toy’s.

When designing children’s toys you have to take into account a wide array of regulations and safety standards before it is even considered for manufacture. One of  which is British Standards EN-71; this guidelines the standards at which a toys should be made concerning the age and risk involved. Reading through this thing was a nightmare and took some time to actually understand, as you can see from my notes above I made sure I had some kind of idea of what to include before I set out and designed my product. Before this project I had never really looked at safety standards concerning the design and manufacture of products and it made me understand how crucial they are in Industry.

Anyway, I guess you lot want to hear more about the design of the toy! Well, I chose to design a Bath Toy for WOW, which could be part of their existing range, this can be seen here www.wowtoys.com. After much research into their products I began to set out a few designs and develop them. The images below show my final idea which I will be prototyping after the christmas break, so watch this space to see the progress. Oh and if you have any questions don’t hesitate to leave a comment!

Anglepoise Project, Bish bash bosh, Done!

After a full 3 weeks of concept and prototyping we finally came up with our final idea, and to be honest I think it was an amazing and well thought idea. It came to a surprise to me at first when I looked back and thought ‘ Corr, that project was one of the best I have done’ and would defiantly be going in my portfolio.

When you work in groups sometimes the brief get neglected and you spend more time organising the group than actually doing work, luckily that was not the case with our group and I think showed with the amount of quality work we churned out!

When we presented our idea to Anglepoise (by this time we was shattered, due to a series of sleepless nights) the hard work really paid off because all we received was positive feedback. so a big thumbs up to our group!  (Watch this space to find out more about our design….)

Anglepoise Project

Its been all go-go-go at uni at the moment, project after project, and we have just been given our newest project which will run over the Easter period into next term. Its the second group project of the year and so far its going pretty well, the brief is to design a garden light for Anglepoise, a very old company who are renowned for their timeless desk lamp (a.k.a Pixar light). Our group is currently in the concept stage and coming up with viable ideas. We want to capture the essence of Anglepoise, however garden lights are uncharted territory for Anglepoise meaning the scope for this project is huge. So far its early days but I will keep you hungry bunch updated as it progresses!

Mousetrap Prototype

With a total 12 hours in the workshop my mousetrap prototype is ready for hand in. After much hard work sanding, cutting and gluing its finally done, and I am quite pleased with the end result. I could have spend some more time on the surface finish, but when stuff has to get done compromises have to be made to meet deadlines. Overall though it turned out exactly how I imagined it!

Shower unit Project

The project that gave me insomnia! Honestly I was up day and night trying to get this project done to a good standard. I wanted this project to be my best yet, and by doing so worked my bloody arse off!

The brief was to restyle a existing shower unit which was already on the market and manufactured by Triton. The shower unit would use its original internal components but with a restyled fascia. The unit had to be marketed under a well renowned hair and beauty brand, in this case it was Vidal Sassoon. The company had identified an opening for an extension to their existing hair care product range and wish to develop a domestic electric shower unit. Vidal Sassoon represented top of the range salon quality hair products with a wealth of experience in the industry which matched no other, it was this I wanted to capture in my design.

Its the best feeling when you finish a project that you have put so much effort into you really feel like you have accomplished something at the end.  This project was so much better than the last one, in which I had to design a Mousetrap. My heart just was not in Mousetrap project, I cant really say why, but I suppose as a designer sometimes you do not have the choice and the luck to always get great briefs in industry. The image above shows my final concept which I rendered on Solidworks, a 3D modeling program.

Mousetrap Project – ‘A better Mousetrap’

The image above shows my a rendered version of my final design for an alternative and ‘better’ Mousetrap. The brief was to design and manufacture a mousetrap which could, well trap a mouse! simple I suppose. I went for a humane mousetrap which used an offset see-saw mechanism to trap the mouse in rectangle shaped box. This project was to be completed within a four week time frame, concept to beginning of prototype manufacture, so it really tested my ability to work under pressure.

Cut Scoop* prototype

Kiwi CutScoop* prototype shown above which was made from High Impact Polystyrene.

The pen in the photo is too give an idea of the rough size of the utensil.

Cut Scoop* manufacture begins

Kiwi cutlery in its first stages of manufacture.

Cut Scoop*

Currently in the later stages of the development process, the CutScoop Kiwi spoon has been designed to ‘effortlessly’ eat a Kiwi fruit on the go. The brief was to design and manufacture a disposable utensil to help promote healthy eating among the young demographic. Its aesthetics and shape was influenced by the seeds inside the Kiwi fruit.