After speaking at the Pioneers Festival we had the good fortune of catching up with Ethan Imboden— vibrator visionary of JimmyJane infamy and now design guru to Bay-Area start-ups and Silicon Valley innovation labs—about the complicated, yet invaluable relationship between design and entrepreneurship.

Ethan's got a colorful past, befitting of a design agitator. He started his career in engineering. Finding himself in a top job working on software and hardware for the Human Genome Project however, he couldn't help but feel oddly uninspired. It was on a soul-searching journey through Europe that Ethan first began to wonder whether his heart might belong to Industrial Design—a designer from the Domus Academy in Milan having described the practice in a way that sounded exactly like what he had hoped engineering would've been.

Returning to New York with new direction, Ethan cut his design teeth at the likes of ECCO Design before making the move West to San Francisco to join frog, the company he would later return to as VP, following further adventures of a more entrepreneurial kind.

Like many an existential would be designer-founder, Ethan left frog and the world of consultancy with the desire to use his design skillset to really make some impact. Before long, he'd set his sights on design-led disruption of the then homogeneously seedy sex-toy market—an industry that had been defined by taboo for far too long, especially, Ethan points out, with the very real relationship between pleasure (sexual or otherwise) and health and wellbeing. With early mover advantage (Ethan reckons only Tom Dixon had made some efforts to redesign and premiumize vibrators slightly before him) JimmyJane, the company that he founded, gradually grew into one of the most cited design-led success stories of this century.

FORM 3 is the second launch of PLEASURE TO THE PEOPLE, a groundbreaking series of waterproof, rechargeable vibrators designed by friends and creative conspirators Yves Béhar and Ethan Imboden

Stepping back from the world of sensual silicone in 2013 following a buyout, Ethan took on the role of VP for Venture Design at frog to help start-ups and businesses exploring uncharted territory to leverage design—perhaps again acting out of a burning desire to translate his skills (and now decade long experience in business) into massive impact.

We shot the wind with Ethan in a conversation that wound over all facets of design within business and new ventures—cut short only by the demands of a packed PR tour schedule. Looking back over our scribbled notes, we're able to summarize Ethan's insights and advice for design-entrepreneurs in six hard-hitting home truths:

1. Check Your Hubris

Coming out the back of design school indoctrination, most of us are imbued with the inflated-ego and over-confidence that only years of protection from the challenges and limitations of the real world provide. "Your skills are right," for successful entrepreneurialism Ethan says "but your instincts are probably not." Whilst confidence and a can-do attitude are of course invaluable, dismissing the knowledge of non-designers and acting out of unwarranted entitlement won't make you many friends and won't get you very far in business. Check your design hubris at the door.

2. Beware the Designer Back-Slapping

The dynamics of design school also has the remarkable ability of convincing its students that the approval of classmates, peers and design award panels is of the utmost importance—a belief that plagues a lot of us like an internal design critic for the rest of our sorry little lives. An over-eagerness to constantly celebrate the accomplishments of 'design' also, Ethan posits, gives the profession an innovation bias towards the new and novel which limits its usefulness. "Don't judge yourself by the standards of design," suggests Ethan. "You've got to think beyond design," if you really want to make a difference by getting your products out into the marketplace. Market success and making the change you want to see in world may just trump any trophy (with the exception of a Core77 Design Award obviously).

3. Smell More Plastic

You can't ever really understand industrial design until you've been out there specifying plastic components and watching them churn out a factory line in China. "You need to smell more plastic," Ethan recalls ECCO Design principal Eric Chan saying to him in his days as a junior. Only then can you understand the realities of machine manufacture—the slight differences between each supposedly 'identical' object for example. If you're serious about getting your own industrially produced and revolutionary new products out into the real world, you have to prioritize this kind of experience on the front-line.

4. Design Serves Business

...and not the other way around. Design school and designer hero worship can often have us believing that the designer's role in business is to barge in at the top, rip up the rule book and start afresh with a bold new vision. Whilst design-led disruption can of course bring many benefits, Ethan points out that it's the business you're trying to make succeed, not the design. "You have to understand that every line that you draw has cascading consequences for the rest of the business," Ethan tells us, vigorously gesticulating the tumbling down a waterfall, clearly speaking from experience. "If you're great new design breaks a huge deal your sales team just made, is it great design?" We're taught in design school to skillfully balance ever-increasing demands of ergonomics, aesthetics, materiality, manufacture etc. but when designers enter the world of business, this curiosity, empathy and mental agility can all to often seem to cease. It's only by extending our understanding—to take the needs of the various arms of business as just another design limitation or specification—that we can really hope to have dramatic impact.

Whilst this may sound like an unglamorous and subservient understanding of design, Ethan suggests that this could be the strongest case for design's representation in the boardroom. The more the design function can take on the helicopter view for the entire organization, the better it can function in producing products that help the business to thrive. If design is going to be tasked with taking these various business factors into consideration, it surely follows that design should be privy to all the information at the top and have a stake in the crucial decisions made at the highest levels.

5. Fast, Cheap AND Good

You've probably heard the smug old adage that designers love to roll out when they're backs are up against the wall—fast, cheap, good; pick 2. Ethan rejects this trinity denial as lazy, pointing to design entrepreneurs as proof that you can have all three. "When you're starting-up, everything is a balance...it's got to be fast, it's got to be cheap...your job is to figure out how good it can be and what is good enough." Among the many other shortcomings of designers, Ethan points out, he reserves a particular distaste for esoteric design perfectionism. "When you're in start-up mode, every day and every design decision is about survival. If you're wasting time trying to figure out if you're hitting Dieter Rams' Ten Principles of Whatever, then you're business is going to die and your product goes with it." Ethan suggests that successful design-entrepreneurs are channeling their OCD into new definitions of perfection—encompassing, for example, just keeping the whole damn ship afloat.

6. Design the Impact, Not the Product

Ethan's disdain for design perfectionistas and self-referentialism is fueled by a desire to use design to make real change. Clearly Ethan's entrepreneurial success was as a result of spotting an opportunity to change the world for the better (breaking down the taboos holding back the pursuit of pleasure in this case) and not an idea for a great new product (they came later). Ethan's advice for where aspiring designer-founders should start? "Forget about products. Start with the impact you want to make and design from there."

Cheers Ethan!

After graduating design school and finding work as a CAD jockey, I donated all of my studio materials to a young design student who needed them. Berol Prismacolors, Koh-i-Noor Rapidographs, circle and ellipse templates, French curves, you name it. I never missed any of that stuff, except one object I really regret giving away: My Panasonic pencil sharpener from the '80s. Lately I've been using more old-school pencils in my shop and could really use the thing.

The Panasonic was made in Japan and looked like this:

It had more metal than plastic inside it and was heavy. That, combined with its four rubber suction-cup feet, prevented the machine from moving backwards while you pushed a pencil into it. The motor ran strong and the shavings dish was a good size.

Electric pencil sharpeners come in one of roughly three form factors. The first has narrow frontage and a deep body, shaped like a Manhattan store.

The second is shallow in depth but wide.

The third type takes the pencil from the top.

I prefer the first type of form factor so that I can place the thing on a shelf in my shop and not have it take up a lot of side-to-side room.

I went online to see if Panasonic still makes it, and of course they do not. On Amazon I found a model with a similar form factor, this Chinese-made X-Acto model:

The reviews are horrific: "Stopped working within a month," "Often sticks, overheats," "Stalled the motor on the first pencil," et cetera. Here's the most damning one:

This "sharpener" won't sharpen. When you try to use it, the pencil tip comes out slightly lopsided, with the lead covered with wood on one side all the way to the tip -- wood beyond the farthest reach of the lead. Result: the wood-tipped pencil won't write, won't even deposit a mark on the paper….

The cause of the problem seems to be [that] the X-Acto 1818, with its single cutter, doesn't seem to hold the pencil at the correct angle….

I suspect that this model requires precision assembly, so that the cutter is installed at the perfect angle. Since other reviews suggest that this model sometimes works, my conclusion is that buying this model is a gamble…. You may get a properly assembled one that works, and you may get one that doesn't.

Yes, we now live in a time where even something as basic as an electric pencil sharpener cannot be relied upon. And companies will keep producing garbage like this as long as we keep buying it. There's no pride of design in the X-Acto model and there certainly isn't any pride of craftsmanship.

In the video below, a repairperson opens up a vintage Panasonic model similar to the one I owned, alongside a newer X-Acto model similar to the one above. You can see the inferior built quality of the X-Acto and most damningly, how poorly and weakly it performs. The lighter weight also means that the X-Acto slides backwards across the table as you push the pencil into it.

The X-Acto is priced around $17, because we Americans are suckers for stuff that costs less than $20. I've heard that below that price point, most people won't go to the trouble of attempting to return something that fails.

I just spent $30 on eBay to order a vintage Panasonic like the one I owned. I'd rather support some guy in Oregon than a factory that produces junk.

While every entry proved their merit in one capacity or another, some honorees distinguished themselves further due to the ineffable 'wow' factor. These were projects that, through cleverness, beautiful design, remarkable functionality or some other exceptional quality, immediately caught the viewer's eye and lingered there. These are a few of our eye-popping entries.

Merge—Transportation Professional Winner

Merge packs a lot of utilities into its slender frame. For example, a retractable rear rack and integrated bungee cord can be used to carry different loads. 

The front of the bike has integrated lighting which can even be seen from the side through a laser-cut pattern in the side, an important safety feature for night riders.

Merge—designed by Pensa and Horse Cycles—is a remarkably sleek bicycle design intended for the urban environment. The modern frame packs in a host of integrated functions, including front and rear lighting, a USB charging port, a retractable rack and U-lock holster. "In listing all these features of the design, in the end we are most proud of the overall simplicity with which they are presented," explain the designers."They are right there at the rider's fingertips when needed, but never in the way when squeezing through the tight spaces, or carrying the bike up the narrow stairs of a fifth-floor walk-up. Merge transforms at a moment's notice, and allows you to truly ride your way." Our judges completely agreed. "What really caught my attention was everything just being so well integrated into a stylish, sporty type of bike. It's a no compromise solution: It looks great and it has all this utility at the same time," notes jury member Eric Stoddard. 

Jibo—Consumer Products Professional Winner

JIBO is the first ever social robot for the home. Designed with the elderly and children in mind, the unique companion is set apart by its friendly and expressive design. 

"The solution for Jibo was a seamless approach which sectioned the main head/body into cylindrical elements connected by a motor-controlled tilted axis rotation. This allowed Jibo to appear clean and non-mechanical while enabling a virtually silent movement, able to snap into a variety of thoughtful poses with precision and sophistication," explain the designers. 

Jibo is a new image for robotics: a friendly, expressive and emotionally connected companion for the home. Measuring only 11 inches tall, Jibo is completely equipped to become an integral part of the home with its sophisticated voice interaction, expressive UI, and physical movement of human-like poses and expressiveness. Our judges were unanimously impressed by the unique personality portrayed by Jibo in an unsurpassed social user experience. "This is the intersection of technology and hardware, creating a beautiful object but also a beautiful experience," said jury Co-Captian Anh Hguyen. 

Bulb LMP—Furniture & Lighting Student Runner-Up, Consumer Products Student Notable

Unlike other bulbs, LEDs do no need specific glass coverings. So designer Renaud Defrancesco (a recent graduate from ECAL) reimagined the common lampshade by drawing unique silhouettes made of glass which essentially become the lamp itself. "This bulb is not only a source of light anymore but it creates a source of atmosphere," he explains. 

"The bulb base is electronic and is directly incorporated into the glass. LEDs have proven to be much more economic in power and have much greater longevity. In addition, the choice of glass is to reduce the number of plastic components and is easier to recycle," explains Defrancesco. 

The Bulb LMP redefines an old technology by creating a bulb that doubles as a pendant lamp. Made of pressed glass and available in many shapes, the clean lines of the bulb/lamp elevate the potentials of LED technology. "Somehow LED lighting has failed to deliver a shade with an identity and yet the long life of the lighting source makes this a worthy element to build a valued housing for. This proposition adds value to a very mechanical solution," explained the jury. 

OpenKnit—Open Design Student Runner-Up

Using the OpenKnit software and printer, users can have a new piece of bespoke clothing—from raw material to finished form—in just an hour. 

At its core, the mission of OpenKnit seeks to revise our production processes. "Production entails long and precise processes before those goods reach our hands, many of which are pervasive in our daily life, and frequently in intimate contact with us, such as textiles," explains designer Gerard Rubio. "In such a context the market price we pay for goods has not absorbed the externalities created, thus we end up paying far less for them than the real impact they have in society and the environment."

Proposing an alternative model to outsourced mass fabrication, OpenKnit is an open-source, low cost, digital fabrication tool that allows users to create bespoke clothing from digital files. As our jury remarked, this innovative idea has the potential to open up small scale manufacturing while opening the doors to a new kind of attitude toward creativity and responsibility. "I love to see this kind of commercialization, said jury member Mark Hatch. "It's accessible to a typical retail type of customer and it's open source so you can build it yourself which is very cool. The ability to design and knit your own sweater in an hour is pretty cool." 

P I G E O N—Transportation Student Runner-Up

"Pigeon is composed of only three essential parts: a desk, handlebar and rotating/closing unit," explains designer Ignas Survila. "My task was to improve a scooter eliminating some shortcomings, to brainstorm the whole consumer and servicing system, to arouse a new interest of consumers in a kick scooter as a mode of leisure and lifestyle, and to make it more consumer-friendly and not complicated in use."

With it's simple functionality and bright color, Pigeon tries to transform the hurried commute into a positive experience. 

The product of methodical thinking, Pigeon is possibly the most user-friendly kick scooter yet. "My task was to improve a scooter eliminating some shortcomings, to brainstorm the whole consumer and servicing system, to arouse a new interest of consumers in a kick scooter as a mode of leisure and lifestyle, and to make it more consumer-friendly and not complicated in use," explains Survila. "This one I really fell in love with. The styling, it's very endearing, friendly and confident. It's a new twist on a very familiar segment, explained jury member Eric Stoddard. "I have a lot of respect for the students who actually went all the way to prototype and went through the exercise of solving all the problems that you find when you actually try to build something."

Room on the Roof—Built Environment Professional Winner

Room On The Roof is located in a small tower in Amsterdam the historic center of the city that has been converted into a cultural haven. As part of a program defined by the Rijksmuseum and de Bijenkorf, it functions as a studio space for artists of all disciplines.

The room affords panoramic views of Amsterdam's Dam Square. 

Designed by i29 interior architects, Room On The Roof is an installation meant to inspire the artists that inhabit it, using the scalar shifts of the Alice in Wonderland universe as inspiration. The space is split in two halves (or worlds): one side contains a vertical installation of wooden volumes—with a desk, daybed, pantry and storage— from floor to ceiling, while the other side is a fully white space. In the wooden half, "the functions have been stacked on top of each other as a kind of 'living cabinet' in order to experience the tower on different levels, which can be accessed via small ladders," explain the architects. "Each level gives a new perspective and view to the outside world. All accessories like a telescope, armchair and lamps, are just like the space itself all white to make a contrast with the wooden volume. The monumental spiral stairs leading to the cupola has been restored and adds to the fairytale-like atmosphere."

People often say "There's more than one way to skin a cat," but no one ever talks about how many ways there are to scale a fish. And in general, when there's a lot of different ways to do something, in means no one's designed the perfect tool for it yet. So there's an opportunity for you, the upstart industrial designer, to think of something better to make this messy and time-consuming process easier.

First off, here's how your mother scaled fish in the sink when you were growing up:

Or if you were raised by a sushi chef father, here's how he did it:

Obviously both of those methods are way too time-consuming. Let's look at the various contraptions people have come up with to speed the process.

Charles Jones invented this bottlecap-based scaler:

Fishermen use this stainless steel device:

Then we get into the power tools. This one's called a "bear paw," and it's wielded by a guy who makes very creepy noises while he uses it:

Here's an electric fish scaler with a guard. The guard is transparent, presumably so you can see through it. But after two seconds it becomes clogged with scales, rendering it opaque:

This guy uses a drill attachment and a bucket filled with water. This is the type of thing that sounds like a great idea, but then you actually do it and realize it ain't:

And here are the automatic methods. A guy named Tom rigged up a drum with sharp puncture marks on the inside:

Floridian Clint White invented this drum-style fish scaler that has the added bonus of being fairly transparent:

Both Tom and Clint's methods are pretty messy and use up a lot of running water. This guy below has what I think is the better design, as he's rigged up a drum to revolve within a tub of water. This keeps it a bit cleaner and uses less water:

So, there we have ten solutions, spanning manual/powered/automatic. None of them seem like Shark Tank material to me. Can one of you do better?

Who the Tools are Aimed at

Here we'll get a chance to look at Festool's design process. It makes the most sense when you understand whom they're designing for. "Our main target are professional users of tools," says Christian Oltzscher, Festool CEO. "In the U.S., we had a reputation for a while that [wealthy hobbyists] are buying Festool. But that's far from our goal. Everything that goes into a tool keeps the professional user in mind. If the home hobbyist is buying our tool, that's great, but that's not exactly who we're developing the tools for."

"We know who our customers are," says Steve Rangoussis, Festool USA's Chief of Sales and Marketing. "Cabinet shops, installers, finish carpenters who need dust collection and need to be precise. Remodelers, specifically ones that are working inside a home and also need dust collection. Furniture builders, but not just any furniture builder: Heirloom furniture builders. People that want furniture to stand the test of time."

Research in the Field

Which brings us to the question of how the company decides what to make. "[We maintain a] continual exchange with tradesmen," says Barbara Austel, Festool Company Partner and granddaughter of company founder Gottlieb Stoll. "Starting with carpenters, joiners and woodworkers, then painters and varnishers, through to tradesmen in specialist industrial operations, such as manufacturing mobile homes and yachts." By observing their processes, the company locates gaps in efficiency and turns their attention towards solving that specific problem.

Wolfgang Reines is one of the Festool employees that conducts research at end users' shops. The environment is not unfamiliar to him: Reines was trained as a carpenter. But once he's back in a tradesperson's shop, "I immediately switch to my role as a product manager," he explains, "where I have to analyse every working situation, every process and even every individual action from a very different perspective.

"I then arrange a meeting with the cabinetmaker to discover more about the processes in the workshop. Or hold discussions with staff to gather valuable information on how to achieve the desired result more quickly. I also try to obtain ideas that could help achieve an overall better working result."

Armed with these insights, product development can begin. As we saw in the Domino article, this sometimes requires inventing an entirely new category of tool, a new way of doing things. The Domino was a success because it greatly improved a common operation with a new method, achieving results in a way people hadn't conceived of prior to the tool's introduction.

Festool's newest tool, the Conturo, is different in that it's far more sophisticated. On the surface, it may seem to do something you've seen before in a tool. But the attention to design and engineering make it radically different to use than what came before.

The Design Process

Festool's product development process is "all about the details, the ergonomics," says Oltzscher. "[Our developers] think about, 'How does a customer work with the tool? How does it feel? How does it feel when you work for eight hours straight with this tool?' There's a lot of testing."

From initial concept to finished design typically takes Festool four years. You could actually say the Conturo took about six, as there were two years of research capped with a reboot on the project's front end.

The Conturo project started with Festool spotting an efficiency gap, an area for which shops did not yet have a good standardized solution. "Our potential customers are totally used to perfect processes," says Robertine Koch, Festool Communication Manager, "and they are used to the combination of stationary machines with handheld ones; for all applications they can't solve with a stationary machine, they use a handheld one." She rattles off the examples of tablesaws and circular saws, sanding machines and palm sanders, router tables and trim routers. But there was one operation where they found this equation was incomplete.

The gap they spotted had to do with edge banding, where there was an established tradition of stationary machines, but no satisfactory handheld solution. High-end cabinet shops have enormous stationary edge banding machines, like this one:

This six-figure beast is made to handle full-sized sheets and will band the edge and trim it flush all day long. Cabinet shops doing production work find the machine a worthwhile investment. The problem is that it can't do curves, rounded corners or bevels. And it sure can't be transported to the jobsite.

To solve that problem, another company had previously invented a handheld edge banding machine. It was being sold on the market, and it wasn't very good. Here's what that machine looked like:

That's not a prototype, that's another manufacturer's actual production model.

In 2008, Festool commissioned two engineering students from Stuttgart's Fachschule für Holztechnik ("School of Wood Technology") to research edge banding possibilities and see how the machine you see above performed.

Their assessment wasn't positive. The machine was clunky to use, ergonomically lacking, messy, and dangerous. The user needed to pour glue pellets into a hopper that melted it down. Figuring out how much glue you needed to insert in order to edge band a particular length was pure guesswork. You'd thus need to err on the side of too much, and keep the hopper full; but left in the hopper too long, the extra melted glue started turning a darker shade, which showed up on the edge banding. The weight balance wasn't optimal, and the hot surfaces of the machine could burn the user's hand. (And while this may or may not have been in their report, as you can see, the machine isn't exactly attractive or professional-looking.)

Armed with this research, Festool then commissioned an outside engineer to produce a "constructional concept" based on this machine. Festool wanted to see if they could work with the existing technology to produce a better variant.

They couldn't. By 2010, the development team realized "that this was not the way to go," says Festool industrial designer Timo Kuhls. They couldn't achieve the desired user experience and the desired results with the existing technology. They were going to have to come up with their own solution and something that hadn't been done before.

Four long years later, project leader Reines, his team of engineers, and his sole industrial designer (stay tuned for a Q&A with him) had pulled it off.

The Finished Design

In a conference room on the top floor of Festool HQ, the half-dozen prototypes leading to the final Conturo are laid out on tables for us journalists to see.

Industrial designer Timo Kuhls (left), Product Manager and Conturo lead developer Wolfgang Reines (right)

Starting at the far right is a buck made from plywood, styrofoam and plastic, with crude handles attached; this was mocked up at the beginning of the process, prior to the development of the machine's guts, to set the guidelines for what the machine should feel like ergonomically.

Left, Timo Kuhls. Right, Wolfgang Reines

With the form roughly decided on, the next four years were filled with intensive engineering and "details, details, details," says Kuhl. There were technical challenges aplenty: In addition to removing the burn risk and keeping the machine's physical balance distributed, the team had to carefully consider how a user would operate the machine, and what kinds of feedback they'd need. Thus a display screen was added, the first to appear on a Festool product:

When you turn the machine on, the screen is red, and the internal glue-melting heater turns on. When it's ready to go, the screen turns green. It tells you the temperature setting—the user can choose between two, depending on the glue used—and displays exactly how many more feet (or meters) of edge banding you can apply, based on the amount of glue you've got in the machine. It's also smart: It recalculates that amount if you change the height of your banding (which thus alters the surface area equation).

The glue itself has gotten the ergonomic treatment. Placing a puck into the machine is easier than pouring pellets into a hopper.

The glue-melting heater is thermally isolated to protect the user from burns. And it only melts the glue required, rather than melting up a hopper's worth. The melted glue is then precisely applied by nozzles in thin, perfectly-distributed strips.

The machine can of course do straight edges as well as curves both concave and convex. Intelligently, the developers have placed a speed-controlling trigger on the handle, so the user can speed or slow the feed rate of the banding (when navigating a curve, for instance).

They also ensured the machine could be used upside-down. In this manner it can be mounted in a table, or even at an angle to apply banding to beveled edges.

The Conturo is not designed to replace a $150,000 stationary edge banding machine, which does all of its operations in one; it is intended to complement it, doing what the larger machine cannot. Thus once applied, the edge banding must still be clipped at the ends (via a clipper they designed), trimmed flush (Festool prefers you use their trim router, naturally) and shaved (with a hand scraper they developed that features different radii).

However, it's possible that a smaller shop that can't afford the six-figure asking price for a stationary machine would conceivably use the Conturo alone. And for tradesmen edge banding on-site, it seems an obvious home run. The Conturo retails for $2,800 alone, or $3,200 with all of the accessories; the competing prototype-looking machine we showed you above is still on the market—for $3,500.

And it appears the company was correct in anticipating the demand. "Before, we were thinking 'Okay, how can we sell this product? It's going to be difficult to explain it,'" says Leonhard Zirkler, Festool's Business Development Manager. "So we were surprised by the success of this product—it sells easier than we expected. The reaction from the customers is enthusiastic, and since our European market launch, the word of mouth has been quite strong." Following its successful launch in Europe last year, the Conturo was imported to American shores earlier this year.

Zirkler understands that the marketing challenge with a tool as sophisticated as the Conturo is explaining all of its features without overwhelming the end user. For that reason, the company set up multiple demonstration events at dealerships where customers could try the machine in person to see how easy it is to use. (I tried the Conturo myself during the trip, with no experience in edge banding at all; I nailed it on the first try. The Conturo is incredibly easy to use, which I would not have gathered until I put my hands on it.)

"It's very important to bring the machine to the customer and to demonstrate this solution," Zirkler says. He presumably knows that when the target market gets their hands on one, they'll walk out of the store with one. 

"And most importantly here, we don't sell an edge bander. We sell a perfect edge. We sell a whole system. We solve the problem for the customer."

Next up, we talk to Festool's only industrial designer, and find out how he got the job!

It's enough to make a furniture designer despair: What if you can't design a truly ergonomic chair, because the people sitting in it have hopeless posture on a spinal level?

According to NPR, acupuncturist Esther Gokhale—who previously suffered from back pain—began traveling the world twenty years ago to visit cultures that don't have back pain. She traveled to remote regions of Africa and South America—"villages where every kid under age 4 was crying because they were frightened to see somebody with white skin — they'd never seen a white person before"—and noticed something: It wasn't just that their posture was different, it's that the very shape of their spines was different.

"S" on the left, "J" on the right

If you look at an American's spine from the side, or profile, it's shaped like the letter S. It curves at the top and then back again at the bottom.

But Gokhale didn't see those two big curves in people who don't have back pain. "That S shape is actually not natural," she says. "It's a J-shaped spine that you want."

In fact, if you look at drawings from Leonardo da Vinci — or a Gray's Anatomy book from 1901 — the spine isn't shaped like a sharp, curvy S. It's much flatter, all the way down the back. Then at the bottom, it curves to stick the buttocks out. So the spine looks more like the letter J.

"The J-shaped spine is what you see in Greek statues. It's what you see in young children. It's good design," Gokhale says.

If her theory is correct, it looks like eating crappy food, sitting on the couch watching Netflix, taking elevators, and driving to the end of the driveway to pick up the mail have taken their toll on our bodies.

Gokhale has thus devised The Gokhale Method, the name under which she teaches classes and gives free workshops to teach people a series of spine-correcting exercises. Doctors refer patients to her. Tech industry executives hire her (she's based in Palo Alto) for consultations. She's even designed a chair that will reportedly help rectify the problem. Take a look at this and tell us what you think:

Do you buy it? My kneejerk reaction is to assume that cultures that don't have back pain also don't have couches, Cadillacs and cookies in the numbers that we do. But I'm also open to the possibility that Gokhale is onto something that people have missed.

We tip our hats to the designers driven by the belief that altruism hasn't gone out of style! When others go after the shiny, new and stylish, these designers seek positive impact—whether social, cultural or environmental—in addition to strong aesthetic and functional results. Here are some of our most inspiring entries. 

Peterbilt's Walmart Advanced Vehicle Experience—Transportation Professional Runner-Up

"Keeping in mind that Walmart is primarily a single driver fleet, we knew that we could reduce the width of the front of the truck by moving the driver to the center of the vehicle. The unique powertrain technology and its reduced cooling requirements allow the frontal area for a radiator to be significantly reduced, together with the central driving position, create a revolutionary and aerodynamic design," explain the designers from Peterbilt Design Studio. 

A key goal of the project was optimizing conditions for the driver. The cockpit has a modular studio space and 180 degree canopy for a unique operating experience. "The driver position is amazing," remarked jury member Eric Stoddard. 

This new truck concept for Walmart might be the future of cargo transportation—it certainly looks the part." A clean power micro-turbine hybrid electric powertrain allows the flexibility of an all-new architecture, creating a paradigm shift away from the traditional trucks with a large engine and cooling system. This radically new design provides superior aerodynamic performance, while putting the driver in command at the center of the vehicle for improved safety and extreme visibility," state the designers from Peterbilt Design Studio. Though just a concept for now, the production version plans to use 100% recycled materials, including steel, aluminum, advanced composites and bio-based plastics. Additionally, the truck is powered by a turbine capable of running on a wide range of fuels, from clean burning bio-diesel to propane. "The focus on aerodynamics and great savings, translating to better fuel efficiency, is what really interested us," remarked jury Captain James Thomas. 

Eve—Furniture & Lighting Student Notable

The Eve faucet sets itself apart with a function allowing users to track water consumption based on target goals defined by each individual. 

In addition to the display, the faucet can also link to digital platforms allowing users to set alerts, daily goals, and comprehensive statistics of use over time. 

Yes, we all know to turn the water off while brushing our teeth, but too often that gets forgotten in the moment. Rebecca Daum, designer of the Eve faucet, thinks this might be a result of our intangible relationship to water." The water out of the faucet seems to be an infinite resource. We turn it on, it flows in a constant stream until we turn it off. We don't get a feeling for the amount we have used. We get in contact with it for a moment and then it has already disappeared in the drain," she notes.  Her simple design engages with this vital problem by creating a very friendly, unobtrusive interface to remind users how much water they have consumed and encourage better habits. "The water crisis is arguably the number one global risk, based on the impact to society," explained our jury. "One in nine people around the world don't have access to clean water. The Eve tap implores us to be more conscious users of a surprisingly scarce resource."

Give Me Shelter—Open Design Student Notable

"The goal was to create a design that is easy to make and assemble, functional, and expresses the care these groups have for the cats they care for," explains designer Chris Peterson. 

"The shelters need a strong support structure and weight to make them rugged and keep them from blowing away in the wind. Therefore, it was determined that plywood would make a great structure material as it can be made waterproof and is very easy to cut. With these two materials in hand the design began to take shape. Because the shelter needed to be easy to assemble it was designed so that the plywood could be inserted into the plastic in a way that allowed each material to support the other. This allowed the feet and ears to take shape eventually leading to a design that looks a bit like a cat."

Taking care of feral cats is an often hidden aspect of society, undertaken by dedicated people who use their own time and money while receiving little in return. Designer Chris Peterson came up with a simple solution for this problem area after becoming a feral cat caretaker himself and discovering the plights of this micro-community. He determined that the greatest benefit in tackling this issue would be a simple way for caretakers to provide shelters for cats in the winter time. and devised a solution based on the tenets of the open-source maker community. "Through this project, caregivers can use simple designs and off-the-shelf materials to create purpose-built and attractive shelters for less than any shelter they currently create," he explains. "The plans are open to the public and freely available to use as is or adapt as desired." The plans are available on corokitty.com, a destination which has become a reference point for feral cat caretakers worldwide. 

GRAYL-The Water Filtration Cup—Consumer Products Professional Notable

The GRAYL filtration cup works like a French Press to easily and quickly filter drinking water, no matter where you are. 

The system has interchangeable filters for varying levels of protection. "The TAP removes many chemicals and heavy metals, TRAIL adds protection from bacteria and protozoan cysts, and the TRAVEL provides the ultimate defense against viruses while traveling in developing countries or highly impacted wilderness areas," explain the designers. 

GRAYL is inspired by CEO and Founder Nancie Weston's concerns about plastic pollution and water quality. "Far too many people do not have access to safe drinking water, and those of us that do rarely have truly clean drinking water. GRAYL is on a mission to change the way the world drinks water," explains the team. To achieve this lofty goal, the designers developed an easy to use, fill-press-drink system that works much like a French press. For added versatility, the system comes with interchangeable filters of different strengths for different situations. Made of stainless steel instead of leaky plastic, the filtration cup has the potential to really address a global issue. "In the USA alone, the demand for bottled water alone is staggering. Bottled/packaged water retail sales in the United States has reached $22 billion. This amounts to 50 billion plastic bottles annually, which have less than a 20% estimated recycle rate. Plastic bottles take 700-1000 years to decompose and each 16 oz. water bottle requires 4 oz. of oil to manufacture, transport and refrigerate," note the designers. 

LINDO Smart Vehicle—Transportation Student Winner

The Lindo is designed as a highly efficient and sustainable public transportation model. To this end, its' battery and motor system is a key design feature. "Consisting of two in-hub motors the vehicles' computer analyses the driving conditions and is able to turn the motors off when they do not need to be used," explains designer Kyle Armstrong, "when one motor is not in use the momentum of the tires charges the batteries."

A central component of the project is empowering users with a simple to use application. "The user is able to order a service to pick them up from their current location via their smartphone and choose their destination to plan out their trip whilst also tracking and monitoring their current usage from the vehicle," explains Armstrong. 

Based on the Piaggio Tuk Tuk vehicle, the LINDO Smart Vehicle is a 3-wheeled, electric vehicle designed to create a smarter alternative for Melbourne's public transport system. "How can we create a vehicle that is efficient but also somewhat self-sustaining and unobtrusive to the user," asks designer Kyle Armstrong. The resulting design is surprisingly lightweight due to its carbon fibre chassis and titanium frame, and very efficiently equipped with 6 lithium ion battery cells that are capable of charging at one quarter the time of conventional battery systems. "I love the completeness of the design, everything's been thought through. From the app, to every detail on the vehicle- the lights, the handlebars, the gauges, the vents, the power train. All of it's been thought through and designed. So it's a very complete solution," said jury member Eric Stoddard. 

Many people I work with as a professional organizer are very visual; they tend to forget about things that aren't out on display. When it comes to jewelry, they are willing to have it get a bit dusty and to assume some added risk of theft if it means they can have most of their daily wear jewelry visible.

One of the common design decisions for jewelry organizers is whether to focus on a single type of jewelry or to create a more multi-purpose product. Another decision involves the size; a larger product accommodates more jewelry but also takes up more room. GLAMboxes has wisely made its multi-prong ring holders in two configurations, a long rectangle and a square, to fit differing space restrictions.

In a similar vein, Dale Randles makes his  branch wood ring holders in different configurations, with a single prong or multiple prongs, to accommodate ring collections of various sizes.

The Champlain ring holder from Simon Pearce is a bit of a multi-purpose product. While it's primarily a ring holder, the bowl could hold some earrings, a small bracelet, a watch, etc. This might work well for someone who wears a limited number of pieces frequently.

The Belle jewelry box from Skultuna, designed by Claesson Koivisto Rune, also provides ring storage and a bit more. In this case, the ring holder is actually the handle for a small jewelry box. While the rings are visible, the items in the box are hidden from view, so this won't be the right design for all of those who are visually oriented. However, if the items inside are always worn with the rings, it just might work.  

These two lovely earring/jewelry holders (from Barbpots and Misfit Dynamo) illustrate another design trade-off; the one on the left is an inch taller than the one on the right. A taller product will provide a nicer display for long dangling earrings, and it will hold more in the center. However, it will also be harder to see and to reach those items stored in the center.

The triple multi-bowl earring trees from Barclay Fine Woodworking provide shallow bowls at various heights, making all the jewelry easy to see. Besides holding rings or other pieces of jewelry, the bowls could also hold post earrings since the bowls are shallow enough to keep even small earrings visible.

When it comes to bracelet or bangle organizers, almost all the designs are along the lines of this one from The Woodshop's Daughter, with a varying number of tiers.

The bracelet stand becomes a multipurpose jewelry organizer when a ring peg is added on. 

The same basic design can be turned into a necklace, bracelet and earring organizer (for earrings with wires) by adjusting the height and position of the dowel tiers, and adding some holes for the earring wires.

While almost all bracelet stands have a horizontal orientation, the GLAMrod bracelet stand goes vertical. It seems as though it would be harder to use—getting to the bottom bracelet would be a pain—but it does take up less space.

While it can work well to simply hang necklaces (especially heavy ones) over a dowel, the Stag Jewelry Stand from GioGio Design seems well suited for delicate necklaces on chains. It's made from two pieces of bamboo that slot together. 

Until now, I've been focusing on jewelry organizers that would go on a nightstand, bureau, etc. But it's also worth looking at wall-mounted jewelry organizers. Many of these are basically just hooks or peg rods used to hang bracelets or necklaces, or netting used to hang earrings—but there are some interesting design, too.

The Earring Angel from Angelynn's makes it simple to hang stud earrings or any earrings with posts—and it's fine for those with wires, too. With many earring racks, the post has to go through a tiny hole, and then the backing gets put into place. With the Earring Angel, the post (with the backing already attached) just goes through the keyhole and slides down into the slot. 

The Izzy Jewel Box allows the wearer to keep jewelry visible and still keep it dust-free. There are multiple sizes and configurations. Those pegs and earring strips are permanently installed, though, so there's no way to adjust the configuration.

Jan's Jewelry Organizer was designed with versatility in mind. It's basically a pegboard for jewelry. Each of the hooks and earring strips can be moved around as needed (or not used at all). The organizer can be hung vertically or horizontally. 

Airlines excel at making the travel experience unpleasant, but lately they've slowed down on innovating with ways to make it even worse. Thankfully, the International Air Transportation Authority is stepping in to help.

The central problem is that airlines have stuffed more seats onto planes, meaning there's not enough room in overhead bins for everyone's bags, so an estimated 20% of passengers are forced to check their carry-ons. But this only inconveniences 1 out of 5 passengers; isn't there some way to increase this percentage, and hassle everyone flying coach?

Turns out there is! The IATA's new initiative suggests shrinking the maximum size of carry-on luggage. Currently, many airlines have set the max at 22 x 14 x 9; the new guidelines are recommending 21.5 x 13.5 x 7.5. That's a reduction of 21% by volume.

Even better, "IATA is working with baggage tracking solutions provider Okoban to manage the approval process of bag manufacturers" to design newly-sized bags that we would all have to buy. These bags would all be stamped with a classy "IATA Cabin OK" logo that they've already developed. Under the proposal, if your bag doesn't have the logo, you ain't bringing it on board.

This is the actual resolution of the photo of the new logo in the press release

Best of all, it makes our current carry-on bags worthless, and we get to put them in landfill, in addition to stimulating the economy of luggage makers by buying new ones!

I know it all sounds like a dream, but the IATA press release seems optimistic the guidelines will be implemented:

A number of major international airlines have signaled their interest to join the initiative and will soon be introducing the guidelines into their operations….

Several major baggage manufacturers have developed products in line with the optimum size guidelines, and it is expected bags carrying the identifying label will start to reach retail shops later this year.

During the Conturo presentation at Festool HQ, product manager Wolfgang Reines led the talk. Assisting with the presentation was Timo Kuhls, who is not only a Festool industrial designer—he's Festool's only in-house industrial designer!

Timo Kuhls (left)

We got to have a brief chat with Kuhls, who's quick to defer credit to both Roland Schirrmmacher (the consultant who has been doing Festool ID for 30 years) and Festool's crack engineering staff. We also got to hear the story of how Kuhls' tongue-in-cheek industrial design Masters thesis landed him the gig a lot of designers would kill for. Those shots are shown at the bottom—and the crazy thing is, he made functioning prototypes!

Core77: During the presentation, it sounded like the interpreter said you are the only industrial designer.

Timo Kuhls: I am the only internal industrial designer.

How is that possible, that Festool only has one designer?

I thought the same thing when I came here in 2008! But there is an external designer, Mr. Roland Schirrmacher. He is based in Landsberg, Bavaria and he's been designing the products for the last thirty years; I was just the first one coming internally. Mr. Schirrmacher has quite a lot of expertise and experience coming with him.

Is Mr. Schirrmacher still active, or have you assumed his role?

He is still working for us. Since I joined Festool in 2008 after finishing my Master's degree (Master of European Design, MEDes), we work on our products individually and distribute the upcoming projects according to our capacities—I'd say roughly fifty-fifty.

Is there any collaboration?

We do need to collaborate in order to make those products seem the same, you know? To make it look like a Festool. I think it's very important to have those guidelines, this very distinctive design language of Festool. As long as you've incorporated that, you can go on working.

I thought the ID department would be like, twenty people, based on the quality of the work.

Thank you very much. But I think much of it comes from working together with the engineers, you know?

[Joking] And is there only one engineer?

No, no, no! There are something like forty engineers.

And how did the design process, the collaboration between design and engineering, go for the Conturo?

How can I say it—as we are focusing on the use of the machine, on the ergonomics and the functionality of it all, there is very much decided in the early stages. For example, we see that this surface [pointing to part of the Conturo's body] was not able to be moved anywhere, because the workpiece needs to go here [pointing]. You know? I needed to place the functional parts in here [pointing], as centered as possible, in order to have the balance right. And all of those things, all of those functional and ergonomic requirements, by themselves, already form a certain aesthetic that is functional and nice itself. So, the pure function already has a feel to it, that you can say, "Okay, that thing is working." And you just need to take that and put it into the Festool world.

So we're [very focused] on the functionality aspect. The form follows function. Which is really an old and much used term, and it still applies very perfectly to us.

Sure. So, you spend a lot of time physically handling models, as opposed to just staring at renderings.

Totally, yes. It's also a funny thing: Because the first model over there--with the wood and styrofoam and everything—it looks, like, totally crappy. But this is the part where the basic decisions are made, you know? When you place everything. You say, "Okay, I'm going to handle it in this way." And as you progress towards the end, it's all getting more into details, details, details.

Also, another thing. When you really have a new technical solution, where you don't have any predecessor, you have to experiment more, to find solutions to these new problems. You know? As opposed to, if you already have let's say, a cordless drill—you kind of know where the components are, and you can just use some styling over it or something.

But that's not possible with a machine like the Conturo. Because all of the components can turn 180 degrees in the next day [as engineering changes are made], you know? And you don't know where you're heading. When you're at one stage, you don't know what the final stage will look like. So, these [gesturing to the line of prototypes on the table] are different processes for each development project.

There's a lot of parts to the Conturo, so during the design process, how do you determine the sequence of what to work on?

It comes naturally out of the process. First of all, you need to know, say, "Okay, where does the housing need to go around?" You have the functional phases. You'll see this part here [points to machine] needs a screw that needs to go out forty millimeters, because it needs to make space for the next pellet to come in. So, okay—I need to put the housing around here. You always have these small things that must be addressed.

I have to negotiate with the engineers. To say, "Okay, please make this as small as possible, so I don't need to move this corresponding part out too much." So not to make it too bulky and everything. So the essence of it is really to communicate on a day to day level with the engineers. It's really important to work very closely with them. So, that's why I'm sitting next to them, we're all sitting in the engineer's department. It's like, you cannot decide which radius to put on here if you don't know about the structure of it underneath. So, the progression of what comes after what in the process, comes out naturally.

And since they have 45 engineers and just one you, what is it that makes your job distinct? For example, they didn't hire a 46th engineer, but instead hired you, an industrial designer.

Sure. They need somebody who knows how to put something into a form. You know? Like, an engineer will say "Okay, I need a screw there, I need something there" and that's it—"It's gonna be square, I don't want to lose time just to make the surface." So I'm helping everything fit in. My job is really to make all the products look like a Festool product. So, we need to know "What does the brand want to communicate, in terms of values? What do we want the customer to feel like while using the products?" And it needs a designer to make it fit this distinct design language, of course.

I'm sure a lot of people wanted your position—do you know how many designers applied for it?

That's another thing—there was no application or anything. But I made my Master's Degree in industrial design. And my thesis project was—do you know Festool's cordless drills? They have this FastFix connection.

Yes.

I used that to make tools for the man who is staying at home with the children. You know? Who's lost his manhood and needs to have some toys to play with in the kitchen. So, I made FastFix products for the kitchen. Or to work the grill. And salt-and-pepper grinders that look like a double barrel, push [the reverse switch] to the right for salt, left for pepper.

So, there were different products which I presented here. And they liked it, so the next month I started here. So that was a very lucky process for me, actually coincidence and luck. That's it. Being at the right place at the right time.

Well, I know it was seven years ago, but congratulations!

Thanks!

With any luck, you'll never see a police badge up close. And even if one is flashed in your face, afterwards as you're sitting on the curb wearing zip-ties you probably won't be thinking "Gee, I wonder how those badges are made."

But for those who are curious, a Brooklyn-based company called United Insignia has a video up showing the process. We always assumed the NYPD's "shields" just came out of a stamping machine, but there's actually a fair bit of handwork involved:

According to the NYPD quoted here, the current design dates back to 1902. Here's their description of the production process:

Our modern shield is made of nickel silver. It is first die-struck in a drop hammer which gives it impression and then is pounded until the desired height of the characters is reached. The perimeter is then blanked and embossed and the numbers and lugs are hard soldered. The badge is then dipped, cleaned, nickel-plated and polished to a high gloss.

If you want to see what some other cities' cop badges look like, check out our older post on the subject.

Via Herman Yung

Judging by the traffic it looks like you, our readership, like reading about bending wood. Whether it's the plastic bag method, the hot-pipe method or the laser method.

Speaking of that last one, an Italian company is using a laser to create bends not for wood, but square stock metal tubing. Check out the flyness created by Taglio Laser:

While they're targeting customers who want to built chassises and structures, I want to see furniture and experimental bike frames made this way. Do you think there are any production efficiencies to be gained by making the cuts, leaving the stock straight, and shipping it to a far-off welding and assembly facility closer to the end user market?

When we saw this photo, we thought we missed something in our History of Braun Products series. This minimalist turntable certainly looks like their handiwork:

But nope, that's the Essential II model from modern-day manufacturer Pro-Ject Audio Systems, a company based in Austria. That design seems about as pared-down as you can get, but for those who feel that less is more, then their Elemental series is more:

You can also get that with an acrylic platter:

Perhaps the surface you're looking to place your turntable on isn't quite wide enough to support the Elemental. In that case, Pro-Ject's narrower-width RPM line might be for you:

A cork mat breaks the stark color scheme a bit:

For clean freaks, here's an RPM model white, with the form-fitting dust cover in place:

But if you want something a bit easier-to-clean, they also offer this more rational cover:

On the more complicated end of the spectrum, the company also makes this technologically-sophisticated beast, part of their Signature line:

To me that one's not as easy on the eyes, but that's not the point of it; audio fidelity is. The silver thing you see in the center is a clamp that tightly connects the record to the platter to reduce extraneous resonances, and the platter itself has a freaking magnetic suspension, according to the product description:

Magnetic feet and TPE-pillows decouple the resonance-free metal granulate filled MDF-chassis from surface. The subsequently benefits from a wonderfully resonance-free, heavy platter, that runs ultra-silently on an inverted ceramic ball bearing with magnetic suspension and is also TPE damped.

(By "TPE," we assume they mean the rubber-and-plastic hybrid known as thermoplastic elastomers.)

You can see more of the company's work here.

The German manufacturer Wiha brings some seriously kick-ass innovation to modern-day users of hand tools. If you don't believe us, check out their stuff that we saw at Holz-Handwerk last year.

Here's one we didn't spot (their booth sold out quickly at the event, so it must've been one of the first to go): Think of your common L-shaped hex key sets, which most of us have rattling around in a drawer somewhere. What's the one area for design improvement, the one thing you could do to the holder that would make it easier to use?

Ah, it's this:

Unfortunately, the American link for this product appears to be broken. I'm still bummed that a company with such flair for product design has such a crappy U.S. website.

Most people know that New York City has its own little Alcatraz, called Riker's Island. But few know that there's another prison in the East River, this one floating next to the new Fulton Fish market in the Bronx.

The Vernon C. Bain Correctional Center is a 47,000-ton, five-story barge with 800 beds spread over 16 "dormitories" and 100 proper jail cells. At 625 feet in length and 125 feet wide, it also holds a gym, a basketball court, a library, three chapels, a rooftop exercise area, an IMAX theater and a casino. Okay, it doesn't really have an IMAX theater and a casino but I wanted to see if you were paying attention.

Tide and punishment

Built in a Louisiana shipyard in the late '80s, the floating prison was towed up to New York in the early 90s, and it looks for all the world like it was designed by a child playing with blue and white Legos. The unattractive structure is also, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, "The world's largest prison ship." (Go New York.)

All A-board of Corrections

As for why we even have the thing, a New York Times article detailing its opening says the ship was built "as a way of trying to develop prison space more quickly and to avoid complaints from community groups about building jails in densely populated neighborhoods." 

The D.O.Sea

And the 800-bed facility wasn't cheap: As the writer of this tugboat blog points out, "She was built...at a cost of $161 Million, which as usual, means it would have been cheaper to send the inmates to Harvard instead."

In the design process post we saw what goes into the development of a new Festool power tool, over at the company HQ in Wendlingen. But once the designers and engineers have the tool off of their desks and it's ready for prime time, another set of teams over at Festool's facility in Neidlingen have jobs that are just beginning.

Imagine you're a prospective buyer, kicking the tires on a Festool at a dealership. The designers may have slaved over the handle and weight balance of a tool, and yeah, it sure feels ergonomic when you pick it up—but how does it feel after several weeks, months or years on the jobsite, when you factor in the vibration of the motor and the resistance of the material you're working? Does this thing get uncomfortably hot after several hours of constant use? Is the sound it makes becoming unbearable?

Festool's approach is to work these long-term issues out first via extensive testing. "Our commitment is that if we come out with a tool, it has to be perfect," says Festool CEO Christian Oltzscher. "We don't want the customer to do the tool testing for us; it has to be perfect when it goes out. It doesn't work all the time—we're not perfect—but that's the place where we're trying to achieve.

"And again, it's the long term thinking in mind. Not just selling a lot of units during the initial market introduction, but making sure customers are really happy with the tool in the long run." The company also guarantees that they'll keep spare parts for any given model in stock for ten years, giving customers long-term repair options in the event something happens to the tool.

Product Testing

Speaking of things happening to the tool, we got to see not one, but two of Festool's testing facilities. At these locations they not only abuse the tools to check durability, but also run them through a battery of tests to check for long-term ergonomic implications.

Editorial Note: We were not allowed to take photographs inside these secretive facilities; company-taken photographs were subsequently provided to us, and sadly, a lot of the cool stuff is not shown. Also, at these facilities some of the presentations were given by floor employees in German and translated to us on-the-fly via headphones; thus I was not able to record and transcribe them, but for direct quotes must rely instead on documents subsequently provided by Festool's press department.

"The key tools of the craftsman are his hands," reads the first document. "Festool has taken up task of protecting the worker's hands by lower vibrations. Thanks to a testing device for hand/arm measurement, the vibrations of the new ETS EC Generation sanders were able to be monitored in order to optimally design the tool. This protects the craftsmen from what is referred to as Raynaud's syndrome or white-finger syndrome."

As for checking to see which parts of tool housings get hot:

"With infrared photos the Testing Department sees the heat generation in the tool and can thus make corresponding constructive changes at critical points."

In a special sound room resembling a recording studio—microphones everywhere, sound-dampening foam lining the walls—they check the audio of different tools, tuning them until they've achieved a "pleasant noise level." With a back-and-forth between the testing guys and the engineers, they can determine if things like this work:

Those are the teeth on the sawblade that comes with their REQ 55 track saw. As you can see, the distance between the teeth is inconsistent. Festool does this because staggering the tooth distance in the manner they have preserves the cut quality, but produces an irregular sound wave that is less irritating to the ears than the soundwave produced by evenly-space teeth.

Another testing room has to do with manufacturing. Techs calculate exactly how much torque needs to be applied to securely affix a particular component with a particular screw without damaging either. These figures are then transferred to the production floor. In the shot below, you see two ladies on the assembly line—which is like hospital-clean, by the way—and they've got hanging pneumatic drills in front of them. Each of those is set at a particular torque to drive a particular screw for a particular part of the assembly, all arranged in order of course, to move it up one counter and down the other. (Festool uses a U-shaped progression rather than a straight line; keeping the assemblers in closer proximity means they can quickly communicate if need be.)

In the Dust Room, a series of shelves hold boxes labeled with different geographical locations. The tech explains that they have various types of dust flown in from around the world—apparently Arizona, for instance, has particularly aggressive dust—and they blast different varieties onto the tools "for hours and hours," while the things are turned on. "The device must pass this durability test while in operation - if not, there is a painstaking search to find the locations where the dust has caused damage. This plays a very important role particularly for sanders."

There are also tests where tools are exposed to temperature and humidity extremes. There are endurance tests where machines are turned on in, say, March and not turned back off until April. Additional electrical tests have the tools plugged in and running while wonky current fluctuations are fed to it. Impact tests where they drop the tool onto concrete from different heights, varying the tests so that different parts of the tool receive the impact.

At another facility we saw, the CT dust collectors are being dragged along a treadmill while they repeatedly slam over a strip of wood attached to the track. (This was meant to simulate being dragged across a threshold, but at an inch or so tall, this looked like a threshold installed by someone trying to get fired.) Two doors down we're shown into a room that resembles an abattoir, with a grate floor; in this room a semicircular perforated metal tube is spraying water—and not a fine mist, more like the volume of a lawn sprinkler—directly onto a vacuum unit, and rotating nearly all the way around it (in the direction of a jump rope) to get water into the bottom of the vacuum too. If it lives, it passes.

When these products pass the tests, it is due to the design and engineering—and also to the work of the guys we'll hear from next.

Quality Control

"If the products don't fulfill the lifetime requirements," asks Norbert Wahl, "why should I pay that big money for Festool tools?"

As the head of Festool's Quality Department in Neidlingen, Wahl is one of the people whose job it is to ensure that a customer never says those words. "Lifetime is a very big issue for Festool," Wahl says.

The task for Wahl's department is at least as challenging as the design, engineering and testing; and as we've seen with much of Festool's processes, they start with the end, with the customer. "The customer needs things like: Perfect results, bearings and gears that last a lifetime, robustness of the housing, low vibration, precision," he explains. "It's very important for us to translate the customer's requirements into our technical requirements, into things we can measure."

What Wahl and his team need to measure is staggering: Neidlingen deals with some 70 million components that go into 62 different tools with a total of 700 variants of those tools resulting in 2,845 sales articles. Last year they pumped out 650,000 finished tools. It is the Quality Department's job to go over the constant influx of gears, ball bearings, electronic components and the like, trying to sniff out any defects on the micrometer level.

Targets are set, and in some cases surpassed. Wahl points to a bearing of the sort used in a sander to give us an example: "Here is the cylindrical shape of the bearing bolt. The shape should have a deviation less than 0.01 millimeter. Yeah? And we managed to have it below five micrometers. [That's 0.005mm.] So, I would say that's almost perfectly cylindrical. And that meets the precision of Festool."

Maintaining the quality standards "is only achievable if all processes and requirements are coordinated over and over again," says Jochen Kleh, Plant Manager at Neidlingen, "in close dialogue with all participating partners and a common understanding of the required quality is achieved." Getting it right means that "then all our efforts can also be experienced by the customers, whether in the form of a significantly longer service life, greater precision or perfect working results. That is our quality guarantee."

Every once in a while, of course, they find a defect; Wahl reveals the numbers versus his goal. "We need 100 percent perfect parts. For us, 99 percent—even 99.9901 percent is not enough. Because that would mean 99 parts per million are bad parts, and this is not enough for Festool.

"So, eighty percent of all our suppliers are providing less than sixteen parts per million bad, here in the production plant. And we are still working on it very hard. Each day we have to measure them, and to guarantee the quality of all those similar components."

"And we are not afraid of some of our competitors in the field. Because we know that we have the know-how of decades. And also the spirit of our engineers will ensure our quality for the next decades. Quality," he finishes, "is when our customers come back, and not our products."

Car commercials are always about their vehicles' mechanical prowess, showing it zip along deserted country lanes or mysteriously empty cities. The car is always the star. But over the weekend Toyota Japan quietly released this video, displaying a more honest reality: Cars as backdrops, intimate theater sets in which snippets of human life play out one commute at a time over a course of decades.

Released a week shy of Father's Day, the car is decidedly not the star here, and you needn't speak Japanese to understand what's going on:

Nearly two decades ago, Marc Prensky perfectly defined that awkward feeling of explaining how to use an iPad to your grandparents by coining the terms  'digital native' and 'digital immigrant.' Having recently spent a week with my grandparents, I can't help but feel a renewed appreciation for that exact technological generation gap. 

Exasperated eye-rolling aside, this  gap poses incredibly interesting design challenges—particularly for products made for generations growing up fluent in technologies our generation is just tapping into. Hence my fascination with Berlin-based Startup Vai Kai (Lithuanian for 'children') led by Matas Petrikas and Justyna Zubrycka. The question of how to create something for children that toes the line between tech and play, drove the duo to create their first product, 'Avakai'. 

While a number of modern toys and games take the lazy approach of either living on screens (or employing embedded screens), Avakai doesn't rely on wiz-bang technology—it joins centuries of toys that allow room for traditional play and imagination. "Children should be able to control and shape their experiences with technology, not the other way around," says co-founder Petrikas of designing the interactions for Avakai. 

Pairs of Avakai can sense proximity. 

Avakai is a wooden doll 'super-powered' with technology. The matryoshka-like figure gives feedback in the form of light, sound and haptic vibration. The touch, gyroscope, compass and temperature sensors give the doll the ability to connect to each other dolls and react to their environment in a creative and playful way. Avakai is a combination of tech and tradition, allowing games such as hide and seek to take on a new layer when played with the haptic feedback responding to proximity to their target.

Avakai is currently funding on Kickstarter with an estimated March 2016 delivery. From the technical side, the toy will be both Bluetooth enabled for a play range of around 100ft (30 meters). For long distance play across countries, the Avakai can be connected through a mobile app.

Avakai connects technology and the real world through traditional games like hide and seek. 

Vai Kai began with Petrikas, working previously as one of the very first Soundcloud employees and a major  proponent of 'kidtech.' When he made the decision to leave music tech and begin a toy company in 2014, a mutual friend introduced him to industrial designer Zubrycka. Through their shared vision that kids should have access to open-ended play through technology and similar design aesthetics the Avakai was born. 

Children of today already grow up in a connected world and the only connected toy they know is a screen. We can give them experiences that stimulate all their senses, allow them to take into their hands and truly play with it. - Matas Petrikas

The Vai Kai team has reached 40% of their funding goal with a little over three weeks left on Kickstarter. To see more on Avakai, check out their Kickstarter page or website.

Texas Armoring Corporation has released provocative videos before. After a much-publicized event where a man was dragged out of his car and publicly beaten in NYC, TAC released a video of their bulletproof cars withstanding similar breaching methods used by the attackers. They offered to armor the victim's vehicle for free—if their video reached 5,000,000 hits. (It didn't.)

This one is a bit nuttier. To prove the efficacy of their automotive armoring techniques, company CEO Trent Kimball gets behind the wheel of one of their modified cars—and has an employee fire an AK-47 at the windshield:

I thought the same as you, "No way that's real, he's not even moving!" To allay such suspicions, the company released an uncut version. This one looks pretty convincing, as you can actually see him flinch after the first shot. (I bet he's squeezing the HELL out of that steering wheel the whole time.)

So what the heck is that windshield made out of? The company refers to their glass as "transparent armor," and the short answer is that it's a combination of glass and polycarbonate. Here's the long answer:

TAC incorporates premium, lightweight glass-clad polycarbonate offering true, multi-hit protection (weighs approximately 10-15% less than traditional armored glass). All-glass is 100% curved and no flat glass is incorporated. All glass includes a premium interior hard-spall layer to prevent fragments/shards from penetrating the passenger compartment in the event of an attack. All glass is seamed, edged and finished using a proprietary quality process that provides unprecedented UV and delamination resistance. All glass features excellent ballistic protection and superior optical quality with very minimal distortion.

Several of the entries this year successfully addressed needs and criteria across multiple categories, and were rewarded with recognition from two or more panels of judges. These are the entries that effectively spanned multiple design concepts and reminded us of the far-reaching impact of thoughtful design practice. 

ANNA: Breathing Assistant for Sedation—Interaction Student Winner, Commercial Equipment Student Notable

ANNA explores the potential of light and sound as problem solving tools in the healthcare industry through it's simple, approachable design. 

ANNA fills a void in the anesthesia process by creating a friendly tool for simultaneously calming children undergoing sedation and helping them achieve optimal breathing techniques to make the process as quick and painless as possible. Across the board, our juries in the Interaction and Commercial Equipment categories were impressed by it's minimal, subtle design that can so easily enter the hospital setting and benefit patients, technicians and doctors alike. 

Avocado—Interaction Professional Notable, Open Design Professional Notable

IDEO's Avocado is a ready-to-use design toolbox, allowing designers to quickly create interactive prototypes without the need to know coding. 

Catering to Interaction Designers who don't have a robust background in coding, Avocado's easy to use platform is a toolbox of interactive elements which create a simple, accessible path to developing digital tools. "It's a nice, elegant design, very simple with some fairly sophisticated types of actions that would actually take quite a bit of coding to make happen," noted Open Design jury member Mark Hatch. "It solves a real problem for designers that don't have clean experience but still want to be able to something better than just a wireframe. I thought they did a good job understanding what the problem was and a good job with the interface itself. I think for those that care in this particular space, it would be a very useful tool."

Bridging the Communication Gap: A New Touchpoint for Pediatric Asthma Education in Emergency Departments—Service Design Student Winner, Strategy & Research Student Runner-Up

Project development is grounded in thorough research: the team conducted 38 user interviews with 28 participants over a period of seven months and completed three rounds of co-design with ER physicians, ER nurses, ER nurse administrators, primary care physicians and caregivers of children with asthma. 

Asthma is a pervasive and potentially deadly condition—especially among minority populations. In this context, educational tools that are given out when a patient is discharged after an asthma attack are critical in ensuring proper after care. However, current discharge protocols deliver complex information in up to 15 pages of content written in inaccessible medical terminology. Through exhaustive research and co-design sessions with five stakeholder groups, Bridging the Communication Gap sought a simpler service for disseminating this vital information. "This was very well thought through and it was great to see a real world application of a student project," noted Strategy & Research jury Captain Dr. Melis Senova. "There was a very beautiful collaboration between the medical staff and the service design student body to co-create solutions together." The project's inclusive use of research has the potential to improve other  healthcare scenarios, where communication between doctors and patients is key yet often misunderstood. "The experience and the solution coming out of it can really inspire many other similar experiences," explained Service Design jury member Luis Arnal. "It was very gratifying to see such a high quality of work." 

Bulb LMP—Consumer Products Student Notable, Furniture & Lighting Student Runner-Up

Since LED's don't need a protective layer of glass like traditional bulbs, designer Renaud Defrancesco created a series of bulbs that double as lampshades.  

Bulb LMP's sleek design and elevated approach to technology, "adds value to a very mechanical solution," as our Furniture & Lighting jury remarked. "This project allowed me to reconsider and redefine an object of current consumption, explained designer Renaud Defrancesco. "The bulb is not only a source of light anymore but a source of atmosphere."

Museum of Future Government 2014—Speculative Concepts Professional Winner, Built Environment Professional Notable, Interaction Professional Notable

The Museum of Future Government featured a series of high-tech, interactive exhibition spaces that engaged visitors in a very hands-on discovery of the concepts explored. Pictured above, visitors designed 3D plants which then competed in simulated environments. 

Commissioned by the Prime Minister's Office of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) The Museum of Future Government Services exhibition inspired and forecast the future of government in the UAE, the surrounding countries, and beyond. Through a series of highly interactive spaces exploring concepts like Healthcare and Education, thousands of high-level government officials visited as "students." For its engagement with forward-thinking concepts, immersive design, and sophisticated use of interactive technologies, the project was honored across three categories. "This was a unanimous decision," said Speculative Concepts jury member Cher Potter. "This to us was a super exciting kind of avenue for where speculative design can really make an impact on the world."

SimPlay/The Future of Medical Simulation—Interaction Student Runner-Up, Speculative Concepts Student Notable

SimPlay's interface allows simulation instructors to easily compare scenarios and provide relevant, concrete feedback. 

SimPlay—a diploma project by Valeria Gaitan Vallejo—seeks to fill a void in medical education where simulation is frequently used to develop technical skills, but doesn't yet focus on improving non-technical skills like communication and behavior changes among the medical team. With it's easy-to-use interface, the project sets up a system for facilitating the learning process in hospital settings. "This is a really audacious and ambitious project. We really admired the impact and the value this might bring when it's brought to maturity," said Interaction jury member Matt Jones. "We were really impressed by both the range of data it captured and the range of ways it visualized data to really hopefully bring some improvements to the situation."

Society of GrownUps—Strategy & Research Professional Winner, Service Design Professional Runner-Up

The Society's brick-and-mortar location in Massachusetts is where many people begin their personal adventure of finding their inner adult. 

The thought of a master's program-like course for adulthood might seem gratuitous, but through research and development, the IDEO design team uncovered a pretty extensive cultural problem. "What they realized in doing this research was that it wasn't about trying to inform to sell better but perhaps to solve a more profound problem concerning financial literacy," noted Strategy & Research jury Captain Dr. Melis Senova. "They basically addressed a cultural problem and unmet needs completely with the creation of a new venture in its entirety." Through a combined solution of classes, one-on-one financial coaching, digital tools, and a community space, the program seeks a simple goal: "We're all here to help each other become a little smarter. And a little more grown-up."

Synchrony Music Therapy for Autism—Commercial Equipment Student Runner-Up, Consumer Products Student Notable

"Synchrony eliminates that technical barrier using an approachable and universally understood form language of a hand drum. Its 20 keys are tuned to the pentatonic scale, which, having no dissonant intervals, allows any combination of keys to sound good together, enabling parent and child to create harmonious melodies regardless of musical ability," explains designer Kenneth Tay. 

Synchrony is a platform for helping parents and children with Autism foster intimacy and mutual understanding. "Designed to sound harmonious regardless of musical ability, it facilitates a mutually enjoyable music making process," explains designer Kenneth Tay. "Parent and child can both coexist in a shared space, communicate nonverbally through music, and engage in interpersonal play while working towards therapeutic goals." Our jury responded to the beautiful design and strong social element. "The historical drum like semantic and the new digital semantic has got book ends of history in there," said Commercial Equipment jury member Mike Gallagher, "and I think that it has more use than for autism."

The Unhappiness Repairer—Speculative Concepts Student Runner-Up, Service Design Student Notable

Silvia Neretti, the self-proclaimed Unhappiness Repairer, travels with her pop-up office searching for people who could benefit from her intimate, low-tech approach to channeling happiness through design. 

Through this project, designer Silvia Neretti creates what she refers to as "behavioral artifacts," simple interventions created in response to one-on-one consultations that attempt to heal bad habits and bring "design happiness" into everyday life. "It combined psychology and the design method to improve people's daily happiness levels," said Service Design jury Captain Cathy Huang. "It's a really clever way to get rid of their bad habits and help them change their behavior for the better." Our jury also responded to the simple, low-tech approach of the project. "The Unhappiness Recorder talks about different roles for designers and an expanded view of design where we're not just creating these glossy products that satisfy simple needs, but really delving into what happiness means and exploring how we use existing products to make interventions in quite creative and interesting ways," said Speculative Concepts jury member James Auger. 

TiLT: The Playscape Project—Strategy & Research Student Winner, Social Impact Student Notable

TiLT emerged from a series of questions: What is the value of play? How is it perceived in different countries? How does play affect a developing child, a school, a community? How can design be integrated into research to maximize use of limited materials within a playscape? To begin finding out some of the answers. Marie-Catherine Dube immersed herself in the Nepales landscape, living there for the duration of the project and using her observations and experiences to drive the final project which ended up being a "beautiful collision of two worlds, design, and a creative impact platform in the form a playground," as she describes. "What most moved us was the openness to local realities that came across so strongly in the story of this project," explains Social Impact jury member John Thackara. "The student was able to see it wasn't just about creating a playground—it was actually a platform to shift mindsets and open up new possibilities of interaction in the community," remarked Strategy & Research jury Captian Dr. Melis Senova. "It's really rare to see a student actually take themselves across the world and immerse themselves in the culture that they're studying."

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