Plumen 001

Although it may sound like some kind of chemical compound used to "get rid" of foreign secret agents, the Plumen 001 is in fact a lightblub. I have come across this deisgn in several places now, namely on the Dezeen website, at EcoBuild and at the Deign Museum, along with in several design magazines. It's what environmentalists have been eagerly awaiting - a clean redesign of the energy efficient light bulb. We openly welcome you to our homes, Plumen 001!

There is a small issue with this though, and that is the small fortune you may have to part with to light your home with these. At a painful £19.95 each, the price is sure to be an issue for mainstream consumers. Although efficiency is something we must concern ourselves with due to the environment becoming an ever more important factor in our daily lives, the current (and often dreaded) energy efficient light bulb does leave a lot to be desired - so it seems Hulger and Samuel Wilkinson (the brains behind the Plumen 001) may have cracked onto something here, especially given that the UK have relatively recently introduced the EU ban on importing high energy filament bulbs. I guess rival designers will soon pounce on this nice little niche in the market, and come up with their own solutions to the energy efficent lightbulb - which should eventually drive prices down.

Taken at the Design Museum, March 2011

So, it would seem this is at least a step in the right direction. Yay for green design! I just now need to justify to myself why £19.95 is a reasonable price to pay for a lightbulb. Damn it.

Design Studies: Ethnography

So further to my last post, the next step was to read up on Ethnography.

                                     

taken from the linked site above

A condensed explanation is shown above, and further reading on this can be found in the link, also given above.

This process makes quite a lot of sense when you think about it really. Observe, realise, and only then design. I think we subconsciously take this into consideration, but a much more in depth approach needs to be taken when we design for a user. In a way - everything is service design. If it has a purpose, a use, or a reason for it's existence, it provides a service, regardless of scale. Pin pointing ways in which to reduce, time, effort and complexity is good design, and all this can only be realised through laborious observations, that may be lengthly to complete, but are invaluable when reducing down to a final outcome.

For example, myself and a few class mates took a short trip to London for a conference for our course. While travelling through the business hub every morning for the three day event, I found it difficult to understand how to behave amongst hundreds of black shiny shoed business men, with their Starbucks lattes, broadsheets and pin striped suits, all of which silently walk at 10m/s. They automatically understood the tube etiquette, which seemed to change for this line only, compared to the likes of Whitechapel.

Do I need to go on a course before boarding?

There were no signs to say you virtually do not talk while aboard the train. There were no signs warning you that there would not be any bin facility for the next 30 minutes of your journey. There were no signs to say you have to be extremely well balanced to be able to squash into a 20cm square area of floor space, with no access to a rail to steady yourself, as the carriage jolted forward - as well as no signage to say that you may not also brush into someone else, even if they are a mere 5cm from your face. This to me, was bad design. A floor pattern may of helped, giving people a plan to adhere to, a sign to be aware if you are taking things onto the carriage that you will soon wish to dispose of, you will not be able to dispose of it any time soon. These things would quickly come to light if someone was to spend time researching this from an ethnographic perspective.

Whaam!

The Design Museum, London

With my upcoming visiting to London next week looming, I have been trying to get a list together of places to visit while I'm down there. We have a few extra days to explore as we are down for 5 days, with Eco Build only occupying 3 of them.

For me, The Tate Modern is a must. I've never had the time to visit before - as the only other time I've ever been to London was for the same excursion last year, to which time was an issue. I've been looking through their extensive list of permanent pieces, along with the current exhibitions, and have come to the conclusion I may need to dedicate a whole morning or afternoon for The Tate Modern. They have 27 pages listing all their works by Andy Warhol, and house Roy Lichtenstein's Whaam! - something I am desperate to see as it's over 4m long! I remember thinking that some pieces that you have longed to see can be a let down in scale, a particular example of this was Dali's paintings I seen while visiting New York's MoMA. Some of them were post card sized - something you would never assume from images printed in books.

Ai WeiWei's Sunflower Seeds Exhibiton

Ai Weiwei's current installation piece entitled "Sunflower Seeds" is something I want to get the chance to see - as the scale of it seems like something that would be very powerful to see, and have more of an impact than mere images.

Next on my list of places to visit is The Design Museum. I'm hoping to find some kind of inspiration for my current project there, as things have taken a dip in terms of motivation. I always do this - storm into a project like a hurricane and then the calm in the middle comes, and then it's a mad dash to the finish line, but hey - it works.

The V&A is another place I'd like to visit, but I'm not sure if I will gave time to spare. I guess I can use it as an excuse to visit again during the summer - as I do need to spend some time taking in the culture from the comfort of some of Camden's finest bars.

Living in Dundee and coming from Edinburgh means I've never had a real sense of travelling times within a city - so I always assume it to be "no bother" to "pop across town" - although in reality, we could be talking about an hour or more. I suppose I will just have to see how much I can squeeze in - although I'm not in any way fussed to see BigBen or The London Eye. Actually, I'd be quite proud if I never see them, in a kind of anti-tourist type way.

EcoBuild: One week until LDN

Well, I have had my confirmation email, assuring me my pass for EcoBuild 2011 is on it's way!

To those who are reading this and are not in the sustainable industry, I am not surprised if you are moving your cursor to exit this post now - but don't.

Everybody is in the sustainable industry. Do you eat? Do you heat your home? Do you travel by any means other than walking or cycling? I'm going to put all my money on your answer being yes.

Without sounding like a Green Peace volunteer that chases you down the street asking for phone numbers and email addresses - protecting and reviving the environment is something we should all concern ourselves with. People seem to think (or tell themselves to ease the guilt) that it won't affect them in their life time, so why bother. It's too much of an irritation to their daily life to consider recycling that sandwich carton, or not take the plastic carrier bag for their meal deal at lunch.

Well, without harping on - it will. I try never to use plastic bags, either just using that age old technique of carrying the one item you have purchased by hand, or using reusable jute bags. It's so easy to incorporate into your lives, and, if everyone was to do this also - would make a difference. I posted a video a few weeks ago about turning off computers - something that seems to trivial and tiny, but, on mass makes an astounding difference.

EcoBuild 2010

Well, why am I going on about saving the rain forests and being green? Aside from it being a personal interest - next week is EcoBuild in London - an annual conference in which thousands of people from various industries gather to educate and promote sustainable products. It's a fantastic opportunity for us young student designers to gain knowledge about products covering a vast array of topics, including contraction materials, surface finishes, techniques, and services that are all from a sustainable background - and the best part is, it's free to attend!

There are also various speeches given throughout the 3 day event (Tues 1st March - 3rd March 2011) including several familiar names - one household name this year being Kevin McCloud - although I personally am not a fan.

This will be the second time I myself will be attending, although hopefully this year without the mix up of passes there was during 2010's event - to which we waiting in a line longer than the average street.

I will post my findings after my visit - along with any other worth while things I encounter during my visit to London.

EcoOffice: Not A Home Afterall!

On Tuesday we presented our findings in our designated groups on our topic we were issued; we were given "green design".

After that, we were issued our briefs commencing from then until 1st April. Instead of what we assumed would be renovating a pre-existing site into an sustainable home, we have been given the similar task of designing a sustainable autonomous office in an existing industrial style building on Tannadice Street, Dundee.

Within this we must create: an entrance and reception, a waiting area, offices housing space for 24 employees, CEO office, 4 manager's offices, a cafeteria, toilets, 2 meeting rooms, a research lab for 4 employees, a library and "quiet space", storage facility and cleaning stores. 

We must concern ourselves with trying to maintain sustainability throughout. I intend to aim for LEED standards, and as autonomous as possible. Thankfully there is no budget to concern ourselves with!

I also intend to try to aim to increase employee eco awareness, and thus not only reduce the emissions of the building on it's own, but also the personal emissions of the employees. The office is hypothetically to be housed by SEPA, so aiming for 100% zero emissions of the building and employees is essential. I have created a few mind maps which I will add once I scan them.

Here is my preliminary research (A1):

On 1st of March EcoBuild will be held in London for three days, to which me and a few classmates will be attending, gaining invaluable knowledge in the eco building materials world. Unfortunately this means a lot of flyer collecting - which is not too environmentally friendly. Whoops!

Reduce|Reuse|Recycle: New Year, New Project, Re[new]able Energy!

First of all, let me just wish everybody a Happy New Year and all that! 

The festivities are over once again, that is of course, until the inevitable giant magical revolving calendar door does a full circle bringing us into 2012 - along with the Olympic Games and the end of the world (if Nostradamus is anything to go by). But enough of the apocalyptic chat.

On a lighter note: I got a morph in my stocking! YAS!

After a much needed rest after first semester - I'm more than recharged for jumping back into the deep end with my forthcoming project: sustainability. There are a few aspects to this project, but from what I have gathered from last years briefs which are still available online, we are required to consider (but not solely limited to) the following: 

1. Investigate and question what the journey is surrounding books, including their content and presentation. What makes a book? Concern ourselves with the art of book binding, and the creation of precious texts and so forth. 
2. Sustainability within design. How does the environment influence design? What products have been designed specifically with the environment in mind? What must we be taking into consideration when designing for the future?
3. Locating possible job positions that we would like to consider as a graduate - what would we consider as a derivative position from the course content?

From the above background research, we are asked to then create a book with green content in small groups. As a result, we will have an upcycled handmade book - that is, to recycle and reuse existing products and waste materials into something of equal or better quality and therefore reduce the need to manufacture brand new products (to downcycle is to create new products that are inferior to the original)(McDonough & Braungart, 2002). 

Further to the aforementioned pre-project tasks, we are then to carry on our findings, progressing onto redesigning and upcycling an existing 2‐storey dwelling with attic extension incorporating living/working accommodation for a client, Emma Fraser, who is a book conservator in the University of Dundee. 

We must accommodate for our client’s requirements, including: a space to cook and eat, a space to bathe, a space to entertain and/or relax, 2 spaces to sleep one for Emma and one for visitors, a space to work (40m2)(24m2 studio – clean space, 10m2 dirty area and 6m2 storage), and a space for outdoor living/working.

art is what you can get away with, after all

I've already downloaded the plans and printed them, and even got on with some preliminary SketchUp ideas - I was after all feeling like I needed to stuck in with something new. I've also just ordered my Design Studies books, as the snow's melted, and deliveries are now possible again! Whoopie! 

I got several things this Christmas that will be joining me in the studio when we return; including a Morph in my stocking which will join me at my desk, as well as origami post-it notes! My favourite silly gift is still an Andy Warhol "inspiration box" that houses a miniature Andy Warhol to help inspire me when it's rainy and windy and not very pleasant - so that's daily really. 

It will soon be time to visit EcoBuild in London again (I've ordered my pass already), but this time I think it will be much more valuable - as our project is more concerned with these aspects of building. Sustainability is something we should always concern ourselves with, as it is our future. I'm gathering a library of ecological materials that I will research into further in time, but for now as it is still the holidays - they can continue to gather dust in my Eco bookmarks folder, while I continue to add more as and when I come across them.

See you all soon, folks!