Hasta La Ideas

At an industrial design program, students are taught the fundamentals of design. They’re also encouraged to branch out with the experimental form factors they’d never get away with at a real-life design firm where there’s big money on the line. So student concept work, by necessity, gets cut a little slack in the reality department, as you want to leave their creativity unfettered. But the question I have for you all is, where do you draw the line? Isn’t there a base level of research and understanding of the problem being solved that is an absolute requirement?

Knowing I’m obsessed with sewing machines, someone sent me a link to this folding sewing machine concept from the New Designers graduate show in London. I almost wish they hadn’t, because I worry that concept work like this can give industrial design a bad name, particularly when it gets the amount of press it’s been receiving. To me, this particular design demonstrates a lack of understanding of the problem being solved; but some of you might argue that’s a virtue. Read on.

The initial idea is laudable: To design an unintimidating sewing machine that folds flat for storage and is easy-to-use, therefore encouraging more people to mend their own things. That’s all fine and good. The problem I have with it is that the designer seems to not have done any research to understand how people actually use sewing machines, and how they physically work.

First off, the concept has just two buttons for stitch selection: A straight-stitch and a zigzag. But there is no interface to adjust the stitch length and zigzag width, two very crucial details in sewing. This is sort of like having a table saw that only cuts at one height, or a car that can only turn to round a 50-foot radius corner, nothing larger or smaller.

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