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Alejandro Villareal's Loom-Inspired Chair

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This is the Loom Chair, designed by Alejandro Villareal's Mexico-based Hierve design house. 

Produced and sold by London-based H Furniture, the inspiration for the chair was a piece of textile-producing machinery: It was modeled after "a small manual belt-making loom discovered in the city of Oaxaca, Mexico."

It's produced through the combination of CNC milling and handwork becoming more prevalent in modern-day shops.

Threads of strong elastic polyester woven cord are stretched to create the seating area and back rest, providing a very comfortable seating experience.

Each particular thread is an independent element from beginning to end — by selecting different thread colours, totally different looks and patterns are possible.


ID Students seek $20K on Kickstarter for Project, Get $300K-Plus

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Talk about the power of simple, intelligent design! A team of industrial design students at Western Washington University have jointly developed a tea-brewing device called Imbue. It consists of just six "ingredients" that, once put all together, enable you to easily brew loose leaf tea:

After producing and selling a small batch locally, the group of students decided the design was successful enough to try for a larger run with a Kickstarter campaign. Setting their sights on $20,000, they had attracted $323,752 at press time, with less than 24 hours left in the pledging period.

Some more details on those ingredients:

The container is constructed from shatter resistant borosilicate glass that works as an effective insulator, keeping your beverage hot and your hand cool. The lid is made from bamboo, a sustainable hard wood used in many household products because of its strength and flexibility. The lid has a powerful neodymium magnetic ring embedded in it to attract the stainless steel filter that holds the tea and is covered by a permanent food safe silicon gasket that is leak proof. This feature makes the interface between the Imbue lid, filter, and draining dish effortless. The removable sleeve is made from a natural insulated fabric with a no slip suede interior lining for maximum grip.

If all goes right, the Imbue will start shipping in October of this year.

Congratulations to the students, and WWU's ID department! Hopefully this will motivate ID students at other schools to try launching their own designs.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Interaction Honorees

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Since the 1980's when the term was first coined, interaction design has become increasingly relevant as a tool for shaping our digital products, systems and services. Seeking to better shape digital environments of multiple scales, it is characterized by imaginative leaps—addressing how things should and could be. This spirit was evident in many of the submissions we received this year. We asked for "interactive content and user interface design for websites, mobile devices and experiential installations," and received a wide range of submissions which were evaluated based on their potential value, impact and/or scale, originality and design craft. 

Jill Nussbaum, Executive Director of Product and Interaction Design at The Barbarian Group, led the Interaction Design jury team as Captain. She was joined by Ian Spalter, Head of Design at Instagram, Carla Echevarria, Vice President and Head of Creative at MakerBot, and Matt Jones, Interaction Design Director at Google Creative Lab. The team was impressed by both the professional and student entries and noted that the selected projects successfully create immersive experiences and consider the digital dimension as a key element, rather than an afterthought. Several of the winning projects created remarkably intuitive interfaces to solve basic yet complex problems, like helping new parents effectively monitor their babies in any situation. 

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Interaction category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it. 

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Speculative Concepts Honorees

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Speculative Design is an emerging field that is still testing its boundaries and scope. It doesn't stop at designing beautiful products, but delves into the many dimensions of design and all of its possible implications. It involves a "bending of the way we think about the world and how design sits into it," as jury Captain Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg remarks." We asked for "all conceptual designs for further insight, discourse, intervention, experimentation or exploration," and received provocative entries from a multitude of perspectives on what design futures might hold. As juror Cher Potter identified: "One thing this competition does is bring together commercially-oriented innovation projects with projects that are much more based on alternative narratives of the future that really are about debate and debating the ideas of inheriting the future. Bringing those together make a really interesting discussion for us in terms of what's valuable. Is it an object of debate or is it something that seems viable in the current market?"

Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Founder of Studio Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, led the Speculative Design jury team as Captain. She was joined by Ghislaine Boddington, Creative Director, body>data>space, Cher Potter, Research Fellow, Victoria & Albert Museum, James Auger, Partner, Auger-Loizeau, and Jan Boelen, Artistic Director, Z33. The team noted that several of the projects exemplified an expanded view of design and the role of the designer, while the most successful were able to bridge the gap between imaginative idea and potential for real-world application. "I think all of the projects we've selected question the borders of speculative design, what it is and what it's purpose is," notes Auger. Though the jury was not able to select a clear winner in the student category, they were impressed by the potential they found: "There's still lots of space to develop these projects further. A lot of them point toward moving forward," mentioned Ginsberg. 

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Speculative Design category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Design Education Initiatives Honorees

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Sometimes learning takes place in a classroom and sometimes it grabs us by surprise in the course of our daily lives. One thing is for sure: education is best when it doesn't stop. It's increasingly important to activate the learning space with educational initiatives that look beyond traditional models. We asked for "any educational class project, curriculum or institutional level program or tool that furthers the practice of design education or education about design," and the community responded with entries that excited, and even inspired, our jury.

Mike Weikert, Director and Founder of MICA's Center for Social Design and Master of Arts in Social Design led the Design Education Initiatives jury team as Captain. He was joined by his colleague at the Center for Social Design, Social Design Associate Becky Slogeris, Sarah Hemming, Co-Founder and CEO at Thread and Jess Gartner, Founder and CEO at Allovue. "We were most inspired by projects that not only furthered design education, but were well designed in both process and application," says Weikert. "Entries that topped our list demonstrated authentic collaborations, innovative approaches, and lasting impact. And, most importantly, pushed learning beyond the traditional classroom or institution."

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Design Education Initiatives category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Consumer Products Honorees

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As the world of consumer products gets increasingly streamlined and optimized, our relationships with our objects are becoming more personal and influential. In this far-ranging category, we sought "final products designed specifically for individual use across a variety of environments and purposes, including but not limited to home, work, leisure, sporting, health and hygiene." The entries we received looked for balance between life and technology, and the jury cited many of the entries as products that actually found their way onto the jury members' personal inspiration boards. "This year was really interesting. It feels like Industrial Design is back," said jury member David Whetstone. "There is a lot more art and emotion in the designs this year and I think that's really exciting for the profession and where things are heading."

Hong and Anh Nguyen, Founders of Creative Session led the jury as Captains. They were joined by Shujan Bertrand, CEO and Owner of APLAT, Jason Mayden, Vice President of Design, Mark One, David Whetstone, Design Director, Astro Studios, Adam Leonards, Principal Designer, Matter Product, and Max Burton, Founder and Chief Designer, Matter Product. "Some of the products that had a high ranking for us this year were products that seemed timeless, simple, and long-lasting," explained Hong and Anh. "People want to interact with beautiful objects that represent who they are as consumers. All of the products we've selected stand alone and make bold statements. " 

The jury focused on products where functionality married with a more human element. As Bertrand reflects: "What we're looking for is that human connection. Connecting people to people, or connecting people to products, in a much more meaningful way. One element of connection that I really appreciate is humor. Some of the products we saw really made us laugh and fall in love with it immediately. If something can make us laugh, I think we can really focus on living a happier life."

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Consumer Products category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Packaging Honorees

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Good packaging design has a wide reach, it essentially becomes the image of a product, defining—and refining—a brand's identity. This year we asked for "all graphic design, branding and structural designs related to the packaging of products," and received a host of entries for products as recognizable as the Big Mac to those that are a bit more tricky to market, like condoms. 

Nishma Pandit, Director and Principal Designer of Ticket Design, led the Packaging jury team as Captain. She was joined by Ayush Kasliwal, Founder, Ayush Kasliwal Design Private Ltd., Manabu Tago, President, Art Director, and Designer, MTDO Inc., and Dinesh Korjan, Founder and Partner, Studio Korjan. The team was looking for entries that went beyond the initial brief and considered the deeper impact that packaging design can have. "We debated over sustainability of the designs, especially since packaging has an extended life in the hands of the user," explained Pandit. Though ecology and sustainability might be obvious considerations given the impact of waste, the team also questioned the emotional layer embedded in packaging design. As Korjan frames one of the key jury considerations: "Does the packaging live a life beyond the product? Not only physically, but does it continue to live in our mind?" 

Without further ado, say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Packaging category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Service Design Honorees

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Service Design structures people, infrastructure and materials related to a service experience in order to better the interactions that take place between provider and consumer. By interpreting needs and behaviors, Service Design formulates innovative approaches that really put people first. We asked for "projects entailing the organization of end-users, communication, transactions, infrastructure, institutions and organizational systems and received entries ranging from voting systems to GPS navigation apps." 

Cathy Huang, President, CBi China Bridge led the jury as Captain. She was joined by Adam Lawrence, Co-Founder, WorkPlayExperience, Luis Arnal, President and Founder, INSITUM, and Martha Cotton, Partner, gravity tank. "I think some interesting trends across all of the entries was a notion of empowerment and co-design. It was interesting to see the increasing ways that people are bringing in the end user, or the complex web of end users and constituents in a service offer. The notion of empowering people to have their own voice was a pretty strong theme throughout the service design entries. Along the line of empowerment is involving people in their own future which was very compelling and very inspiring," explains Cotton. The entries we received sought a more expansive view of Service Design, as Arnal discusses. "Traditionally a lot of service designers studies have been with the public sector, governments and NGO. This year we are very excited to see a lot of entries coming from the private sector as well. This means private companies are paying attention to improved customer experiences and finding valuable opportunities in service design."

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Service Design category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.


2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Design for Social Impact Honorees

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Designing for social impact is a systems-based process that involves all aspects of design and life and requires an ability to think strategically about issues of policy and economics among others. This vital field tackles some of the biggest issues of our age: environmental solutions, poverty and disaster relief are just some of the giants that design-thinking is trying to overturn. We asked for any "projects specifically designed to directly benefit social, humanitarian, community or environmental causes," and received a great diversity of responses that addressed the deep complexities of designing for social impact. "Often we tend to look at resource-poor communities as just issue-ridden with no hope. What we forget to see is the incredible resourcefulness that these communities embody on a daily basis and that I think all designers ought to learn from," explains jury member Tabitha George. "In issues that attempt to change people's lives for the better, there are no simple answers and I think that is something we all need to understand deeply and learn from."

John Thackara, Director, The Doors of Perception, led the jury team as captain. He was joined by Tabitha George, Partner, Quicksand, Dr. Mathilda Tham, Design Professor, Linnaeus University and Gill Widman, Co-Founder and Principal, Plot. Overall, the jury was happy to see refreshing entries marked by a sense of hope. "The competition evidences really well how the field of design for social impact is maturing...I was impressed with the deep empathy coming through many of the projects," said Tham, "I think empathy is a key design skill."

 The work we received was engaged with a wide variety of issues, from child mortality to climate change, and demonstrated an understanding of the many systems and layers involved in each case. Though working to solve some of the world's most complex problems, the entries retained a sense of respect and humbleness which impressed the jury team. "It was great to see people working so well with local contexts," said Widman. "When a designer's attitude is connected to the people and place, the designer has a subtly interesting role of provoking and making tangible ideas while bringing new ways of approaching things. Sometimes that includes not building the big, heroic option, but staying within a set of constraints and helping people use design to blossom and make it theirs. This can be a problem for some designers, but those who did it in this instance were visibly different and ought to be celebrated." 

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Design for Social Impact category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Commercial Equipment Honorees

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At the core of designing Commercial Equipment is work: productivity, efficiency, and performance. Within this field, as we saw from our entrants this year, the scale of solutions can vary from a small hearing aid to a system of crane lifts. We asked for any "equipment and systems designed for public, commercial, industrial, medical and scientific use," and received a very eclectic series of entries, though one trend the jury noticed was the predominance—over half—of submissions focused on the medical and biotech industries. 

Dan Harden, President, CEO, and Principal Designer, Whipsaw led the jury as Captain. He was joined by Bill Evans, Principal and Founder, Bridge Design, Mike Gallagher, Vice President of Design, Crown Equipment Corporation and Sam Lucente, CDO and Co-Founder, Cookbrite. "In this category we felt it was really important to honor every definition of design: great aesthetics, great usability, great experience, good social benefits—the full gamut. It's not a beauty contest, we were looking for full design solutions," explains Harden. The jury was impressed with the diverse range of skills deployed across the projects. "Thank you for being makers! We saw people cutting cardboard, we saw people in the shop making models, beautiful models, spray painting," noted Harden. "The result is fine art mixed with technology that is soft and friendly and it's obvious that the technology is taking a back seat to the experience. The result is very humanistic and very refreshing." Overall, a trend that emerged was a thoughtful combination of design and technology. "What happens when the designer or creatives are given electronic devices and sensors, and the creativity that comes out and how you can merge that with traditional industrial design and design thinking type of research patterns—it's pretty exciting," said Gallagher.

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Commercial Equipment category. Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

Commercial Equipment Professional Honorees

Commercial Equipment Student Honorees


2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Transportation Honorees

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We all engage with transportation systems everyday, whether we do so via our personal bike or experience a daily dose of collective frustration on public transportation. This year we called for any "vehicles, systems or modes of transportation used to get people or objects from one place to another, for private, public, commercial or industrial purposes." The entries we received—from jogging strollers, to smart bikes, to reinterpreted tuk-tuk systems—reflected a forward-thinking, resourceful design practice. 

James Thomas, Industrial Designer and Founder of BicycleDesign.net led the jury as Captain. He was joined by Torgny Fjeldskaar, Design Director, BMC Switzerland, Melissa Bruntlett, Co-Founder, Modacity, Rob Cotter, Chief Designer and CEO, Organic Transit and Eric Stoddard, Design Manager, Ford Motor Company. Some of the most compelling entries stimulated discussion about the future of the transportation industry. "Everything's going to change and I think this a step in thinking about that, and how that's all going to come together," said Cotter. "Whether it's partly autonomous, whether it's super light, whether it's zero carbon or multi-sourced power. All those things are important in a very, very significant way because, largely, they're not being addressed on a production level. It's really important that the designers of the future are kind of moving in this direction."

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Transportation category.

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.

2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Strategy & Research Honorees

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Whether through analytics or immersive ethnographic research, there are many ways designers infuse their work with rigorous research, ultimately leading to proposals that are aligned with their contexts. We asked for "projects or products that predominantly utilize design research and strategy," and received many entries including brand strategies, child engagement strategies and civic approaches to town planning.  

Dr. Melis Senova, Founder & Director of Strategy & Design, Huddle Design led the jury as Captain. She was joined by Marcel Zwiers, Co-Founder and Creative Director, 31Volts, Harold G. Nelson, Visiting Scholar, University of Montana, School of Computer Science, Hugh Evans, CEO and Co-Founder, FromHereOn and Dr. Yoko Akama, Senior Lecturer in Communication Design, RMIT University. Overall the team was impressed by many of the projects which proposed total solutions, not stopping at research but rather allowing the information they gleaned to inform and even change their design strategies. 

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Strategy & Research category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.


2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Built Environment Honorees

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We live, work and play in built constructs. From more stable environments like our home and office, to temporary spaces like restaurants, hotels and exhibitions, we go from one built environment to the next and are impacted by our surroundings in many ways. For this all-encompassing category we asked for any "spatial design as it relates to physical interiors, exhibitions or installations, either permanent or temporary, for private, public, commercial or industrial purposes," and received many dynamic entries. 

Laura Allen and Mark Smout, Senior Lecturers, Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL led the jury as Captains. They were joined by Will Hunter, Founding Director, London School of Architecture and Vicky Richardson, Director of Architecture, Design, and Fashion, British Council. Their discerning eyes were looking for immersive environments, projects that really addressed issues of inhabitability, and interesting responses to bringing nature into the built environment. 

Say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up, and Notables of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Built Environment category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Award program. Each entry below has a link specifically for it.


2015 Core77 Design Awards: Meet the Open Design Honorees

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Open Design takes the cliche phrase, "Sharing is caring," out of the kindergarten classroom and gives it real world application. More than just 3D printers, this segment of design can cover everything from the quirky DIY wearable projects found on Pinterest, to the highly technical and socially impactful design that received the Student Winner title this year. At its core is the spirit of inclusion; the notion that just about anyone, almost anywhere, can replicate these designs. We asked for "projects created by the end-user that are meant to be shared for others to create," and the Open Design community responded with enthusiasm, much to the delight of our Open Design Jury.

Jennifer Turliuk, Co-President of MakerKids, led the Open Design jury team as Captain and led the charge of exploring the colorful variety of entries we received this year. She was joined by Mark Argo, Creative Technologist & Founder of Aesthetec Studio, Inc., and Mark Hatch, Chief Executive Officer of TechShop. The team was impressed by the entries overall and noticed an added layer of inclusion in a few of the noted entries—not only were the designs inclusive, but the resulting projects/products were often meant to be enjoyed or appreciated among other people. 

Without further ado, say hello to the Winners, Runners-Up and Notables for the 2015 Core77 Design Awards in the Open Design category. 

Be sure to vote for the projects that impressed you the most in our first ever Community Choice Awards. Each honored project below has a link specifically for it, so click through, read up on what went into each one, and vote for your favorites. 

From all of us here at Core77 and the Core77 Design Awards, congratulations!

Congratulations to the 2015 Core77 Design Awards Honorees

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The day you've been waiting for has arrived. Today we announce the honorees of the 2015 Core77 Design Awards

With over 210 total honors bestowed by the dedicated jury teams, the honorees hail from all over the globe and represent the most innovative and inspiring student and professional work from across 14 categories. 

The 2015 jury teams, comprised of 56 design experts from 15 cities and 8 countries, were most impressed by the depth and thoroughness of student entries this year, noting that the level of execution and research matched, and often exceeded, that of their professional counterparts. The juries noted the ongoing interest in social impact, with many of the designs focusing on creating a lasting positive impact rather than on more superficial design elements.

The honoree announcements also kick off the public voting for the inaugural Core77 Community Choice Prize. This brand new addition to the Design Awards program asks the global design community to vote on their favorite honored entries between today and June 22nd. A grand prize winner, the project that receives the most votes over all across all 14 categories, will receive airfare and accommodations to attend the 2015 Core77 Conference in Los Angeles, California. Anyone who votes in the Community Choice Awards will be automatically entered into a drawing for one of three free tickets to attend the 2015 Core77 Conference.

So dive in! The winning projects, jury videos and community choice awards are open for your browsing and voting pleasure


Barber & Osgerby on Justifying the Existence of New Objects

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Names: Jay Osgerby and Edward Barber

Occupation: Founders of the London design studio Barber & Osgerby

Current projects:

JO:Most of them are confidential, but right now we have projects that span emerging technology, architecture, furniture and product—so a complete scope of all types and scales of creative endeavor.

Mission:

JO:Generally, I would say it's to create new archetypes and modes of use for things, the only way to justify the existence of new objects.

EB: To design useful and beautiful things.

Edward Barber (left) and Jay Osgerby. Portrait by Alisa Connan

When did you decide that you wanted to be a designer?

JO:Well, as I child I knew I wanted to do something creative, but I didn't understand or know the term designer until I was older. And it was only then that I decided to go in this direction.

EB: I'm not sure I ever decided. I just fell into it, really. I thought I was going to be an artist or a sculptor, and then one day I got very practical and signed up for a design course. But I imagine that I will probably end up not being a designer at some point.

Education:

JO:I did a one-year foundation course in art and design, followed by a degree in furniture and industrial design at Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication. After that, I went to the Royal College of Art, where I studied architecture for my master's degree and met Edward.

EB: I did a design degree at Leeds Polytechnic, and then I also did a master's in architecture at the RCA, where Jay and I met.

Barber & Osgerby's new Pilot chair for Knoll

First design job:

JO:I've never actually had a job—my first design job was at Barber & Osgerby.

EB: Same answer. I was never actually employed as a designer by anyone, partly because I was probably unemployable. Jay and I were actually offered a job by one of the tutors at the Royal College of Art, but that never materialized. And while we were waiting for the job to start, we decided to work together. So, yeah, I've never had a job other than my own office.

Who is your design hero?

JO:Probably Christopher Dresser. He was one of the first people to actually practice what we today call industrial design, which was trying to give the companies that were emerging from the industrial revolution a competitive edge through creativity and starting to understand and synthesize design language to give meaning to objects which were otherwise merely mass-produced items. He was influenced by the Orient and by Japan in particular, and really brought in some of the sensibilities of the East, of a reductive design language. He was incredibly prolific and he remains a huge influence.

EB: Design heroes for me are people who are unnamed, really—people who made everyday household objects from wood and metal. You know, those things that you find in flea markets. Or even going back beyond that. If you look at simple wood-carved seats and bowls and things from 150 to 200 years ago, from Africa or Polynesia or someplace like that—things that have been design-developed through time.

Also new this year, a series of Collector Cabinets for Glas Italia
Olio, a new range of tableware for Royal Doulton

Describe your workspace:

JO:Edward and I share a small-ish studio space that is probably around 500 square feet, as part of a bigger studio space that is about 8,500 square feet. It's one of these old, ex-warehouse spaces in the heart of Shoreditch, and we have a space that is interconnected underground. When these buildings were warehouse spaces, they were connected by underground link ways so that the workers could go from one to another. So we have a kind of collection of very strangely arranged rooms and spaces that have these hidden-away corridors between them.

Other than the computer, what is your most important tool?

JO:Well, it depends on if you're counting the phone as a computer. It's either the iPhone or a pen. Probably a pen.

EB: The computer is not at all important for me. I only use the computer to write e-mails. It's not a design tool for me. I'm a person who has a pen and a sketchbook or a roll of tracing paper. So I guess a pen is the most important thing for me as well.

What is the best part of your job?

JO:Apart from the free coffee? The sheer diversity. Every single day is totally different; every hour is different. I get to work on some of the most amazing projects in the world. Through that comes this necessity to travel and this imperative to be influenced by technicians, engineers, new clients, new materials and production methods. And all of those things contribute to a huge diversity and constantly changing working day.

EB: Designing. That sounds a little stupid maybe, but there's a lot of travel and a lot of meetings that in some ways get in the way of design. They're all necessary, but the most enjoyable part is actually sitting down and drawing and designing.

What is the worst part of your job?

JO:For me, it's the same as the best part. You never really know what you're doing and you're having to travel the whole time. The early starts can be really brutal. Being based in London, in a country which doesn't really manufacture so much anymore, we're compelled to throw ourselves around the planet on aircraft at least once or twice a week. And, inevitably, if you want to get to a meeting in Italy or Switzerland at a reasonable time in the morning, it means leaving home at 4:30 a.m. So sometimes the traveling can be quite brutal.

EB: Being away from my family.

From 2014, the Mariposa sofa for Vitra
For last year's London Design Festival, Barber & Osgerby created Double Space, an installation at the Victoria and Albert Museum featuring two enormous rotating silver elements suspended in the Raphael Gallery.

What time do you get up and go to bed?

JO: I get up at 6:40 a.m. and I go to bed around midnight.

EB: Well, right now I have a one-month-old baby, so it's sort of irrelevant. It's whenever I get a chance to sleep while I'm at home.

How do you procrastinate?

JO:I doodle.

EB: I probably just put on another pot of coffee before I make a decision on something.

What is your favorite productivity tip or trick?

JO:I clean my table down—I always feel like I can work well on a clear table but in a messy space.

EB: When you're designing, you have good days and you have bad days. And if you're having a good day, I think you should try and work on as many projects as possible, to try and get ahead. Because if your creative brain is working well, everything seems very easy. And on other days, everything feels really tough. So, yeah, spread that creativity across as many projects as possible.

Barber and Osgerby in their London studio

What is the most important quality in a designer?

JO: The ability to communicate, either verbally or nonverbally. If you cannot communicate, you cannot be a designer.

EB: Originality.

What is the most widespread misunderstanding about design or designers?

JO:That the majority of designers are in it for self-promotion. And actually our job isn't self-promotion, it's promotion of the people who are commissioning us.

EB: That we all live in these super-designer minimalist spaces. If you could see my place, it's not like that at all—it's a very eclectic bunch of stuff.

What is your most prized design possession?

JO: Probably my bicycle. It's a stainless-steel bike called a Snob, by the American company Ritte.

EB: I'm going to go back to what I was saying earlier. Honestly, it is a stool from Ethiopia from about 150 years ago. It's the most beautifully carved and simply utilitarian object.

What is exciting you in design right now?

JO: Like many people, I'm really excited by the fact that there's a huge shift back to narrative and making in design. And not so much just about industrial production. Small-scale production seems to have unleashed a whole new wave of creativity—a little bit like it did when Edward and I first graduated and there was a big recession on, and it converted people who would normally just go straight to working in agencies into setting up on their own. A similar thing is happening now. Recessions are fantastic for design.

EB: Yeah. Both Jay and I have been really interested in craft, or the handmade, from early in our working relationship. And there has been this massive resurgence in the interest in craft. So I find that very interesting as well.

If you could redesign anything, what would you choose?

JO: The roads in London, to make them safer for cyclists.

EB: I think the LED lightbulb, so that you could have a 360-degree light coming from it. But that's only because it's a problem that we're working on at the moment.

Desktop CNC Milling: Cutting Applebox Faces with Two-Sided Machining [Core77 Shopbot Series, Ep. 11]

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Everything we've cut on the Shopbot thus far has been on one side. But it's helpful to learn two-sided machining, whereby you can flip a piece over and register it with utmost accuracy; that way you can carve both sides of something and get them to line up in the middle, if need be.

In the following video, where we cut the faces of our applebox, we'll show you a simple trick for doing two-sided machining.

Core77 Visits Festool, Part 1: An Introduction

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On the occasion of their 90th anniversary, German power tool manufacturer Festool recently invited a small group of journalists to a weeklong media event at their headquarters in southern Germany. As the sole design publication in attendance (the rest were from the trades), Core77 made it a point to learn about what sets the innovative company's designs apart—and how they do it. The following series of articles is a result of the trip.

Power Tools, Then

Imagine that you're a craftsman in 1925, and you hear someone has invented a special power tool that greatly simplifies one of your operations. It's pricey, but if the tool does what they say it will, it'll save you tons of time—and thus money—in the long run.

So you travel to the factory, as there's no other way to order one. Once you arrive, they quiz you to suss out whether you're really a craftsman, because these tools are only made for craftsmen. That done, you put your money down and your name is added to the bottom of the list nailed to the factory wall. Several weeks later, you return and pick up your newly-built tool. It was worth the hassle because this is your livelihood, and the tool is going to make your operation a lot more efficient.

Power Tools, Now

Today the process for buying power tools is much different: We can walk into any big-box store and pick up whatever we need immediately. But the Wal-Mart-ization of modern commerce has had a negative effect on the quality of the tools. The retailers set cutthroat price points, forcing manufacturers to shave their own costs by taking it out of the tool; housings get thinner, tolerances go down, plastic replaces metal. The consumer gets an affordable tool—but one where the durability, precision and longevity have been squeezed out of it by the relentless number-crunching.

Festool has not gone down this route. Instead the company makes durable, innovative and high-quality power tools with the end user in mind, not the mass-market sales contract. This provides the freedom to pursue product designs that satisfy their own criteria first. "We build to quality standards, not a price point," says Steve Rangoussis, Festool USA's Chief Sales & Marketing Officer. "There's something to be said about pride of craftsmanship, and our craft is making the best tools [we can]."

The buying process described in the first two paragraphs of this article was Festool's—or more precisely, Festo's—back in the 1920s, when Albert Fezer and Gottlieb Stoll started an innovative tool company titled from a combination of their surnames. Ninety years later the company name has gotten a bit longer, and the buying process considerably shorter; modern-day distribution networks mean the brand now sells on five continents. And if you were to look at a global map of their distributors over the past decade and a half, you'd see more and more of them winking into existence in that little country north of Mexico.

On the Rise in America

"We can see the U.S. market for us is growing very fast," says Ole Held. And you don't need to be the CEO of Festool USA (as Held is) to see it: Even casual American TV or YouTube watchers cannot have failed to notice, amongst the current crop of renovation/homebuilding/DIY shows and YouTube channels, Festool's iconic-looking tools appearing more and more frequently in more people's shops, perched in the background or being wielded in the foreground. And social media denizens will notice Festool USA's Facebook page "likes" bearing down on six figures.

But while the bright green lettering of the Festool logo makes the tools stand out on-screen—amidst the wash of DeWalt yellow, Milwaukee red and Makita blue—that's not what differentiates them in actual usage. Or at the cash register. Festool has a reputation for producing expensive tools that provide benefits the other brands either lack or end up chasing down. Superior dust collection, clever ergonomics, precision adjustability, unique time- and labor-saving features, a system-based approach to design, and even careful consideration of the tools' Systainer carrying cases, all speak of a design attention lavished on their products that you simply don't see from most manufacturers these days.

These features, coupled with what we witnessed at Festool's facilities in Germany (which we'll explain in this series of articles), are undoubtedly where the high prices come from. And surprisingly in America, where low prices are king, Festool's approach—high design, high cost, no compromises—is working, amidst a field of competitors with much lower prices. It appears that in an era of disposability, certain American customers are happy to pay more for an intelligently-designed tool that is built to last.

As a result, Festool is sharply expanding the size of their American facilities in Indiana to meet the demand. "This month we are doubling the size of our warehouse, doubling the size of the training facilities," Held reports. Their timing is good: A recent industry study on the world power tools market reports that "Global power tool demand will rise 4.8 percent per year through 2018 to $32.9 billion. The US will remain the largest market."

Fanatic End Users

But there's more to Festool's American market gains than just increased sales. In the fifteen years since they first made inroads here, the company's products have spawned the type of fanaticism that is the envy of any brand, whether one producing sneakers, smartphones or kitchen appliances. Festool's trade show booths are just as jam-packed at JLC Live in Providence as they were at Holz-Handwerk in Germany. Online tool forums are filled with Festoolians who gleefully refer to themselves as having "drank the green Kool-Aid." Buying one Festool product, they'll readily attest, soon leads to buying another. And another.

On some level, the cynic in you has to believe it's just hype; irrational people with too much money trying to justify their expensive purchase(s). But try using a Domino, or one of Festool's track saws or sanders hooked up to one of their dust collectors—don't just read about it, go out and physically try it—and chances are you'll change your tune. Reading the testimonials on the 12,000-member Festool Owners Group online forum, the story is nearly always the same: At first I had a hard time swallowing the price tag. But after seeing the difference the tool made for my business, I wonder why I waited so long.

Among thusly converted craftspeople, that realization has translated into both an urge to share and outright evangelism. It's not that Festool products sell themselves; it's that Festool's end users sell other end users on them. Before dinner on the first night of our trip, Rangoussis shared this anecdote from the early days of his career:

Before I joined Festool, I was an independent manufacturer's representative. I sold a variety of different things, and when there's a wide range within what you sell--some products that are good, some that maybe are not--you feel like you have a target on your back.
But the first [trade show] I worked for Festool, I literally had customers--people who had already purchased Festool products--coming into the booth and talking up the products to other [potential] customers.
I could've just sat back, because these guys were literally selling other people in the booth. The booth was crowded and these guys would go on and on about how great the product is, and how stupid you'd be not to buy it, et cetera….it was amazing. My wife was with me, and seeing the enthusiasm of the customers, turned to me and said "Wow, I wish I worked for a company like that."

What is it that breeds this type of enthusiasm? What does the company get right that others do not? What really, physically, practically sets the tools apart? And perhaps of most interest to our readership, how do they conduct their research, how do they decide what to make, and how does their design process work?

Festool HQ

To answers these questions and learn what gets green-lit inside that building above, we need to understand multiple things: The company's history of innovation, its internal thinking, and how their corporate culture itself influences the design of their tools. In any company with long-term thinking, those things influence the finished products coming off of the assembly line in a way that the short-term-thinking companies seem to miss. 

We'll also take a look at the design process of one of their latest products, and talk to a Festool industrial designer. Stay tuned as we walk you through what we saw and learned at the Festool mothership in Germany.

Staying Organized at a Sit/Stand Desk

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Height-adjustable desks are getting very popular as people become concerned about the health risks of sitting all day. Many of these desks are just flat surfaces with legs and an adjustment mechanism—you often see photos of the desks looking quite bare, with just a computer on them. But as a professional organizer, I usually work with people who are not such minimalists; they have cords to deal (because not all equipment is wireless) with along with pens, pencils and such.

Some sit/stand desks do come with tools to help keep things organized. NextDesk has an optional under-the-desk vanity cover, where cables are fed through the grommets into a raceway to keep them hidden from view. (The user can choose to have up to three grommets.) This design will look especially nice for users who place their desks looking out at the room, rather than facing the wall.

There's also an optional power management system that can be mounted to the bottom of the work surface, with 12 surge-protected outlets.

Ergo Depot takes a different tack with its private label Jarvis desk. The purchaser can get up to three wire management grommets, but there's no company-specific cable tray.

Instead, Ergo Depot offers the NeatLinks cable management system from Humanscale as an option when the desk is purchased. It's not as elegant looking as the NextDesk, but it still does the job of controlling the cables. For consumers who aren't going to want to research all the possible cable management systems themselves, this offering will be welcome. 

The Jarvis desk also has an optional swivel pencil tray, which allows the worker to keep a few critical supplies close at hand, without cluttering up the desktop (or tempting kids and cats to knock things off). However, if the worker needs a keyboard tray for ergonomic reasons, a tray like this (or a drawer) might get in the way, depending on where it was positioned and the size of all the components.

Anthro forgoes grommets on its Elevate II desk, but includes a cable tray as part of the basic package. Some users will be perfectly satisfied with this simpler design. 

The Holmris U Desk has an integrated drawer, providing more storage than than a simple pencil tray. With no dividers built in, the space is more flexible than the Jarvis pencil tray—but small things may be harder to find.

Most workers at sit/stand desks who want a lot of storage at their fingertips will get a separate pedestal storage unit to go under or beside the desk. But Bold Furniture provides another option: a double-pedestal height-adjustable desk, designed by Joey Ruiter. Each side can have one, two or four drawers. The desktop, base, drawers and modesty panel all have a range of color options. 

Another way to provide storage for those working at sit/stand desks is to use wall panels with organizing modules, as Lista Office does. However, since the worker would need to reach across the desk to get to these panels, which might be awkward (especially if there was a computer in the way), this seems like a less desirable option than simply providing drawers. However, it does provide visible storage for those who work best when things are out in the open.

The UpWrite desk is a bit of an outlier here, since it doesn't provide cable control or other storage. But it does provide a whiteboard, which many people find useful for anything from reminders and to-do lists to brainstorming notes. 

23-Year-Old Student Proves Earth is Surrounded by Freaky Plasma Rings

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Cleo Loi is only 23 years old, but the University of Sydney student of astrophysics--undergrad, even—has just proven something that scientists couldn't for the past 60 years.

The theory was that there might be enormous bodies of plasma moving about Earth in a series of rings aligned with our magnetic poles, though none could prove it. 

Ms. Loi, however, had the ingenious idea of splitting the actions of a radio telescope array in half. By using the left half to look slightly to the right, and the right half to look slightly to the left, she was able to essentially mimic the triangulation that human eyes use to determine depth and see in three dimensions. The result: She and her research team found the plasma rings.

"The structures are strikingly organized, appearing as regularly spaced, alternating tubes of overdensities and underdensities strongly aligned with the Earth's magnetic field," reads the abstract from her team's paper, "Real-time imaging of density ducts between the plasmasphere and ionosphere."

Since the research took place in Australia rather than America, I'm guessing the plasma rings will not be harnessed into a devastating superweapon that will turn our planet into a powerful Death Star. Instead it seems, according to Australia's News.com, that the implications are more scientific than martial:

Ms Loi said the drifting plasma tubes could distort astronomical data, especially satellite-based navigation systems. It may also mean we need to re-evaluate our thinking about how galaxies, stars and clouds of gas behave and what they look like.

Here's a video that explains how Ms. Loi made her discovery:

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