DESIGN NAME: Weed
PRIMARY FUNCTION: Lamp
INSPIRATION: I used to spent a lot time outdoor with my grandma, and she taught me how to recognize different grass, how to make food from the natural materials which has still left me with deep impression until today. I still recall the process of making a rabbit out of dog tail grass, which is also the most ubiquitous weed in my childhood. It represents freedom and wildness, it's everywhere. I believe in Chinese culture there also exists this kind of free joy, of holding the grass and go wherever you want.
UNIQUE PROPERTIES / PROJECT DESCRIPTION: Lighting can also mean wildness and freedom. In many cases people need formal lighting like ceiling lights or desk lamp. While often most of the time, people need some casual lighting which can be more easy and relaxed to carry with.
Weed lamp is an easy-charging lighting product which aims at providing users with agile and convenient lighting. By using the traditional Chinese imagery it arises people's emotions towards nature and connects this feeling with people's daily lives.
OPERATION / FLOW / INTERACTION: When you sit quietly indoor, this lamp will offer you with a sense of gentle lighting instead of turning on too bright light. When you want to go around for a look, just simply take the stem out from the base and hold it in your hand. It can be your best companion when you outdoor or in some darker rooms, without being distracted too much.
PROJECT DURATION AND LOCATION: started in March 2nd and finished in May 1st in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province.
FITS BEST INTO CATEGORY: Lighting Products and Fixtures Design
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PRODUCTION / REALIZATION TECHNOLOGY: The outer shell is made by 3D printing in PLA material.While in order to make the stem easy to bend I used silicon 3D printing and put an iron wire inside to make it more stable.Inside shell consists of wireless charging coil, which convert electricity into magnetic flux by using the principle of electromagnetic induction to charge.Inside the bottom of the stem consists of a coil receiver to collect the magnetic flux, then cover to electricity to charge the bulb on the top.
SPECIFICATIONS / TECHNICAL PROPERTIES: 110 mm x 95 mm x 460 mm
TAGS: lighting, portable, wireless-charging, wild, storytelling
RESEARCH ABSTRACT: The insight I came out after the research is that people care a lot about the freedom feeling when using lighting products, they often regard these product as companions under special circumstances.
The target user group is based on family, so by interviewing them during phone calls and sending out questionnaires, I asked questions like :What kind of lighting products do you use mostly? Under what kind of situations would you use this specific product? etc.
Then I found that people mostly use 2 main kinds of lighting products. One focuses on human, one focuses on environment. The human lighting products are the portable, smaller ones which can offer extra help, sometimes even represent the people's taste and value.
So this problem become like this, people want formal and functional lighting like ceiling lights, while they also need informality while they are outdoor or around, or want to look for a book in darkness.
I extracted 3 main keywords for this lighting. Care, agile and fun. Care means wen you using it, it can be your companion wherever you are. And it's agile and lightweight to take. This lighting product will offer you with fun and joy, through its design features.
CHALLENGE: During the design process what kept making me feel confused was the lighting's base design. I want it to have the light and free feeling of plants, it can grow everywhere, so it has to be easy to hold, easy to put it on any surfaces. After comparing the straight form and the pointy form, I chose the pointy form to offer it with the natural feeling of plant growth and bifurcation.
Then is the technical part. It hard to fit the inner structure like coils and chips into the nutshell, for the size of the coil has long diameter. After try different forms of both shell and stem structure I finally combine these together.
ADDED DATE: 2020-05-06 11:11:35
TEAM MEMBERS (1) :
IMAGE CREDITS: Jinying Cheng, 2020.
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