Before entering design school I worked as a prep chef. I learned to sharpen knives and observe some industrial-speed kitchen designs. One of my jobs was to transform neverending containers of vegetables into bite-sized pieces--quickly. (I can still hear head chef Rich yelling at me to pick up the pace.) The design system in place for this--designed both for speed and for right-handed people—was as follows:
I worked at a stainless steel table that had a rectangular cutout on the right side of the top surface. Into this cutout was dropped a rectangular plastic bin with a lip around its perimeter that prevented it from falling through; the top of the bin was roughly level with the worksurface. To the left of this, in the center of the table, was a two-inch-thick cutting board. Its thickness brought its top surface slightly higher than the bin, an important detail. To the left of the cutting board was the target container of vegetables.
(more...)