Great Industrial Design Student Work: The Attaché Folding Stool by Rain Noe

"There are some problems with folding furniture," observed mechanical engineer Chi-Hao Chiang, who left his native Taiwan to pursue a Masters in Industrial Design at Pratt Institute. "Folding chairs can be folded flat and the seat height is proper, but it's too long for people to carry, especially those who are short. Folding stools are easy to carry, but the seat height is too short for people to sit comfortably, especially those who are tall."

As one of his first projects at Pratt, Chiang set out to create an easy-to-carry portable chair with the appropriate height. His ME background peeks out a bit in the sketches:

Ideation & Mockup

"Making small physical mockups to test the feasibility. The result shows that the rear legs cannot stand stably with the weight of the seat."

"For the second concept, adjusting the proportion and thickness of legs, adding a notch and latch as a hard stop to increase the stability, while also being a handle."

Mechanism

"These restricted-angle pivots are designed to increase the bearing strength. Two teeth on each side would catch into the grooves to make the front and rear legs unfold at the certain angle (45.65 degrees) to stand independently and stably. Using PLA 3D printing to make the prototype, then using steel 3D printing to build the final precise model."

Full-Scale Prototype

"Building the 3D model with Fusion 360, defining the angle to make Attaché be most compact. The whole stool uses repeating angles to have a consistent design language and clean shape both in folded and unfolded form. Using CNC process on MDF to make the full-scale prototype, testing the accuracy of the mechanism and feeling the tangibility."

Final Model

For the final model, called the Attaché Folding Stool, Chiang swapped out the MDF for maple, stuck with steel for the connectors, and used Domino joinery.

Chiang subsequently gained his ID degree, and is now working in New York as an industrial designer.

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A Discreet AirTag Holder for Bikes by Rain Noe

"Every employee here has had a bike stolen," writes Elevation Lab, a Portland-based industrial design firm turned accessories brand. They're not alone: Each year in the U.S., an estimated 190,000 to 2 million bikes are stolen.

For that reason, Elevation Lab designed this Tagvault: Bike, a discreet bike-mounted AirTag holder.

"We purposefully designed this not to look like an AirTag holder," they write. "So it's hidden in plain view. [It] bolts to standard bottle cage mounting points."

The holder is IPX5 waterproof rated, weighs 26 grams and comes with anti-theft titanium bolts (as well as the required driver).

At $20, the company says, "It's the cheapest one-time insurance you can buy."

"Here, thiefie thiefie thiefee...."

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Free Hot Water: The Suntap Solar Water Heater by Rain Noe

Austria-based industrial design consultancy Salz designed this solar water heater for emerging markets.

While conducting research in an impoverished area of Mexico, Salz learned that residents were scraping by with two different sources of heat, and suffering for it:

"Most families we talked to had gas stoves for quick meals and reheating. The stoves were not used for daily cooking due to the high cost of gas. Outside wood fireplaces were used for cooking tortillas, beans and to heat water. Currently families bath every 3rd day. With more hot water available they'd bath every day and wash dishes with hot water."

The firm also observed that in this region, houses use rooftop gravity-fed water tanks.

They designed the heater to work with these, in this manner:

A startup called Suntap has commercialized the design and constructed 15 prototypes to date. They say that on a warm day, the Suntap heater can produce 15 gallons (56 liters) of 160°F (70°C) hot water; they also claim their system's output, on a daily basis, is the equivalent of displacing 4 pounds of wood, 8 ounces of gas or 30 square feet of solar panels.

The company says they can manufacture the units for $40 a pop in small-batch production, but can get that down to $15-$25 per unit in a 10,000-plus run. They've selected Mexico, India and Africa as their initial markets, where people are getting by on as little as $2 a day.

I think the company wouldn't do badly by targeting disaster preppers in America as well.

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Great Industrial Design Student Work: Alissa Wolter's Moodable Lamp by Rain Noe

This Moodable lamp was done by Alissa Wolter, when she was studying Product & Interaction Design at the Kunsthochschule Berlin.

"Moodable is an interactive lamp that can be adapted to various situations. The light quality can be changed by a simple and intuitive motion: opening the lamp changes light temperature, brightness and propagation angle simultaneously. The principle is based on a folding mechanism that enables digital lighting control through an analogue gesture, thus creating an intuitive user experience."

"The two halves of the housing are identical, making production and assembly easier."

Moodable won the Lighting Design Awards' Lighting Product Design of the Year for the project in 2019.

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QuickDraw: A Hidden Under-Desk Charging Cable Mount by Rain Noe

This clever little gizmo is by Elevation Lab, an industrial design firm that evolved into a brand, following a wildly successful iPhone dock they designed and Kickstarted in 2012. Today the company designs and sells both desk accessories and Apple accessories.

Called QuickDraw, it adheres to the underside of your desk, keeping your charging cable tidily out of the way. A quick-release mechanism holds the cable in place, and a spring-loaded clip allows you to reel more or less cable, as needed.

Here's how it works:

QuickDraw runs just $13.

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