We’d all but given up on wireless headsets. As convenient as it is to be hands-free, many devices are clunky, too heavy and occasionally ineffective. With today’s release Jawbone is changing all that. Having mastered the…
Continue Reading…
As noted before, not only is information useful, it’s also beautiful. Recognizing this, the recently appointed VP of Data at sleep and health data tracking device Jawbone, Monica Rogati, has partnered with artist Shantell Martin…
Continue Reading…
Product news: industrial designer Yves Behar has added a pocket-sized version to Jawbone‘s range of Jambox wireless speakers (+ slideshow).
San Francisco electronics brand Jawbone released the Mini Jambox as the smallest in its range of speakers, which can wirelessly connect with phones, laptops and other bluetooth devices to play music.
Jawbone’s creative director Yves Behar told Dezeen that the latest speaker was developed to make listening to music on the go a more communal activity.
“People’s experience of music is pretty selfish and very much focused on earphones,” said Behar. “I think now we expect speakers to be used everywhere, from underground to office settings.”
The speakers are made from extruded aluminium, reinventing the manufacturing process from the original Jambox to reduce the number of parts and assembly steps.
“You really have to develop some manufacturing techniques that are very, very advanced in order to make a product that is affordable,” Behar said.
A CNC machine was used to create five textured patterns on the front of the speaker and users can chose between nine different metallic colours.
The speaker is managed through an app, where Mini Jamboxes in range appear as icons in their colour and texture. Many users can connect to one Mini Jambox at a time, so everyone can contribute to the music they’re listening to.
“We play the game ‘who’s music is this?’,” said Behar. “Essentially [the Mini Jambox] becomes something that allows people to jump in and play their own music.”
In Milan two year ago, tracks submitted by Dezeen readers were played through an installation of Jamboxes called Jamscape. Earlier this year Jawbone released the UP activity-tracking wristband, which monitors how you move, sleep and eat.
We’ve also featured a gadget that plays music wirelessly through vintage speakers and a wireless speaker that you wear over your sneakers.
See more design by Yves Behar »
See more speaker design »
See more products by Jawbone »
Here is some additional information sent to us by Behar:
The Making of the Mini Jambox
The Mini Jambox is the latest entry in the category-leading family of Jawbone speakers. The original Jambox design ushered in the era of the wireless speaker with critical and commercial success. When we first explored what the Mini Jambox could be we dreamed of a very small and pocketable size, of an experience so simple and yet game changing, and of materials and processes so refined they had previously only been used in top-end audio products. Jawbone design goals are to seamlessly integrate technology and everyday life. Mini Jambox is built on the foundation that life is constantly moving; with Mini Jambox you can pick up and bring your sound environment with you. We call it pocketable sound.
The design explorations for Mini Jambox started with a blank sheet and the idea to completely re-invent the wireless speaker, as we knew it. “It’s a strange moment when everyone loves your last product, and yet you realise the next one will have to be conceived and re-invented as if we were designing it for the first time,” says Yves Behar, CCO of Jawbone.
The user-centred insight and starting point for Mini is that people love the small Jambox size, and yet they want to take the product with them without hesitation about size or weight, from a jacket pocket to a small handbag. Delivering clear, high quality sound in a small space requires a very rigid enclosure with inherent structural integrity. To fulfil this need we explored many roads. Eventually aluminium extrusions combined with a very advanced and patented assembly method became the clear winner. This new approach enabled us to achieve the most efficient use of space, as outer skin and structural skeleton are one and the same. Form and function are truly intersected, as the overall size is the smallest, yet the rigid acoustic cavity affords maximum volume for the sound chamber. The extrusion and material also confers Mini with the strength and robustness needed in a physical object made for portability.
“In order to innovate, we have to take a process and push it somewhere entirely new,” says Yves. The demanding pursuit of refining the aluminium extrusion into an entirely new construction and aesthetic took twelve months, flexing what might be possible with a mechanical engineering assembly that requires fewer parts and assembly steps, stewarding major leaps in production capabilities at scale. “The result is that the Mini exterior skin is also the internal skeleton, in one fluid gesture; we are not just wrapping internal components with a sexy package, the package is the sound chamber.”
The Jawbone design language has always pursued minimal construction and geometry, made personal through the integral use of relief textures that are both personal and tactile. On Mini, we are pushing the boundary of rough and fast CNC, typically used to machine mechanical internal details. We flip the use of this usually hidden process, employing it externally to reveal beautiful capabilities for textures. We used large CNC cutting bits programmed to sculpt a few marks in the aluminium at high speed; the resulting intersections create new unexpected patterns. The beautiful reliefs, enhanced by reflecting light on Mini, are the result of a craft methodology developed with small machine shop partners, requiring a deep collaboration between designers, machinists, and engineers.
The CNC process innovation has transformed what’s both possible and efficient in using aluminium. We turned CNC, an industrial process, into a brush we can paint with. Mini Jambox speakers’ highly specialised perforations and unique framework channel sound for clear, elegantly routed sound. Functionally driven design that is also expressive.
The five textures and nine anodised colours allow people to make Mini into their own personality. The textures also provide a tactile grip, and each of them is carefully matched to an anodised colour that shows aluminium relief best.
From the design to the user interface and packaging, we believe Mini Jambox is our crown jewel of Jawbone design and craft. “Every element goes back to the purest expression of simplicity, performance, and elegance,” says Yves. Mini combines beautiful design and experience at the most minimal size. Providing unparalleled and uncompromised listening in a breakthrough highly portable mini package, Mini Jambox blasts rich sounds at high volume. The integrity of the Mini materials and craft enhances our music experience in ways we could only have dreamed off.
The post Mini Jambox by
Jawbone appeared first on Dezeen.
Since its introduction in November 2010, Jawbone’s Jambox has done what few products in its space have: remained relevant. While we’ve since seen various iterations of the Yves Béhar design, from Big Jambox to our very own CH Edition…
Continue Reading…
News: a wristband designed by Yves Behar for San Francisco electronics brand Jawbone that monitors how you move, sleep and eat has now launched in Europe, just over a year after its initial launch was plagued by technical problems.
Available from Jawbone’s website and in Apple stores, the flexible UP wristband collects data on the user’s activity round the clock. It then delivers information and tips on how to improve the results through a smartphone app, which has now launched on Android as well as iOS.
Travis Bogard, Jawbone’s head of product management and strategy, told Dezeen how extensive user-testing had helped to improve the design after an initial batch was withdrawn due to problems with water resistance and reliability.
“There were issues where the batteries were not holding charge after about a week for some people,” he said. “We’ve gone back to the drawing board and re-designed it from the ground up.”
Bogard said the product was designed to be something people would forget they are wearing. “Think about something like a watch: most people won’t wear their watch to sleep,” he said. “It’s too bulky and uncomfortable. With UP we’re trying to build something you’ll wear throughout the day and throughout the night. Size is a very important enabler of that, as well as flexibility and comfort. Basically it needs to disappear.”
Motion-sensing technology works out how active the wearer has been and vibrates to remind them to get up and move about after a period of inactivity. At night the wristband tracks how long and how deeply they’ve slept.
Wearers can also take photos of their food or scan barcodes to enter information about their nutritional intake, and tell the app how they’re feeling in order to work out how their sleep, movements and eating affect their mood.
The key feature of Jawbone’s wristband is that it learns about the wearer over time, Bogard said. “It will help you understand yourself better. It helps you understand what was going on with your sleep, your food, how you compare to other people.”
The development of the wristband reflects Jawbone creative director Yves Behar’s belief that creating hardware and software at the same time is design’s “new frontier”, as he told an audience at London Design Festival last year.
UP is one of a number of wearable devices to come onto the market over the past couple of years, alongside Nike’s activity-tracking Fuelband and the forthcoming Google Glass headset.
John Hanke, head of Google Maps, predicted the future of wearable computing in a recent interview with Dezeen, saying: “People are working on skin sensors and other ways of transmitting information to us in a way that’s passive and that doesn’t require us to divert our attention.”
We previously reported on the Jambox wireless speaker by Jawbone – watch an interview about it that we filmed with company founder Yves Behar in Milan, or see all design by Jawbone.
Here’s more information from Jawbone:
Jawbone® today announced European availability and a new AndroidTM application for UPTM, its revolutionary wristband and app system that helps you learn things about yourself and your lifestyle that you never knew. UP fits effortlessly into the way you live to help you understand how you sleep, move, eat and feel, and how those activities affect one another. It delivers useful and engaging information through a smartphone application that generates personalised insights to help you make meaning of the data and achieve your goals.
“We are excited to expand the UP community by introducing support for Android, 11 new languages for iOS, and product availability in more than 25 additional countries around the world,” said Travis Bogard, Jawbone vice president of product management and strategy. “Everyone wants to improve upon themselves; we’ve found this to be a fundamental human desire, no matter where a person is starting from or what they want to achieve. Today marks a big step toward our commitment to help people establish a basis for behavior change by bringing UP to everyone who wants to live better lives.”
UP Gives You a Rich Picture of Yourself
UP utilises sensors in the wristband, the powerful phone in your pocket, and data in the cloud to deliver a narrative of your daily life:
– Sleep: UP employs a revolutionary sleep tracking system. Sophisticated motion-sensing technology tracks micro-movements of your wrist to deliver unprecedented detail including how long it took you to fall asleep, how much light vs. deep sleep you got, how long you were in bed and how many times you woke up during the night. By using the new Power Nap feature or setting the silent Smart Alarm, UP wakes you at the most optimal point in your sleep cycle so you wake up feeling refreshed and alert.
– Move: UP gives you comprehensive information about how you move throughout the day, including active vs. idle time, intensity of movement, total steps, distance, and calories burned. UP also vibrates gently to remind you to get up and move when you’ve been inactive for a specified amount of time.
– Eat: UP helps you understand more about your food choices. Simply take a photo of your food to create a visual journal, or go deeper by scanning a barcode or searching the database for more complete nutritional information.
– Mood: UP lets you keep track of how you feel throughout the day so you can correlate how your sleep, movement and eating affect your mood.
– Insights: UP analyzes your data to deliver highly personalised insights. It reveals connections between different elements of your life, shows how you compare to others, and educates with new information that’s tailored for you. The more you use UP, the more powerful the insights will become.
UP is Designed for the Way You Live
UP is a sophisticated computer wrapped comfortably around your wrist and built to withstand everyday life. Encased in a smooth, hypoallergenic, medical-grade rubber, UP is shower- and splash-resistant so that you can wear it all day and night. With up to ten days of battery life you rarely have to take it off to charge.
“The UP band is powered by the patented MotionX® engine which encapsulates years of technology development and innovation on the biomechanics of natural human motion. The accuracy and power efficiency of MotionX has been critical in enabling UP to deliver a 24/7 product experience,” said Philippe Kahn, CEO and founder of Fullpower, developer of the MotionX technology.
Available Beginning March 20
The UP band comes in three sizes (Small, Medium, and Large) and eight colours (Onyx, Mint Green, Light Grey, Blue, Navy Blue, Red, Orange, Hunter Green), and will be available at Jawbone.com and Apple Stores in Europe beginning today. Apple Stores in Asia and Australia will begin carrying UP next month, along with other retail locations in Europe, Asia, Australia, and The Middle East. Visit Jawbone.com/retail-partners for the most up-to-date availability.
The UP by Jawbone App for Android is available today as a free download on Google PlayTM. Jawbone’s iOS app, UP by Jawbone 2.4, is available today in 11 languages as a free download from the App Store. The UP wristband is required for the app.
The post UP activity-tracking wristband by Jawbone
relaunches in Europe appeared first on Dezeen.
Initially released this time last year, the Jawbone UP, designed by Yves Behar, made its debut as a holistic life tracker worn on the wrist 24/7. As you may remember, the bendable band syncs with an iPhone app to record bodily information such as daily activity, sleep and diet….
Continue Reading…
In this movie filmed by Dezeen, Bandar Antabi of designer electronics brand Jawbone explains how the company took a holistic approach to designing their Big Jambox wireless speaker.
“[When] we look at design it’s not only the external facade of the product, but also the internals and software, and how basically users interact with the product,” says Antabi.
San Francisco start-up company Jawbone first launched the Jambox in 2010, which became the top selling wireless speaker in the USA and UK, so they launched the Big Jambox as a larger but still portable version.
It streams audio from smart devices wirelessly via bluetooth and is portable enough to be carried in one hand.
Designer Yves Behar has been working with Jawbone for almost ten years as their chief creative officer and is involved in all design decisions for products, including the Big Jambox.
A continuous, perforated stainless-steel sheet wraps around the front, top and back of the speaker, which Antabi describes as “a manufacturing feat”.
Yves Behar and Jawbone collaborated with Dezeen to create an installation of over 1600 Jambox speakers that played original tracks submitted by Dezeen readers in Milan 2011 – find out more about the project here. Read more in our previous stories about the Jambox here and the Big Jambox here.
See all our stories about speakers »
See all our stories about Jawbone »
See all our stories about Yves Behar »
The post “We take a very holistic approach to design”
– Bandar Antabi of Jawbone appeared first on Dezeen.
More than 100 different color combinations now available
When something is modular and colorful creative-types can’t help but mix and match parts. As fans of the Jawbone’s Jambox since its launch, we have a few here at CH HQ and are guilty of dismantling and reassembling them in different colorways. With today’s launch of Remix, any Jambox…
Continue Reading…
Yves Behar’s Big Jambox wireless speakers are available at Dezeen Super Store at 38 Monmouth Street, London WC2, and will be providing the music at the launch party on Thursday.
Wrapped in textured metal mesh, the Big Jambox is designed to fill a large space with sound and pairs wirelessly with up to eight bluetooth devices, controlled remotely via those devices or using bottons on the case. It includes a microphone for making calls via Skype or FaceTime. Read more about it in our earlier story.
They’re available in red white and grey for £260.
The party takes place at Dezeen Super Store on Thursday 12 July from 6 to 9pm with sounds by Dezeen Music Project and Big Jambox. Get more details here and RSVP to office@dezeen.com.
Don’t forget Dezeen friends can get 10% off any purchase (excluding sale stock and Jambox) and enter our competition to win a designer watch worth £150 by downloading this flyer and presenting it at the store.
If you can’t make it on Thursday the shop is open until 30 September so we hope to see you soon!
Dezeen Super Store
38 Monmouth Street, London WC2
1 July – 30 September 2012
Monday to Saturday: 11am to 7pm
Sunday: 11am to 5pm
Party: Thursday 12 July, 6-9pm
The post Big Jambox by Yves Behar for Jawbone
at Dezeen Super Store appeared first on Dezeen.
Electronics brand Jawbone have launched a larger and louder version of their wireless Jambox speaker, designed by creative director Yves Behar to fill a large space with sound.
The Big Jambox has similar styling to the portable original, with textured metal mesh wrapping the front, top, back and base. This version also boasts rubber feet to reduce vibration.
It will pair wirelessly with up to eight bluetooth devices, controlled remotely via those devices or using bottons on the case, and includes a microphone for making calls via Skype or FaceTime.
The Big Jambox is not so portable as the original, measuring 25.6 x 8 x 9.3cm and weighs 1.23kg, compared to the original version at 15.3 x 4.1 x 5.8cm.
It comes in three colours and textures: Graphite Hex, White Wave and Red Dot and will be released in the US this month before rolling out internationally over the coming months.
Watch Behar talking about Jambox in our interview from Milan last year on Dezeen Screen.
See Behar’s sketches of the original Jambox on Dezeen here and see all our stories about fuseproject here.
Here’s some more information from Jawbone:
BIG JAMBOXTM by JAWBONE®: DESIGN FOR YOUR LIFE
Yves Behar, Chief Creative Officer, Jawbone
The original JAMBOX SmartSpeaker is both a critical and commercial success that has ushered in the era of the wireless speaker. The new entrant in the JAMBOX line, the BIG JAMBOX, takes all of the design attributes that made the original a success, and pushes the boundaries of materials, manufacturing and form to the next level.
Over the last 10 years, Jawbone has approached design with the goal of seamlessly integrating technology and everyday life. At Jawbone, we believe that innovative product design is what unites our achievements in science, technology, engineering and craft, bringing each element together to form a single quality product in a beautiful package. As the embodiment of Jawbone’s overarching design philosophy – “Sound Designed for Your Life” – BIG JAMBOX was built on the foundation that empathy for our users’ lifestyles inspires better design.
This design ecosystem is expressed through:
a) Clear geometric forms and a refined simplicity
b) Relief textures that are functional, tactile and visually stunning
c) Unique, proprietary materials and manufacturing processes
BIG JAMBOX is the purest expression of the Jawbone design ethos. The pure proportions and geometry are the first elements one notices.
The refined volume makes BIG JAMBOX portable, while delivering incredible sound performance. To maximize performance and minimize obstructions, perforated metal wraps the front, top, back, and underside of BIG JAMBOX. A series of patented relief textures are applied to the metal minimizing vibration and maximizing the structural integrity and robustness. The wave, hex and dot textures also minimize material thickness, and provide a visual playfulness as the light catches and defines the subtle relief. The seamless edge-‐to-‐edge transitions of the perforated steel require considerable manufacturing innovations, resulting in a proprietary process that pushes the boundaries of art and engineering.

The thin elastomer edges frame the openness of the metal, and integrate an on/off button with a ring LED, a pairing button and connectors within its surface. The same material is used for easy to identify controls that are sized and spaced for quick and easy use. On the underside eight rubber feet isolate BIG JAMBOX from vibrations and ensure it stays firmly in place, even when pumping out deep bass.
While most of the industry is trying hard to up one another with decorative forms, BIG JAMBOX aims to deliver the best sound with the most honest design and experience. These principles extend to all areas of the design for BIG JAMBOX, from the packaging to the product experience. Simplicity and performance are what we strive for and what we aim to integrate into our users’ everyday lives.

.
Yves Behar on Jambox – Watch this movie on Dezeen Screen »
Gabriel Lamb of fuseproject on Jambox – Watch this movie on Dezeen Screen »
.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
