Core77

Indeed, concepts like this one do give industrial design a bad name. More than often they get worldwide press coverage (cool shiny thingy, everyone!), engineering/manufacturing customers see them and arrive at the notion that industrial designers are a bunch of morons who shouldn't be allowed to design anything more sophisticated than wooden furniture. In the end it makes our job more complicated because every time you have to explain that no, you are not like that guy who designed a phone "charging" from body heat or THAT guy whose award-winning revolutionary free-flow water tap spatters water all over the bathroom, and yes, you do understand the basics of their technology and physics in general.

I agree with the article, I think there is a relative amount of creative freedom depending on the ambition of the end product. In this case the product is being designed to do a job that exists and people are familiar with, therefore there is the chance to research and understand how it is carried out. The above idea is like a sketch, but there seems to be little point to finish there when there is an easy opportunity to sit the sketch alongside a real sewing machine and compare.

I think that there is a real positive to be had about a kind of dream designing but it's more suited for trying to push functions beyond what is contemporary experience. To try and break habits or to construct new interactions.

This type of design is a mainstay of student work lately and I find that whenever you analyze something you are immediately branded a hater, rather than a critical thinker.

This is the crucial problem with current "concept design" galore, the risk of turning "design" into a photoshop/cad playground, where very little attention is put into the true design process (analysis of the problem, prior solutions, requirements, development etc) and more to styling, extreme originality or artistic inclinations.

I think concepts like this, along with articles like this one, are important to inspiring people to think differently about the objects they thought they knew.

In general I do agree that before redesigning anything, the designer needs a real understanding of how the current versions is being used. Otherwise they will end up redesigning it for worst. Of course some boundaries can and should be pushed, but not the ones that will make the item unpractical.
However before I can comment on this sewing machine , could you please clarify if you have posed these questions to the designer? It is possible that he has thought of these point and has a solution for them.

I think many of the points you highlighted would have been identified if the designer had attempted to create a functional prototype and test it with actual users...

However,

I think it depends on the level of education (i.e. what year they are in and whether it is a bachelors or masters) and the amount of time spent on the project. If you have a week to design a sewing machine which in reality takes perhaps a year or two to develop there are undoubtedly phases of the design process you will have to skip. The research phase unfortunately tends to be the first thing to be axed in such a short project as students are quick to sketch, 3d model and show shiny renders.

The type of ID course is also significant. i.e. if you study at a polytechnic (technical) university where you obtain a BSc, you will undoubtedly be expected to take a more scientific (and thus mechanically minded) approach than if you are studying at a Design academy where you will get a BA. If you are studying an MSc you definitely can't get away with the 'magic box syndrome' you alluded to. I really can't see someone getting away with such omissions in an Industrial Design Engineering course.

I think the example you have shown highlights a problem to do with the 'resolution' of a prototype, sketch or 3D render. The higher resolution and more 'realistic' a render or prototype looks, the more people think it is a final product and expect it to work. Thus people look at the prototype in a different fashion and have different expectations from the prototype than if it was a blue-foam mock-up. As the surface tends to be the element we interact with most, when that looks complete we expect the interior functional aspects to also be complete... This is why you see blogs go crazy over beautifully realistic looking yet impossible automotive renders that are nothing more than the equivalent of a concept sketch in terms of design quality.

Your observations are spot on and comments refreshing. It seems that these days, there is a real reluctance to criticize anything anyone young does (unless there is a political tone to it) and the result is a world filled with either false "oohs and ahhs", or worse, an inability to assess the true value of something. I'm all for creativity and "outside the box" thinking (sorry about the use of that phrase), but having investigated failures recently, I've found that it takes the failures to spark the successes. That really isn't a surprise, given the attempts it takes to finally come up with a winning anything, but the lack of true honesty is going to kill some because they won't know who to trust. Keep up the honesty.

My only comment about this article: It is ALWAYS easier to be a design critic than a designer.

I do agree that the design needs some refinement. However, you're view on state of design is based on the assumption that a designer has finished learning once he graduates school...which is very far from the truth.

Here is a good example of a sewing machine:

http://www.uwid.uni-wuppertal.de/examensarbeiten/susanne-eichel.html

It is the bachelor thesis of Susanne Eichel, done at the industrial design department of the universitiy of Wuppertal, Germany.

I think this is an example of the design vs. engineering struggle.

The flip side of all this is that if he would have been bogged down with all the requirements and restrictions you listed, would he had pursued this concept at all? Or if he hadn't given up, would the idea have been communicated as clearly?

I don't think this was supposed to be a demonstration of a product, but rather of an idea.

Now that the idea is here, let's see which doors it will open... for one, it made you do this post, right?

as a just graduated student, i think its important to also iterate that often young designers have multiple ongoing classes with different focus areas and varrying timeframes. I have had two week assignments for semantics classes that are structured to focus on certain core ideas, in those instances, the conceptuality not the function. I also have 4 month long studio courses, which are more thorough and afford more opportunities for critique and making changes. Perhaps, this was not for a major class? If it was, perhaps the student was torn apart for its lack of functionality and research but only applauded online by the masses who are obsessed with finding new content to "like" or blog about?

I have had intense, collaborative, and research heavy projects in the past that never got any hooplah on the web but have done well at the critique because of process. In terms of online presence, the only work people have responded to are my aestheticly pleasing pieces of work that often sparked a debate at my critique.

Either way, it's an interesting perspective and I think it's more important to have students explore the way this person did. He has a nice, finished, portfolio piece - while it may have flaws, ultimately if they spent more time researching and developing they probably would not of had enough time in a student timeframe to actually accomplish a completed, molded, semi-mechanical model!

We all talk of trade offs, and I think this is one of them.

I guess it's important to ask what this student's brief was, if this was a form concept only, then the result is worth debate that would inform refinement in a second or third phase if it were a serious project for a serious manufacturer. As an entry level machine a smaller motor may be appropriate, as would a limited selection of stitch options that would be navigable through the addition a couple of extra buttons or through multiple switching option for the ones it has.
My studies were rigorously aligned with real world outcomes and only briefs with the preface "Blue Sky Design" would ignore the bothersome practicalities of reality. It was a methodology that trained us for the realities of the pragmatic world of industrial design but it did sometimes deny the opportunity for the far fetched hero work that makes it into the blogosphere.
I think the main problem we have is that young designers may have only seen design through the products of Dyson and Apple and perhaps something that should be taught in design schools is that "I" design is not the best solution for everything.

First, a disclaimer: I'm drawing on 10 years personal experience of product and interaction design consultancy, so can't speak for creative professionals in other roles. To an extent, the level of constraint consideration in an undergraduate project should reflect the student's particular area of interest and career goals. Doubtless some creative professions require more free-thinking than others. Since Richard hasn't had the opportunity to explain the aims and thought process behind his project, I won't comment on it directly. As mentioned, the fundamental premise is good and my degree project certainly never got this much attention - so fair play for making a splash!

That said, I strongly believe that students targeting careers in industrial/product/interaction design (consultancy or in-house) need to demonstrate an understanding of the user experience and technical constraints relating to their project. It's a crucial part of framing the problem which the designer is attempting to solve.

A third aspect to consider is the commercial context of the project (e.g. how it fits within the broader business strategy of a "client" organisation/brand). That's hugely important for professional designers, but I wouldn't necessarily expect a student project to delve too deeply into it.

Crucially, this process of understanding the user experience and technical constraints should directly inspire the creative process. Having thoroughly immersed yourself in the user experience, consider the various attributes you're identified as being important one at a time (e.g. "Clear indication before the thread runs out") and scribble down as many design solutions as you can to that particular attribute. That's the time when you can put the technical constraints to the back of your mind for a while - just focus on solutions to deliver the best user experience given your insight into the problem.

Having done that, you can then consider technical feasibility. Where do your different ideas rank on a scale of "easy to implement" vs. "currently impossible"? Think about the relative cost implications of the different solutions as well. Maybe there's a more cost effective way to solve a particular problem? Are there any great ideas which seem impossible/expensive, but could be made to work with a little more thought? This is how you'll start to filter and refine your ideas and, eventually, bring them together in one or more complete design concepts.

The end result should be a design solution which can be justified in terms of delivering the target user experience whilst meeting technical constraints (and, if you really want to shine, fitting within a business strategy).

Making this clear link between insight and design solution is the single most common piece of advise I give to students. The acid test is that you should be able to point at every feature of your design and say "This is designed in such-and-such a way in order to deliver this experiential attribute, which I determined to be important by immersing myself in the user experience".
[Cue observation/roleplay snippet that supports your point].

Extra brownie points for going on to say something like "I've also considered how the product would work, the manufacturing process and the target price-point, and that's why I implemented the design solution in this particular way".

The number of student projects which don't appear to follow this methodology is disheartening, and leads me to suspect that the problem lies in design education itself. I wonder if the marking schemes for degree projects are to blame? Perhaps there's too much box ticking ("research survey - TICK, concept sketches - TICK") without sufficient emphasis on the importance of joining the dots between parts of the design process.

The projects which impress me most as a recruiter are those which demonstrate a connected journey from experiential & technical insight gathering, via identification of target design attributes, focused problem solving and validation/refinement, leading to a carefully considered design proposal.

This is the best way for a prospective employee to demonstrate the skills that employers (at least in my sector) are looking for: an ability to frame the problem, define a brief, understand constraints, identify user-experience goals, solve problems with creative thinking, validate and refine their ideas according to the targets and constraints they've identified, and argue a strong case for their eventual design decisions.

What's most frustrating is that, as well as delivering better end results, the above methodology should actually make the design process easier and more transparent. Thus we're really doing students a disservice if we're not teaching it correctly. Any professional designer will tell you that staring at a blank sheet of paper and trying to conjure good, relevant solutions out of thin air is next to impossible. Targets and constraints are the necessary fuel for creative problem solving.

Your mileage may vary ;)

Students (and teachers?) out there might be interested to read a previous blog that I wrote with some tips for effective portfolio projects: http://www.thealloy.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/design-students-you-dont-have-to-change.html

sorry but i think your points are just nit-picking. the concept apparently achieves its primary aim, and nothing that you've mentioned cant fit into the diagram as it stands (and thats what it is, a diagram). design schools value innovation, so while it would be nice to have the time to completely flesh out a solution with the appropriate detail, doing so isnt illustrative of any innovation in the proposal.

If you all designed as the author mentioned you'd leave no fun for us engineers!

I see how all the things you mentioned are important (crucial, actually), but also how the designer has considered them details that would detract from the communication of the concept - a folding, easily portable sewing machine. I think it depends on your personal design process, but at this point the designer could go back and consider those details and how to reconcile them with the design intent. Others might resolve details first and then work out towards a larger gesture like this.

But you guys are all missing the point... it looks like an NES.

I agree with this article, how do you sew a cuff? But the shortfalls go beyond the sewing specific requirements. There is no provision for securing or charging the wireless pedal. No power supply, where does the foot go when its folded? I designed some rather silly products in college but I at least had to think about tooling and split lines.
But above all that I think this is a lazy 2D form. No merit.

If the user isn't considered and/or the designer as no idea how to make it real (within a reasonable scope) then it isn't design, its art, its sculpture.

You might be able to figure out how to fold a "machine" that's made of foam blocks, but that exercise is limited in value if you don't explore the true spacial and functional aspects of the product.

This all assumes he's near the end of his education and working on full studio projects. If its for a modelshop or other a skill focused class, nevermind.

When I started ID school almost 20 years ago, the learning curve to understanding & developing compelling design work was far flatter than it is today and most initial concepts are turned around in days not weeks. However students have a number of tools at their hands that weren't available before such as youtube videos & the variety of construction blogs that inform many of the subjects that a student would be expected to understand in the course of their work. I wouldn't expect a student to have a complete understanding of the project after only a week or two development but I would, frankly, expect them to understand the basics of the product function.

Honestly, this concept, like many others I've seen on a certain website, just shows sloppy thinking on the part of the future designer in question. If you can start to pick it apart in a minute, there is something fundamentally wrong with the overall concept & must be rethought. There is absolutely nothing making a mistake & learning from that mistake - that is the essence of the design process. But life isn't going to slow down and often times the difference between two equally beautiful concepts is one student spending 5 extra minutes of their time learning something for their concept than just diving in & hoping for the best.

Hipstomp, you get lusty over Syd Mead and student work that follows in this tradition...but when the illustration is in model of CAD form, it's somehow irresponsible?

For me, this article highlights the growing fracture between design as a management consulting, engineering and a marketing skill. The student did an excellent job at identifying and communicating the product's core feature. This is a high value skill.

If, as an inexperienced designer, he had gotten caught up in the functionality and expert user interviews, would the primary thrust of the project have been lost? Likely.

I in no way disagree about the responsibilities of good design...but quality control is a manager's job, not a student's. It would be completely irresponsible to ask an entry level designer to orchestrate the relationship between the marketing, political, ergonomic, mechanical and financial aspects of a project.

I have reviewed millions of dollars work of less thought out/useful/insightful concept work from major consultancies.

It's completely unfair to crap, in such a public way, on a student who is doing such provocative work. There are plenty of unusable/manufacturable concepts coming out of top 10 consultancies to pick on.

If its meant to be so futuristic that powerful motors will fit into the space of a thimble then one might ask the question: why still sew pieces of fabric together? Why not just "fuse" or "weld" the fabric together, or just weave a single piece garment and do away with joining altogether. It seems that the exercise has been carried out to a limited degree and then left with no fulfilling conclusion. If, as you have done here, the executor had shown it to someone with a morsel of textiles knowledge they could have prompted the same and simple questions you have asked. This is how design works. Design in isolation is more limited than that done in a more collaborative way. Asking questions is easy and to not have them asked is lazy and looks naive at best.

Easier to learn this mistake at college than in the real world so lets hope something good comes from the exposure of this particular idea.

Same idea, better execution, less press:

http://www.industrialdesign.lth.se/gallery/ba_projects/2010/mattias_nilsson/

I'm a mechanical engineer, and I work at a big name design firm.

I love this concept.

The engineering specifics and usability concerns could all be worked out in a form that looks much like this. Maybe a little bigger, maybe more controls, maybe more windows. This concept isn't inventing a new way to sew, it's inventing a new form.

What you should be asking yourself is not "where is the window for the thread?!" but rather "does a folding sewing machine make sense? Is it useful enough for us to further develop it? Are there users that want this?" If the answer is no, then it doesn't matter if it's feasible or not. If the answer is yes, then you go out and you figure out all those details.

Is there a line for suspension of disbelief? Yes, but this is far from it. Heck, look at this thing:

http://www.amazon.com/Lil-Sew-ZDML-2-Lightweight-Handheld/dp/B0046U88ZY/

You could easily fit those guts into this concept, and have room to improve them.

What this goes to show is what I call the "uncanny valley of design." This mock-up is slightly too real for people to use their imagination on the missing details, but not real enough where the details are fully thought out.

If anything, it's a good lesson for the student. Next time, he should make his model a little less, or a little more refined, depending on his goals. Sometimes, doing less work is better. People won't start asking you where you plan on putting all the parting lines and which way all the plastic parts are being drafted if you're only showing them sketches and unpainted foam models. Then again, you won't get on core77 with an unpainted foam model, so, meh, seems like it worked out to me.

I'm just surprised that THIS is the one concept you call out as being unrealistic. I've seen much less realistic concepts praised on this site.

Despite being the longest comment, Ben Griffins advice is succinct, well written and I think spot on.

I do think this project highlights a lack of rigour from the student, his tutors etc. I see a lot of projects that appear to have a 'that will do' attitude. I don't think students are pushed enough to work everything through and instead are too often allowed to hide behind the get out of dodge excuse - 'well it's a blue sky concept'. It worked for me in University, but in the long run didn't do me any favours.

I think there will always be opinion on what is suitable/acceptable for a Student/graduate to produce based on University/exam board judging criteria, which can be a bit 'Tick box' oriented, verses what employers would like to see. Ultimately the test will be wether he is able to get employment based on his portfolio, not just on the merits of this project.

There is a trend for design students to produce endless slick CAD renderings without making a physical model to see how the design would feel/operate etc I don't think this is necessarily their fault, but ours for not correcting the mistake and for society to celebrate without question the pretty pictures they produce (via various blogs etc). In this instance the student did produce a model, without (it appears) answering the usability questions basic investigative research would have provided, this is much more worrying than how big a motor can be made and where the power comes from etc. The question is why?

This concept is flashy, unrealistic, and dramatic. I agree with the writer. Whats the point in being an industrial designer if you don't understand the basic idea of being an industrial designer? Isn't the sole purpose creating a design making it easier and more efficient?

I don't think that the designer thought about what people actually do. I think what happened is that they saw a sewing machine and they probably did not like the way it worked for "them." They thought oh this should be flat pack so "I" can store it and oh "I" wish there were not as many settings. I think that this is just a naive design, which is what most of us do in the beginning, we design for ourselves.

This is coming from someone who just recently graduated.

I agree that design concepts such as this are thoughtless and don't fully take into consideration the packaging or end user, however I think if you are going to draw a line you should have done it long ago. I have repeatedly seen designs such as this being applauded on core77 and find it unfair to berate this design simply because you understand what is wrong with it.

If this were a concept for a rifle, or a softball launcher, or a portable washing machine, I doubt hipstomp would have spent a second writing about it. It's because sewing machines are his 'thing' and so as a result it gets singled out.

That's not nescessarily bad, if someone posted a rifle concept that had a lot of flaws in the design (like any design for any game/movie ever would if it was being seriously proposed) I'd probably pick it apart as I know a lot about how guns function and I could ask all the same questions (where's the charging handle? why is the magazine in that ridiculous position? why are things attached to the barrel like that?)

But as someone who was until this spring a student, yeah, I often had trouble with finding my line between figuring out function and letting it just be a representation.

Often I have the issue, if you could call it that, that once I took a concept beyond being a small sketch into the 3D world, I became obsessed with ensuring that my 3D representation was right. I'd scour McMaster for 3D models of hardware, find the dimensions of motors, spend hours studying how the gearing of, say, a fishing reel works. I'd take apart objects, reverse engineer them, and keep pushing to update the details. Essentially trying to be industrial designer, mechanical designer, and manufacturing engineer all at once.

It was tough to find myself so mired down in doing it the 'right way' while around me I saw people with beautiful CAD renderings of shapes that... looked cool but may or may not function. Meanwhile I struggled to make things fit, solve problems like what gearing to use, and ultimately had less-than-steller presentation as a result.

Do I feel really good now that I know how to take a concept and develop a nice product that merges a compelling and intuitive form with an understanding of making it all work inside, and I can take that concept and generate models which I can use to print functional prototypes and hand directly to tooling designers? I feel pretty good. Do I feel that perhaps I missed the chance to explore a little more wildly because I was so concerned with physical and practical constraints? Yeah, a bit, actually.

I like the sewing machine concept as a concept; I see it as 'check out this cool idea' sketch in a 3D form. Something you could take to the next level.

I was reading the article above and it made me think "why not throw another 'magic box' on the thing and have all controls governed by a smart phone?" not knowing much about how the knobs mechanically link to affect the way stitches come out, but I could see a couple servos/switches/CNC style widgets inside that would turn digital input into physical stitches. It might be a horrible idea, but that's OK, it's just a knee-jerk solution to a few flaws in a product concept that if they make sense could be thrown into the next iteration in some way. Or not.

If people like this idea, it will eventually go to the next phase, and hopefully that's where a deep-dive into research and testing would occur, where the designer or someone else would figure out exactly what they needed to design towards, figure out issues of function and space, and determine materials and construction methods, and get to the working prototype stage.

At that point we could critique it as to whether it had considered all the functional details that a basic sewing machine would require. If many of them were considered before the development of the prototype, great, only a few additions for the next one.

critique the press, the reason for the story and the stories written...they usually are worse than any particular design offense in a students concept.

unless of course the PR piece was just a conceptual article... but not so lucky I think.

Its a goddamn concept. Relax. Designers in general have been giving themselves a bad name for ages.

I struggled with elements of this discussion in my last project from this past spring semester (sophomore ID)
It was a lighting project, to design a light based around a quote we were given. The specifics of my concepts are too important, but I am still questioning the process I followed months later.

My concept was a wooden, character-like, desktop light that one would have on when they were working late, the last one in the office/studio, and have it keep them company. I wanted the actual lighting to be a slow fade in fade out breathing effect from an internal LED. I also wanted the fade in and out rates of the light to be adjustable so the user could finely adjust it to fit their mood.

My initial ideation was much more fruitful than some of my other projects, and I settled upon a concept that I really felt good about more quickly that usual, giving me more time to focus on the form and the tech that went with it. I was so excited about my concept and I wanted it to be a stellar portfolio piece and even to use it in my studio as it was intended!

That said i new basically nothing about electronics. But I was determined to make it a working prototype, so I bought my breadboard, resistors, a new soldering iron, the works. Doing research, getting the circuit that I needed to get the desired lighting affect was difficult and my failures to make the circuit successfully were met with inadequate knowledge of how to troubleshoot them.

One of my teachers, who I respect greatly, told me with confidence that I should fake the lighting affect; hook up a dimmer switch to the light and create the desired affect manually for the final show, a product video etc. His argument was not that I should be content to let the engineers handle that stuff for my whole career, but that with all the time I was spending teaching myself basic electronics I was losing time refining the meaning of my concept, the form, interaction elements etc.

Of course faking it was completely counter to the goals of having a working prototype that I could use and show to people readily and let it speak for itself. Stubborn me, I continued playing around with my potentiometers and 9v battery blindly chasing my desired lighting affect.

Keep in mind, this was about a 4-5 week project.

Eventually I did get the circuit down with its adjustable elements and all.
To speed the story up, by the morning of the final show I did in fact get my wooden form crafted, with the circuitry and lighting inside it, more-less working.

That said it was simply not enough time to hammer out all the details, ensure the integrity of all the moving and operating components etc etc. The light began failing one piece at a time following its short but glorious life at the final show.

Looking back, I am glad I learned something about electronics, I likely wouldn't have otherwise. And I feel good to say that as a designer I did not take the attitude of 'leave it to the engineers.'

But that said, I might have learned more and gone deeper with the subjective elements of the design if I had said to myself, this project is about light, how people interact with a light I design, and what kind of meaning I can attribute to an object through light, not about learning what a diod does.

I don't know if what I did was best or not.
Reading this article I agree that the designer, regardless of a student or professional, needs to understand the fundamentals of the archetype behind their concept. But speaking from my own experience I think the undertaking of thoroughly tackling the technical elements of a design, although an invaluable ability in the working world as I'm finding at my current internship, may not always be the best use of the very limited time one has as a student. I think it is critical for students to take their own time to investigate the mechanics behind how things in our manufactured world work. But while in design school I think the main priority should be developing a students ability to develop, evaluate, and refine the subjective elements of making things that designers are the sole advocates of - user interaction, the meaning of a product, why it should be made at all etc etc. You could spend an infinite amount of time on these subjects, and maybe students should while they still have the chance to be so focused.

Where is the instructor to ask the right questions and guide thinking process? Industrial Design is the design of systems within and inter-related systems.

Pretty lipstick...

This page of the guy's portfolio would be turned over post haste... no depth of anything.... sorry. I see a lot of portfolios.

I am guessing he wasn't a Brunel graduate.

Very interesting post and valuable insights from the comments. I agree that sometime designs, even concepts, are failures because students are too disconnected from the actual functions or markets for their designs (like someone who doesn't fully understand poverty designing for a third-world country). Sometime this kind of design approach is promoted through organizations like Red Dot and IF; where designs that won awards, beyond beautiful renderings and amazing presentations, are completely unfeasible, useless, and unneeded.

I don't think it's the case with this particular sewing machine design; from an engineering stand point, it might be difficult to solve some of the problems mentions, but if the project was about "how can a seeing machine be more portable", it's an interesting student concept.

It's unfortunate that this subject originated from a major contributor of Core77 who is extremely bias, this post would be be different if the same sewing machine concept was designed by a studying of another country, say, South Korea. The same person thought a pencil with build-in LED that displays measurements while drawing freehand was "neat", and a transparent glass cellphone with water-bubbles for buttons was "bad-ass".

At least we wouldn't be having this discussion just because someone suddenly and conveniently lost the ability to imagine show a hand-wheel can be placed.

@Old Brunelian
"I am guessing he wasn't a Brunel graduate"

... He's not, but my comments above regarding understanding the user experience and demonstrating how that insight has informed your design decisions apply equally to many of the Brunel portfolios I see. I studied there myself, so have some affection for the place and appreciate their technical rigor, but their curriculum and approach is not beyond improvement: PCB in a square acrylic box anyone? ;)

Well said, I doff my (virtual) hat to you! First of all thank you for using the term sewist (not sewer) to describe people who sew and for explaining everything that is functionally wrong with this design in a manner that would make sense to real sewists. Having sewn my own wardrobe for the last couple of year, I agree with all the points you made and with the fact that there was a better designed and more functional student concept machine out there that the media omitted from their coverage. Thanks for critically covering both!

@ Ben Griffin, a fellow dt98'er

You are quite right of course - the ubiquitous acrylic slab with a PCB embedded somewhere - as indeed was my major project - dt98cai.

I do think that universities are NOT helping graduates get jobs when it comes to portfolios amongst other things however... but it does mean that good work stands out... ;)

I don't know if this is helpful, but there's a pretty good interview with the fellow who made this on DEVELOP3D's website, he goes into his process a bit and there are shots of a couple of his other projects--which might provide a needed bit of context for this conversation. The unfortunate misspelling of Mr. Fukusawa's name is something I hope they catch soon (maybe I'll email the author...)

http://develop3d.com/blog/2012/07/new-designers-2012-top-five-no.1-richard-burrow-plymouth

Personally, as an industrial design student who is a year away from "The Real World" it concerns me a great deal that the great majority of portfolios I see have some example of "CADworld" renders and models that have very little relationship to reality. Communicating to what degree a given artifact is intended to be a concept or a finished design is a tough problem, and often one we face in school in presenting our work to outside parties coming from entirely different backgrounds. I guess I can really only give an answer from my own experience, which is "treat it as a design problem"...

Hate to give a non-answer answer, but maybe that's because I recognize I may be out of my depth. Part of learning!

Something else I'd like to learn--how to keep this site from formatting my comment as a run-on sentence? HTML doesn't do anything that I can see...

The importance of design ethnography is evident here. Unfortunately, it is being done much more in HCI and digital domain, than it is in product design domain. I cannot agree with the argument that doing research would impair one's ability to break out of the current paradigm and design innovation. On the contrary I think that doing design ethnography can inspire innovative thinking.

There are a lot of comments here, so I haven't read all of them.

I hope I missed someone mentioning that maybe this is getting so much press because there are a good amount of people who would appreciate such a simple, under-functioning machine.

Maybe there is a user group, that needs a mending machine, instead of a sewing machine. Maybe then need to fix top stitching and hems every few months, and then need to not have a sewing machine the rest of the time.

Maybe the project is a joke, and the media is such that they report on the silliest of things without really understanding what they are talking about.

Was the machine seen on Fox News?

I agree with the author that students should perform more research in that they should find, understand, and define the design constraints of a product they are trying to design/ re-design.

In this case I believe this Concept is being given the criticism of a final product and should be treated as a concept that it is. With a concept there is room for improvement since it is still on the concept state.

I believe students should definitely perform more research before going in the conceptualization phase but at the same time, receive criticism according to their experience and level of expertise.

If this sewing machine was ready for market then the criticism serves it well that there was no rigorous research done but this is just a concept there is still room for improvement.

This is primarily a concept, therefore is a full render an appropriate way of demonstrating the idea?

The full render gives the illusion of completeness - we would not be having this debate if it was just a sketch.

The kid has taken a 30 second idea and spent 30 hours communicating it. A waste of time (mine and his) but not a crime.

Fundamentally a flat pack sewing machine isn't a bad idea but clearly it is lacking seriously in development.

Ultimately, it is render porn and it doesn't do much to enhance my opinion of industrial design.

I come from a mixed background, I studied PDE (Product Design Engineering) at the Glasgow School of Art, as well as University of Glasgow. The course mixes industrial design practice as well as mechanical engineering.

I've found the technical knowledge of some BA/MA educated industrial designers shocking. However, I agree that a lot of industrial design projects can be (and are allowed to be) naive, as surely 6 months to a years work by a 20-21 year old can be nothing but a bit naive? They are all trying to be Phillipe Stark before their time.

What is missing is process (sketches, user testing, prototypes) to build up a design story. Industrial designers are too focussed on the end goal; a CAD render or model to sell to the client. To be honest, joe public and people in suits have no understanding, nor interest, in the design process-they want to see the end product that they want to sell or buy-and are sold to the vision.

Who can blame young impressionable industrial designers? All they see is the beautiful CAD renders and models on websites, magazines and exhibitions. They think 'that is what design is all about'. In the same way that a young girl will look through a fashion magazine and think the airbrushed, photoshopped and contrived models are what fashion and beauty are. It's false.

You rarely see the coffee-stained biro sketches, the rough blue-foam models, the design iterations, the prototypes that didn't work. That is the true beauty of design.

There needs to be wariness of advanced renders and crisp models, as it sells a false reality to non-design observers. Many do not understand that the A-surface CAD render and the shiny model on a plinth are empty; hollow.

Equally, product designers need to understand packaging of components and how things work (that'll be the MEng in me). They need to understand the trends of motor and battery technology and can forecast what it could be like in the next 2-5 years; by looking at past and existing products and components, as well as emerging technologies.

If you can't find a motor that fits then design your own (Dyson Digital Motor anyone?).

Perhaps industrial design needs a shake-up? Link it in more with engineering and business courses; or just stop pressing the 'render' button?

Very interesting article, and very valid point. So many designers/architects get to experiment with massively unreal ideas, and we fail to learn basic practical things that will be of some use at work. Being an architect, and having been to the UCL Summer Show (Architecture) some of the projects were very interesting, but I did ask myself: so why is this architecture?
Is it about the software or the concept?

I agree with DB, the 'resolution' of your presentation piece needs to match the resolution of the design. If this was a sketch presentation with notes and annotations, or a quick photoshop illustration, we would better understand in how much detail we were meant to read the project.

Most people think that a 3D render is always preferable to a 2D illustration, but sometimes it can be counter productive. Kinda like printing a picture off your phone on A2 paper!

The only thing that gives design a bad name are those who concern themselves with such things.

This is by far and away the largest amount of feedback I have ever seen on a core77 article. As a young ID student I thank you guys for giving your insight and experience on the design process while giving me things to look out for in my own work.

WWMD? What would Mies do? While the design is reductivist and reminiscent of Bauhaus design principles at a glance, the core question raised in the article is the key. The concept that form follows function is where god is indeed in the details. This design may look enticing initially as a concept for simple storage and setup, but the author has hit the mark on his comments regarding the complete lack of utility the design brings. I would love to see a functional iteration of this that takes the feedback from the author, the end product of that effort might get to what the student was trying to achieve in this design.

I have to believe that the instructor might have been just as guilty of not knowing what the requirements are to complete the task of sewing, even at its most essential.