RE-Chronograph addresses concerns regarding sustainability such as product materiality, lifecycle and waste, by using user-driven design as a tool to change social values and attitudes towards aging products and materials. This goal is achieved through the development of a dialogue between designer, product and user, using the Internet as a medium. As the designer I have explored opportunities to upgrade a product's physical form in a manner similar to the upgrade of products digital interface, though restoration, patina and dynamic surface to facilitate these social changes.
The key goal of RE-Chronograph is to reduce waste, of both material and product; this goal is addressed in three ways within the product and its system for manufacture. The first avenue to address this goal is to elicit sentiments of attachment and value to a product through crafted user-involvement in the products production and subsequent life. The second avenue involves welcoming evolving user needs and desires by providing a system for upgrade/refurbishment. The third avenue for addressing waste reduction utilizes new manufacturing technologies, using chiefly digital techniques there is no need for tooling and excess inventory.
RE-Chronograph is tuned by the user through a framework set by a collaboration between a designer and fashion house, using an on-line interface, the product is then manufactured using chiefly additive digital processes and is dispatched to the user. This product recognizes that it is inevitable that a user's wants and needs change overtime; to facilitate these changing desires RE-chronograph can be restored and/or reconfigured at any stage of its lifecycle using the on-line interface. The user receives a dynamic product of self-expression. By involving the user in the design process and allowing for change one is able to attribute value and create appreciation of a particular object for a particular user, negating the need for replacement products and thus reducing material and product waste. The goal here however is to extend life, not to eternalize it.
Customizable/restorable elements of RE-Chronograph include the face, time telling function, housing, size, strap and buckle. The featured RE-Chronograph was user-designed by a 23 year-old male from New Zealand.
This notion of product restoration and refurbishment has been applied to a watch in this example, there is however enormous potential to craft these notions to other products such as consumer electronics. It is this designer's belief that to achieve a sustainable industry and world, we must engage in collaborative efforts with all aspects of product development and the end-user. In an effort to insight and facilitate positive change towards sustainability.
