Mapping out our five year plans, rarely do we foresee the obstacles and challenges that will someday confront us along the way. The daily things: broken pencils, missed train rides, or a popped wheel. Function is never without failure. Even rarer is the notion of celebrating those failures when so much of audience-facing content is in praise of superlatives or how we got to the finish line rather than the journey. Sina Sohrab and Joseph Guerra of industrial design office Visibility commemorates the uncertainties as well as the milestones that propelled them through 5 years of their practice this past Wednesday, with the opening of their exhibition Under the Office.

All photography by Blanca Guerrero

Known for their conceptual products as well as furniture pieces, Visibility took this as an opportunity to exhibit a quirky archive of past work and prototypes of objects such as chairs, light fixtures, household appliances—with some alluding to failed pitches and killed projects throughout Sohrab and Guerra's years of working together. "I think the idea of failure is a difficult one to define when you're starting out. In a general sense you think of it as a negative that something didn't work out, but more often than not it's these projects and shortcomings that service the next in a more meaningful way than you'd expect," says Sohrab.

Since quitting their day jobs to focus on their design office and building their clientele, the co-founders have been on the cover of Monocle, have launched a stool for Matter as well as their first electronic appliance, and built a team of like-minded people—but their accomplishments were not without a set of strong lessons, particularly in a field where creative profiles are saturated online that the pressure to stand out is high. "Hard lessons are plentiful when you're baptized by fire," explains Guerra. "A lot of designers out there strive to hone their craft and hopefully the cream will rise to the top. Making money takes creative thinking as well, but everyone wants to make it look easy. Places like Instagram are not a real place for meaningful conversations."

The need to be visible or to please is a secondary priority for these visual technicians, despite their competitive industry. What's more important is shaping our environments in a way that show up as authentic, particularly in our common interactions with the material—whether it's with baby strollers, spray bottles, or corkscrews. There can be big lessons in small objects for all of us, whether we always see it or not.

The Senior Interaction Designer is responsible for leading design projects by utilizing their conceptual skills, industry experience and imagination to bring creative excellence to our client's digital products. This is a position that will require exceptional problem-solving skills, a drive to innovate and the ability to come up with innovative

This year, Ventura exhibited their Dutch Edition at ICFF for the first time, venturing into new territory from their typical WantedDesign Manhattan takeover. In the center of the massive furniture fair, a booth filled to the brim of work from 15 different Dutch designers brought a bright, joyous and material-focused perspective to NYCxDesign. One of the main trends we noticed from the show-within-a-show was a focus on textile innovation, with five of the 15 projects centered around finding new creative ways to work with both traditional fabrics and even unexpected ones like Colback. Below is an overview of the five textile-focused works, which are all on display at ICFF until tomorrow, May 22:

The Composition Table by Creative Chef

Creative Chef combines product design and food to create meaningful dining experiences. Keeping with their mission to bring everyone together over food in unexpected ways, the designers decided to transform one of the most common dining accessories: table linens.

At first glance, the textiles appear to be just a colorful, visual treat, but their pattern is actually scannable sound waves, which when scanned create a musical composition to listen to over a meal. The idea is that the phone with the scanning app can be passed around the table, and each time a guest scans their placemat or section of the tablecloth, a new sound is added to the piece.

Kaumera Kimono by Nienke Hoogvliet

Nienke Hoogvliet's goal is to find ways to make the textile industry more sustainable, with a specific focus on working with pollution and starting a movement against fast fashion. For her exhibiting project, Kaumera Kimono, the designer created a new material from wastewater that can be used during the dyeing process.

Hoogvliet discovered that Kaumera, an alginate like material derived from wastewater, actually makes textiles absorb dyes better. So, in turn, less water is needed in the dying process. To add color to the textiles, she used two natural dyes extracted from wastewater: Anammox and Vivianite. Kimonos are garments that, unlike fast fashion pieces, are passed on for generations, so Nienke decided it would be the ideal garment to apply her research to.

BLOCKO Cushions by Aleksandra Gaca

Aleksandra Gaca's 3D woven textiles, aptly called Architextiles, have already been seen in the fashion and automotive worlds as cozy, sound dampening pieces. But the process to bring this technique to a point in which it can be manufactured for use in the industry did not come easy. In fact, Gaca has been working to develop this technique for around 20 years—working to refine both the design and manufacturing process (now she is able to produce them by machine instead of by hand).

At ICFF, the designer is exhibiting a step into the home decor world with a series of cushions using her sound absorbent fabrics. The cushions provide a visual, tactile and auditory experience with a surprising gradient color effect as you move them around in your hands.

Colback Table by Rick Tegelaar

Rick Tegelaar discovered that Colback, the same material dryer sheets are made from, can be 3D printed, so he decided to customize the FDM printing process to accommodate yarns made from the material. The designer also developed a method of adhering the printed yarn over non-woven Colback material to create reinforcements, add rigidity and create tensional strength.

To make the table on display at ICFF, Tegelaar used this same technique to create a graphic layer on non-woven Colback to enhance the appearance of a material we all know from our laundry supplies.

Cafe´ 6116 Coffee Table by Ruben van Megen

In many portraits painted by 17th-century Dutch masters, Persian carpets are often seen being used as tablecloths because they were thought to be too beautiful to put on the ground. As a new take on this tradition, Ruben van Megen is exhibiting a table that features a tabletop made from a real Persian rug covered in resin, thus preserving both the beauty and the scars of the carpet.

There's still time to visit Ventura Projects at ICFF—the fair runs until tomorrow, May 22.

Shook is the first in a series of lounge chairs inspired by the repetitive nature of an obsessive mindset. The viewer is invited to recline while contemplating the thoughts trapped in their head.

In 2008 Land Rover was in flux, having just been acquired by Tata Motors (along with now-stablemate Jaguar). Tata wasn't exactly a household name, and Gerry McGovern, Land Rover's Director of Design, told Alloy + Grit of his reservations at the time:

"For me, when Tata bought Jaguar and Land Rover, there was a bit of concern. What do they know about the premium automotive business? They were first to admit they knew nothing about it. But [they said], 'That's why we bought you. You're the experts. You run the business in the way you see fit.'"

However, there was one very significant change made by the new owners. At the time, Land Rover was structured the way that a lot of car companies are: The design group reported to the engineering group. But fortuitously for Land Rover, Ratan Tata, who was then Chairman of the Tata Group, wasn't your average businessman; he held a degree from Cornell in Architecture and Structural Engineering. In other words, he was trained in both design and engineering, and understood what the relationship between the two ought to be.

Thus Tata had a question for Land Rover: "Why does Design report to Engineering?"

From then on the arrangement was swapped, to the betterment of the company, as we saw here. "We're all in it together," McGovern said, "but they do the engineering better than we can, we do the design better than they can. So we respect each other, and we make sure we get it in the right order."

We're at a press event for Range Rover's new Evoque, where the car's high sales figures are being touted. McGovern takes the mic and turns the talk towards design. "Of course volume is important to us, and business is important, but more important is that we create vehicles that our customers love for life," McGovern says.

"Design leadership and engineeringintegrity is at the top of the bar no matter what vehicle it is. That hasn't always been the case at Land Rover--in the past they looked the way they did because of what they did. But what we've tried to do, over the last 10 years or so, is give them a good dose of design in order to make these vehicles more universally desirable without them becoming generic. That has certainly made a difference. And we're doing it without in any way undermining the engineering, because the two can be reconciled if you've got the right attitude."

McGovern then goes into detail about his and Land Rover's design approach, their design do's and don't's, how they harness design to create an emotional connection and more. Here are excerpts from that chat.

A Modernist Approach to Design

"For us it's about being reductive. It's about being 'less is more,' it's about reduction of clutter. We believe that's absolutely right for a Range Rover, which is a sophisticated vehicle."

Desirability

"Let's face it--people don't actually need luxury Range Rovers. I said it. They don't actually need luxury watches, luxury homes, luxury holidays. They don't need them, but they desire them, and that's the difference. If people can feed that desire with products and services that are morally sociable, responsible and sustainable, and in the process feed lots of families and keep people in business, there's nothing wrong with that."

Three Elements of Using Design to Form an Emotional Connection

"That emotional connection is something that only the best, in my view, achieve. Whether it's a car or anything else, to me it's down to three things:

"Visceral: When I look at it, do I desire it, do I want it?

"Behavioral: When I've got it, does it work, does it do what it's supposed to do? And last but not least,

"Reflective: Once I've used it, experienced it over a period of time, do I still desire it? Does it still do what it's supposed to do? And am I building a lasting relationship with it, which reinforces why I bought it in the first place?

"Now these aren't necessarily all equal, sometimes the product can over-index on the visceral and not on the behavioral, but overall still be very successful--they vary, it's like a graphic equalizer. But for me, that's the absolute core of emotional design."

Not Looking at Competitors

"In Land Rover we tend to work a slightly different way to some of our competitors. I know and have talked to most of the design leaders all around the world, and I don't tend to look at their designs too much, because I think that can subconsciously affect what you do, and I encourage our designers not to do the same either. We're cognizant of what's going on, in terms of being competitive and the latest technology and all those things. But when it comes to design, we've got our own DNA."

Design First

"In the studio we [designers] create the tangible asset, we create the volumes, the proportions and the basic layout of the vehicle and the packaging. And once we've signed it off, then we ask our brilliant engineers to come in and deliver and get us as close to that design as possible. A lot of studios work the other way round. I believe that's dangerous because the horse has bolted and you end up with what's called 'styling,' which is reinforced by volumes and proportions that don't look right.

"If you look at a Range Rover, it's very elegant: Long wheelbase, bit of a boat tail, short front overhang, that's the body relationship. It's a very well-considered, proportional design. That's not even talking about the surfacing, just the volume and proportion. Now if we did it the other way round [by starting with the engineering], there's a danger it could end up looking [quite wrong]. This isn't having a go at Pete [Bingham, JLR Chief Engineer] and his fraternity--we're all in it together--but they do the engineering better than we can, we do the design better than they can. So we respect each other, we make sure we get it in the right order."

On Chaotic Design

"We are starting to see in the marketplace more and more of this approach to design which I call 'Zorro,' [as in] the fencer--all the lines all over the place. And to me it creates visual confusion."

Refining Vs. Rebooting

"There's this preoccupation in the automotive industry that ever time you do a new car, it has to be completely different. Why? When it comes to a new vehicle that we haven't produced before, that's our opportunity to be radical. But if you've got something that's established, that people love, [I'd rather] refine it. Look at the evolution of the 911, it's a very good example. Or the evolution of the Range Rover. That is our approach."

Defender of Design

Yes, we know what a lot of die-hard Land Rover fans most want to hear McGovern talk about: The Defender, that iconic and discontinued British 4x4, which Land Rover will shortly be resurrecting. The new design is cloaked in secrecy, and at the press event, after teasingly joking that he had one out back to show us, all he would say is this:

"Our design strategy, or our brand architecture: Land Rover is still a master brand; Range Rover is our family of luxury vehicles that talk to refinement and sophistication; Discovery talks to versatility. And I think when Defender comes, this strategy will all make sense. It will be the absolute polarization of Range Rover, to give you a clue."

We're waiting!

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A young designer asked me this question during the Q&A session after one of my talks at a conference: "What is the most important skill to have as a designer?" After pausing for a beat, it dawned on me that the most important skill to cultivate as a designer isn't sketching, modeling, research methodologies, leading workshops, or presenting—it's dissatisfaction. Getting into the state of having just the right amount of dissatisfaction is the glue that holds all of my work together. It is something that was taught to me from the very beginning in school, and it is something I hold onto today.

At RISD we practiced what they like to call a "critique culture" where students were encouraged to look critically at the world around them and discuss those criticisms. This practice is meant to help you do two things: first, to look for opportunities all around you that you can work to improve and second, to turn your critical gaze onto your own work to try to improve it. If you didn't follow through on the second, a fellow student would be sure to bring it up in a critique of your work in front of the professor. Everything was subject to be questioned, from major design concepts to an instructor asking why your print was hung 5 degrees off level, or why a corner was dog eared, or why all of your tacks were not the same color. What we learned was that the only wrong answer was not to have one. To have not thought critically about your own work and how you presented it was a major faux pas.

If you are happy with something the way it is, you may not find the motivation to search for a better solution.

Later in my academic studies, I took an exchange semester at the Cleveland Institute of Art. The program there offered a bit of a different spin on RISD's critique culture. Their students were encouraged to walk around to see what their classmates were working on and to ask if they could do an "overlay" where they took a clean sheet of paper and quickly ideated their feedback and thoughts on your project. This practice built a strong sense of camaraderie and taught us that getting to the best idea was the most important thing—not our egos. By pushing our egos to the side, we opened ourselves up to the ideas of our classmates.

Whatever your creative output is, you have to have a measure of dissatisfaction to work on a problem. If you are happy with something the way it is, you may not find the motivation to search for a better solution. Sometimes creative people get a bad reputation for having a bit of an attitude, but this might be because we are constantly identifying everything that is wrong with the world around us.

If you have too much dissatisfaction, however, you may find yourself in a state of paralysis. Having overloaded on dissatisfaction, I know it can lead to a bad place where nothing feels good enough to show anyone. It has taken a long time to learn how to control that emotion and find the right amount of dissatisfaction.

When I am in that perfect state of dissatisfaction, I feel like the ideas and iterations flow more freely. I'm able to look at research more objectively and create patterns out of insights. I'm able to review work in a constructive way, and I'm able to receive feedback with the assumption that the person I'm talking to can help me make the solution better. I remember when I was working on the Air Jordan XXI PE I, was showing an early prototype to Gentry Humphrey, who was the head of product line management for footwear at the time. I was working on a complex lacing system that hid most of the laces under a second tongue for a very sleek look that differentiated the product from the production AJXXI. There can be a bit of tension between product line management and designers, and Gentry very carefully suggested that perhaps there was a little too much white space in the composition and that a molded lace keeper at the top of the tongue would add that extra bit of polish. He was surprised by how much I lit up with my response as I said, "that is exactly what it needs".

If you have a critical mindset to your own work, you find that good ideas can come from anywhere. When you ask other people to look at your work, they will give ideas to you. You have to apply that same critical thinking to the feedback you have gotten. You have the hard task of deciding what bits to leave behind and what nuggets can be turned into insights.

In my professional career, I've tried to hone that critical gaze into a healthy level of dissatisfaction. When people ask me what project I love the most that I have worked on in the last 20+ years, I tell them the real question is what project I dislike the least. I've learned something with every project—I see the mistakes, the learnings, the battles lost, and I love that. To me it means I have grown and that I could do even better now.

If you can take a critical gaze at your surroundings as you walk through the world, you will never be at a loss for work. There are so many solutions that we take for granted because they have persisted for so long. They are waiting for a dissatisfied designer like you to come along and make them better.

As part of an ongoing effort to transform public perception regarding waste and its potential for reuse, Bee'ah, the leading waste management company in the Middle East, commissioned designer Ammar Kalo to develop a communal table for Dubai Design Week 2018.

As a Nickelodeon Partner Strategy, Positioning & Presentation Designer, you will gain insight into how one of the most successful entertainment companies operates while designing engaging trade marketing presentations based on Nickelodeon’s content, capabilities and target audience. They are seeking a designer with animation skills and an understanding of print, digital and video production so if you're a jack of all design trades, catch this job opportunity before it's too late.

See the full job details or check out all design jobs at Coroflot.

Iris is a new tool for drawing and measuring circles. Simply rotate the rings to open and close its captivating aperture mechanism. Iris' concept came from conversations with our Kickstarter Community. Our supporters said that circle drawing tools lacked innovation and were difficult to use. These tools were unreliable and short-lived. So, we set out to completely redesign the circle drawing tool.

As amateur photographers, we noticed that camera apertures were reliable mechanisms and were surprised that they had not yet been developed for other purposes. In response to this observation, we designed an instrument that brings the quality of the camera aperture to your desk.

Brought to you by MAKO Design + Invent, North America's leading design firm for taking your product idea from a sketch on a napkin to store shelves. Download Mako's Invention Guide for free here.

Navigating the world of crowdfunding can be overwhelming, to put it lightly. Which projects are worth backing? Where's the filter to weed out the hundreds of useless smart devices? To make the process less frustrating, we scour the various online crowdfunding platforms to put together a weekly roundup of our favorite campaigns for your viewing (and spending!) pleasure. Go ahead, free your disposable income:

This DIY cardboard smart speaker is specially created for kids, who'll have to assemble the Raspberry Pi-powered robot before they can program it to perform a wide range of tasks, from texting grandma to creating an interactive story time. Unlike Alexa, Chatterbox prioritizes privacy, so it never collects data and will only listen when the yellow button on its friendly head is pressed down.

These drum pads are super portable, wireless, and connected so you can practice anywhere (without waking anyone up!) or even add them to an existing drum kit to take it to another level.

Here's a pneumatic compression wrap that promotes healthy circulation throughout the body. A useful tool to help tired athletes recover faster, it's also a good idea for those who have to sit or stand for extended periods of time for work.

Made using the traditional Japanese bentwood technique known as Magemono, this bread tray is made of coniferous woods which, due to their porosity, are able to control humidity so you won't have to deal with that icky condensation build-up that occurs when you put freshly toasted bread on a plate. Instead, your toast will stay perfectly crispy until you're ready to dig in! The campaign is also offering insulated tumblers, including one made specifically for beer, with an unglazed surface that promotes foam.

Aguardio is an easy-to-install sensor that will track the amount of time you're spending in the shower and give you gentle reminders to encourage more mindful water consumption.

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Today at the GreenTech Festival in Berlin, Skyports and Volocopter announced plans to build the first physical, mobile "Volo-Port" (electric take-off and landing system) for their air taxis. The overall design and renderings of the system were created by Brandlab. It's absurd to think that helicopter taxis might become somewhat of a norm one day, but this idea has actually been brewing for quite some time—we even had the chance to sit inside a prototype model during CES in 2018.

Even so, the idea of actually taking air taxis instead of ground ones has never felt feasible due to the logistical challenges of facilitating timely and cost effective electric take-offs and landings. As seen in the photos above, however, the prototype has been tested by real humans, so the next phase will be to design a system around the new transportation model—starting with the mobile landing pads and stations.

The proposed station will be completed in Singapore by the end of 2019, which makes sense judging solely by the exaggerated information we know about Singapore a la Crazy Rich Asians (I mean, check out that one guy's Eames lounge chair and floor to ceiling window ratio in the renderings).

In order to operate an air taxi system within a crowded city like Singapore, though, Volocopter and their partners definitely have some kinks to work out (please refer to the rendering of an air taxi landing directly on a train station?), but the physical system in Singapore will aim to address most concerns. According to Volocopter reps, the system will allow for, "real-life testing of the full customer journey, showcasing of planned customer services (pre-flight checks, passenger lounges and boarding procedures), practical testing of ground operations and services (including battery swaps and charging maintenance), and the opportunity for authorities and industry regulators to interact with the infrastructure and provide feedback before they are asked to approve the final design." It's unclear whether the Volo-Port will be located near a train station or airport, but we are assuming that is the case based on convenience.

Once implemented, Volo-Port stations will be the only physical infrastructure required for Volocopter's air taxis to operate. "Each individual Volo-Port is designed so that it can stand alone or connect to other ports in numerous formations, enabling rapid deployment and scalability," says Duncan Walker, Managing Director of Skyports. "We have analyzed the available spaces and movement dynamics in city centers across the world and recognize that infrastructure is a key enabler for the emerging UAM market." From the renderings, it appears as if the modular system is adaptable based on location needs (coast, roof and apparently highway?) and roof structure.

There are still many unanswered questions, but for all the skeptics out there, Volocopter is assuring that this is the new reality of transportation. "Once regulation comes through on the aviation and city level—and this will be sooner than most think—we will be ready to take off," promises Volocopter Co-Founder Alex Zosel. So the real question is: would you test ride one of these?

Have you always dreamed of becoming a motorcycle gear designer? Portland-based Icon Motosports is looking for a Product Designer to join their industry leading motorcycle equipment design team. Their in-house product design department needs an individual who will collaborate with the entire design and development group in pushing designs to the next level, and of course, "motorcycle riding experience very desirable".

See the full job details or check out all design jobs at Coroflot.

Set inside Casa Perfect, a historic West Village townhouse spiraling into lavish rooms filled with furniture from contemporary design gallery The Future Perfect, Brooklyn-based designers Chen Chen & Kai Williams present their latest exhibition Romancing the Stone. Calling on the beauty of the ordinary stone, the designers transformed the ordinary material into unexpected forms, such as flowers, mirrors and plant stands. Like a lover, the hardened object becomes soft and vulnerable in the eyes of its beholder.

The collection includes the Geology Table and the Stone Rose light fixture, both built from stones that have either been found or excavated. The Geology Table bares a composition of split stones, revealing minerals otherwise hidden, assembled like puzzles atop a steel framework of legs. To achieve this, the designers worked with a bridge building company to cut 4 inch thick slices from a 1 ton boulder using an 80" blade.

Carl Jung once described the stone as the symbol of our simplest and deepest human experience. For millenniums, humans have been drawn to rocks because they reflect our own sedimentary core, unaltered through time and weather. The Stone Rose fixture, an exemplary addition to the show that speaks to both the delicacy and resilience of the artists' material, proudly displays translucent petals sliced thinly enough to emit light. "For the Stone Roses, we used a small slab saw used normally to cut geode slices," explains the duo. "We made some experiments with the thickness, there are a few where the slices are thinner, but we found that for the most part those were too delicate, so the thickness we arrived at was the thinnest we could make it without losing too many petals in the process."

Romancing the Stone is available for viewing by appointment until August 1, 2019. Make an appointment here.

In 2003, Converse celebrated its 95th anniversary, and Nike acquired the brand for $305 million. Annual sales grew from $200 million to $2 billion, and now the brand represents one of Nike's fastest growing segments. The latest release from Converse, the Star Series, is a collection of three shoes designed in collaboration with none other than athlete and architect turned Nike design legend Tinker Hatfield, marking a true connection between the two brands. The series includes the Star Series BB, Star Series RN, and Star Series UT; a basketball shoe, running shoe, and utility inspired chukka that aim to blend the lifestyle versatility of Converse and the performance features that Nike brings to the table.

Merging the benefits of two distinct footwear brands into just three shoe designs posed an exciting challenge for Hatfield. "Converse's design language to me is very egalitarian. Simple, straight, horizontal," says the designer. "The uppers tend to be humble materials. I think there's a beauty in that, so we wanted to design products with performance features but honor the design language." After reflecting on sport culture today, Hatfield imagined a family of products that nod to Converse's design history but also experiment with both function and aesthetic.

The first in the series, and most statement-making from a design history standpoint, is the All Star Pro BB. We all know the Chuck Taylor All Star as the original basketball-turned-lifestyle shoe, but its design has stayed almost identical since 1920. The introduction of the All Star Pro BB in particular marks a new era for the brand and promises a re-emergence in the competitive basketball shoe segment.

Production Model: Star Series BB

The BB's silhouette is made with an open tongue construction, complemented by a diamond-textured midsole, which references the original All Star's toe bumper. The silhouette notably features a nylon ballistic mesh upper for breathability and durability, marking one of the most obvious deviations from the traditionally canvas All Stars.

Prototype: Star Series BB

The Star Series RN is the most versatile in the collection, as its straightforward design combines performance elements of runners with the materials and colors of a total lifestyle shoe. The silhouette borrows design details from archival runners from both Converse and Nike and combines them with the design language of the Star Series BB, including a similar rubber outsole and the Converse Star Chevron logo in the foam window.

Production Model: Star Series RN

"Evolving the RN from prototype phase to final was a similar approach," says Jimmy Manley, Senior Director of Footwear Innovation at Converse. "After initial flex testing of the silhouette, we removed some of the rigidity across the shoe, particularly in the forefront. It also added dimension to the overall design aesthetic, allowing for multiple blocking options, which enabled us to explore a range of colors and materials in future expressions."

Prototype: Star Series RN

The final shoe in the pack, the Star Series UT is a runner's take on the lifestyle Chukka. The mid-cut Cordura upper features a runner's notch for easy wear and to draw an extra connection between the three shoes. "Evolving the UT was a matter of obsessing material and fit. The UT is reminiscent of a classic chukka design," says Manley. "The beauty of a chukka is its simplicity, which also makes a true design challenge. How do you create incremental improvement, but still maintain the essence of the original?"

Production Model: Star Series UT

"Our objective was to bring the classic chukka design into more of an athletic zone," continues Manley." We quickly realized that transitioning to a ballistic mesh upper from suede would help us achieve that. From here we had to solve a fit challenge, so we added in a medial overlay, which gave more support on the rear sides of the upper, and cushioning in the heel."

Prototype: Star Series UT

The Star Series pushes the boundaries and connection between Converse and Nike, remaining true to certain details of Converse's past while adopting new design details and materials from Nike's design language. It's been over 15 years since Nike acquired Converse, and nearly a century since the original All Star debuted. This collaboration with Tinker Hatfield marks a shift from lifestyle to technical product for the company and a commitment to making updates to their designs. What do you think of the collection? Do you believe Hatfield and the Converse design team fulfilled their brief?

The Star Series BB and Star Series RN will be available for purchase on May 28 via the SNKRS app, priced at $75 for the BB and $95 for the RN. The Star Series UT will launch in late 2019.

Any number of designers can come up with wondrous solutions that don't mean a damn thing if they cannot be manufactured economically and efficiently.

This is a story not only about clever design, but of the clever manufacturing technique that had to be invented in order to realize said design.

The Problem

Ocean waves have a way of beating the living shit out of coastlines. Since that's where our oceanfront properties, coastal roads and all-important ports are located, protection is needed.

Image credit: NOAA

The Solution

To defend coasts from flooding, countries around the world install breakwaters, also called revetments. These are collections of massive concrete blocks, dumped into the water and piled atop each other.

The idea is that the waves then slam into the breakwaters rather than the cargo gantries, vacation homes and margarita bars we like to place along the shoreline.

Two Problems With This Solution

1. Building a breakwater requires manufacturing thousands of concrete blocks. A concrete block is relatively cheap to make, but the problem is that all blocks secretly want to be Legos. What I mean is, when you first dump them into the water, they look nice and random and jumbled, like this:

That jumbled-ness is desirable. You want both space between the blocks, and a lot of randomly-angled surfaces, to better dissipate the force of crashing waves. But the problem with cubes is that over time, gravity and movement cause them to inevitably settle, lining themselves up like good soldiers:

You can see the problem. When the water starts to rise, this happens:

Now the blocks have simply formed a smooth ramp that mirrors the seabed, and the waves can once again come crashing up and over.

2. To solve the cubes-like-to-settle problem, revetment designers around the world have come up with all sorts of fun shapes to use in place of cubes. This is like the opposite of Lego, where you're trying to come up with a shape that ensures it's impossible for the pieces to neatly nest together. Here's a sampling of existing shapes:

The problem with any of these will be obvious to any of you with any experience with molds. Cubes are pretty cheap and straightforward to mold. But to create (and operate) molds that can produce any of those other, more complicated shapes above is freaking expensive. In fact, some of those forms above look like the winners of a design competition whose theme is "How complicated and expensive a mold can you design?"

A New Design Solution

So cubes are cheap to mold, but the blocks interlock. Studying this problem, Josep Ramon Medina and Esther Gómez-Martín, two researchers at Spain's Polytechnic University of Valencia, wanted to see if they could design a cube-like shape that had fear-of-intimacy issues and would not lay directly on top of a nearby mate. They came up with a shape called the Cubipod:

The protrusions on all six faces of a Cubipod help the blocks interlock, while preventing them from self-assembling.

For testing, Medina and Gómez-Martín produced thousands of scaled-down Cubipods and filled a model coastline with them.

They found that their new shape did indeed maintain the required irregularity.

A New Manufacturing Solution

Now we run into the problem a lot of designers encounter: "I've got this great new design, but how can I manufacture it economically?" To comprehend the challenge with Cubipods, we first need to understand a couple of things:

1. The logistics of shipping.

Let's say you set up a factory to crank out Cubipods; now how are you going to transport them to the site? Stacking perfect cubes on a flatbed is pretty straightforward; but Cubipods are specifically designed not to get too close to one another, which is great for breakwaters but horrible for fitting them onto a vehicle.

The obvious solution, then, is to manufacture them on-site. Which leads us to the second issue:

2. Understanding how conventional breakwater block concrete molds work.

Take a look at this mold, produced by Portugese manufacturer Carldora, for an X-shaped breakwater block:

To give you an idea of its scale, here's the same mold with the scaffolding in place. Workers must stand atop this scaffold in order to pour the concrete into the sprues:

To release the part, molds of this size and type open laterally.

Here you can see the same arrangement in effect with an H-shaped design for a breakwater block.

Due to the Cubipod's shape and desired on-site manufacturability, this laterally-releasing mold arrangement was "out of the question," says mold designer Antonio Corredor Molguero. A laterally-releasing mold takes up far too much of the limited space available to manufacture breakwater blocks on-site. Instead Molguero and engineering partner Carlos Fermin Menéndez devised a mold that releases vertically.

Once the concrete has set up, the base stays put, and workers swing open four hinged panels on each vertical face that release those pesky undercuts.

Then the entire mold is lifted straight up, releasing a fresh Cubipod.

You might say "Yeah, but then that means you'd need to have a crane on-site." Well, they already have cranes on-site--how do you think they lift the breakwater blocks and move them into the water?

With Molguero and Menéndez's space-saving mold design, multiple molds can be placed quite close to each other, as the releasing action requires little lateral space. That means a lot of Cubipods can be constructed quickly and efficiently.

Wait a Sec, Why are Cubipods Any Better Than Tetrapods?

If you're a civil engineering nerd, or have ever traveled to Japan, or are an industrial design student, you're likely familiar with Tetrapods. Japan's coastlines are littered with this type of breakwater block, and countless, sadistic Industrial Design Drawing 101 instructors forced us to draw these jack-like shapes in perspective, over and over again.

By looking at the Tetrapod's shape, you might reason that they use less concrete than a Cubipod, and that they too are released the same way, i.e. vertically. However, that's not commonly the case. Instead, a top cover that encircles the sprue, plus three circular hatches, plus the three large panels that comprise the top part of a Tetrapod mold, must be individually removed and pulled away to release the part.

This is fairly graceless and inefficient operation that you can witness here.

A Debate Question

I took a close look at Carldora's design for a Tetrapod mold. They've added a bit of innovation with this "Decompression System," which allows the three large panels and three lower hatches to be loosened--but all remain attached to each other as they release the part. They can then be lifted off as a single piece.

However, I believe the Cubipod's mold design is still better, at least from a business perspective. Why? Cost of manufacturing. Take a look at a Tetrapod mold alongside a Cubipod mold:

Supposing the cast blocks were of the same scale, which of those shapes do you reckon is cheaper to manufacture? It's debatable, but I'm guessing the Cubipod mold's flat (if more numerous) surfaces might win the day versus the Tetrapod's finer, curvaceous and more complicated form. But I am not convinced of this, and I'd love to hear opinions from other industrial designers or engineers in the comments.

Conclusion

Thanks to the Cubipod, SATO, the Spain-based coastal construction firm that Molguero and Menéndez work for, managed to reduce their breakwater construction costs from 15% to a whopping 45%, depending on the project. And for their efforts, the duo of Molguero and Menéndez--whom SATO actually lured out of retirement to work on the project, recognizing they needed his expertise*--have been named Finalists for 2019's European Inventor Award.

If industrial designers often go unsung, I'll say mold designers receive even less recognition, so I'm glad to see these two getting their due.

__________

*In the Hollywood movie version of this story, Menéndez quits his job after one of his molds plays a central role in some spectacular tragedy. He swears he'll never design another mold for the rest of his life, sells his belongings and disappears. Molguero tracks him down in some bar in a developing nation, and convinces him to come back for One Last Job.

This position offers the unique opportunity to realize and bring to life concept and schematic designs for museum and entertainment brands. Filled with exciting problem-solving, this role weaves together in-phase prototyping, electromechanical integration, ergonomic and user-centered design development. All aspects of the design must be taken into consideration—both aesthetic and function. Work with materials such as woods, metals and plastics to bring your ideas to life!

See the full job details or check out all design jobs at Coroflot.

YOYOmodule is a series of wireless charging modular designed smart devices, each module (Light, Fan, Mirror) has its build-in magnet, battery and wireless charging system. You can attach them to any metal surface, and attach to the stand to wireless charge it. You can take all the modules with you anywhere you want, and you can even charge your smart phone with it.

The Kikkerland Design Challenge exhibited the results of their 13th competition at WantedDesign Manhattan during NYCxDesign. This time around, the design company partnered with Central Saint Martins University of the Arts in London, prompting students to design products within the stationery, desktop and office categories that incorporate Kikkerland Design's witty personality.

In an effort to introduce design students to the process of bringing products from prototype to production, the winning designs from this challenge will be developed for production by Kikkerland Design. To help propel your favorite design into stardom, vote for it by simply "liking" the product on the competition's page. Below are a few of our favorite results from the competition, ranging from a creative bathroom storage solution to a useful recipe stand:

Opting to switch from single use plastic bags to reusable ones is a no brainer these days. Toprakizgi Güven's The Fold Bag takes the classic foldable reusable bag one step further buy turning it into a key ring. The bag folds out to be a backpack, shopping bag or shoulder bag, and the keyring section ensures that you'll never forget your reusable bag at home.

Instead of aimlessly scrolling through Instagram during your bathroom experience, Naz Bender's Repo shelf encourages you to crack open a good book instead. Repo attaches to your existing toilet paper holder and becomes a hanging shelf for your favorite books and notebooks. It fits all toilet paper holders and installs quickly and easily, with no assembly required.

The White Noise Bookmark Speaker by Ruin Deng is a speaker and bookmark in one. The device sits next to you while you read and produces white noise to help block out extraneous sounds, especially persistent city noises. When you need a break from reading, rest your open book face down over the speaker to hold your place.

This recipe tin and stand by Jianing Ding houses blank recipe cards for your favorite recipes. The cork lid flips over to act as a recipe stand to avoid getting the cards dirty while you use them as a reference.

Tobie Chevallier's DIY Nightlight Battery lets you create light using only zinc, copper and vinegar. The battery cells are housed in a cork and glass structure that contains the chemicals and absorbs any odor from the vinegar. This item is ideal for classroom or at-home use, as it only uses natural materials.

My Story Teller by Ines Duplessis encourages readers to use their imagination to create a unique story. After prompted with the "Story Maker", a spinning plot decider that randomly chooses a hero, place, character and object to create a story around, readers are then tasked with weaving the selected elements into a story of their own using shadow puppets and light. The entire set neatly folds up in a book-shaped case.

Coffee grounds have many uses, but we often throw them out due to convenience. Quiwan Wang's "Colendar" aims to make repurposing coffee grounds into an air freshener easy by merging the daily task of updating your calendar with saving the material. Simply lace a drawstring through the outer perimeter of a standard cone coffee filter, place the satchel inside "today's" calendar tear off sheet, lace the drawstring through the holes and hang. The calendar paper absorbs any runoff from the grounds and emits the enticing smell of freshly roasted coffee.

This DIY Door Organizer by Margot Willot hangs directly over your doorknob forcing you to remember small EDC items like your keys, wallet, glasses and earbuds. A cork option arrives flat and requires a simple assembly process, while a felt option requires no assembly.

Mom Mug by Jade Echard is seemingly handmade, offering an alternative to impersonal gifts without having to actually make anything at all—talk about convenience. An included ceramic pen allows gifters to add a personal message to the teacup, mug and ashtray in the collection. This design was named the Academic Winner of the challenge.

Learn more about the Kikkerland Design Challenge and view the rest of the Central Saint Martins University of the Arts projects here.

Are you a boating buff? White River Marine Company designs all types of boats and the various products needed to operate them. Their ideal Industrial Designer candidate is a highly creative, self-motivated individual that works well in a fast paced, collaborative environment. They'll have the opportunity to create early design concepts, ensure that they convey the consumer benefits, have best in class craftsmanship, excellent ergonomics and innovative solutions while meeting cost targets and man

See the full job details or check out all design jobs at Coroflot.