GROWING FURNITURE
SCENARIO
Children by far have a good rate of growth and maturity. This growth of children leads them to outgrow most of the things they buy, which then goes for a waste and remains unused. In order to attract the child with gifts, parents unintentionally ignore the fact that children after a certain age will outgrow that product in the coming years. Hence most of the products bought for young ones are mostly passed on to the next generation leading to repetitive designs without giving any thought to feasibility and originality.
With many attractive furniture designs in the market, parents become ignorant of the functional values and most of the times end up buying expensive furniture for their children. At the point of purchase they don’t think about the later stages of the child’s life and in few years they end up buying another piece of furniture which caters the needs of a growing child. With replacing furniture every time it becomes expensive and also the natural resources are extensively used.
BRIEF
With the advent of nuclear families, cost of living getting higher and meeting the needs of the present without affecting the future its necessary to realize the importance and need of functional furniture.“Growing furniture” is thus the new upcoming response to this problem, whereby the furniture grows in relation to the child and thus accompanies him in his successive years of growth, without having to buy products for different stages of their life. It also looks and feels perhaps different, and gets interesting for the child to see different functions from one piece of furniture.
It conserves both money and natural resources, and at the same time is convenient, functional and feasible for parents. It reduces the hassle for parents and works well for people living in compact houses.
A self project for children’s growing furniture that would involve children of the age group 2-10 years. Studying the evolving stages of a child, his/her lifestyle, and the current scenario would be an integral part of my research. This would give me a better understanding of the needs of children/parents and would thereby reflect in my design.
I intend to design and prototype furniture by exploring forms, mechanism and incorporating the need of children/parents that would make my design more valuable and different from the existing products.Being sensitive to form and having understood the need and scope for growing furniture,
I propose to work on this concept
I propose to work on this concept
TARGET MARKET
Parents
Middle and upper middle class/Nuclear families
For people living in compact houses
Open to new functional ideas
People who are practical and value money
DELIVERABLE
FURNITURE ---- Children ----- functional piece of furniture (based on research/need)
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Focus on user group
What are the existing products in this category?
Ergonomics
Material Study
Understand the stages of a child’s evolving life
Scenarios where the designed products would work in its best efficacy
Different techniques of mechanism
Learning the needs of children/parents and applying them
APPROACH/PROCESS
Market study - existing products and their prices.
Studying Consumer buying behaviour – budget, customer’s requirement, preferences
Narrow down on audience, which scenario works best for the concepts
Case study -
- Studying the current scenario - (problems faced, satisfaction, expense
- Identifying needs of customers
- Learning the evolving needs of a child
- Being aware of his/her daily activities and habits
- Uderstanding his/her likes and dislikes
Understanding the ergonomics
Developing basic furniture for children to get a better understanding
Learning the existing techniques and mechanism
Figure out the best aesthetics of the product
Developing concepts, brainstorming of ideas, sketches, Model making (if needed), prototype
Test out the functionality
MATERIAL /RESOURCES
Dovetail India Pvt. ltd
Case study involving parents and their kid’s
Talk to designers who have worked on kid’s furniture
Doubts and queries by Srishti faculty
Srishti Library, Bangalore for Books
Reading different Articles/books
You tube
Online Research/Websites
Visiting kid’s furniture stores selling similar products
LEARNING OUTCOMES
Understanding the ergonomic study of children.
Material knowledge
To observe and learn the methods of working with the skilled workers
Learn to build on skills
To explore my imagination and produce something effective
Adjusting joinery and how it functions
Various techniques that may make the production simpler
To work within a limited period of time
To work within a limited period of time
