Interviews

I interviewed five people on their thoughts about the bandaid holder. Marilyn has a 3 year old daughter, Bobbie has a 12 year old daughter, Katilyn is 12, Vikram plays a lot of sports, and Chris is an EMT student. Below are the answers to the questions that I asked followed by pictures of them holding the product itself. 

Q: What is your initial reaction of this product?

Answers:

Marilyn: What is it?

Bobbie: Band-Aid holder, why is it a keychain?

Katilyn: Band-Aid holder.

Vikram: Mini first aid kit.

Chris: It is too big to be mobile.

Q: What do you think the function is?

Answers:

Marilyn: A Band-Aid holder that doesn’t hold enough.

Bobbie: Band-Aid holder that you wear around your neck.

Katilyn: Where does it open up?

Vikram: To pull Band-Aids out of.

Chris: Easy access to a Band-Aid.

Q: Do you think this is useful?

Answers:

Marilyn: No, this would fall to the bottom of my purse and I would never remember it again.

Bobbie: No, you can’t have multiple sizes and the Band-Aids inside are cheap.

Katilyn: No, the Band-Aids will fall out.

Vikram: I guess, but I would rather take the Band-Aids out and throw away the holder.

Chris: No.

Q: What would you change?

Answers:

Marilyn: Make it more portable and wouldn’t get lost in my purse.

Bobbie: Make it more flexible to hold and to able to keep Band-Aids of more than one size.

Katilyn: Make it bigger and use a design that would actually keep the Band-Aids in it.

Vikram: It needs to be easier to hold and it seems use a lot of plastic for nothing.

Chris: Make it completely closed so that it is still sterile.

Q: Would you use it?

Answers:

Marilyn, Bobbie, and Chris: No.

Katilyn: I have some, but I have never actually used them.

Vikram: Only if it was the last thing that I had.

Q: Do you like the product?

Answers:

All: No.

Q: How much would you pay for it?

Answers:

All: Wouldn’t pay for it; only have them because they are freebies.

Chris: Would buy if it was for a charity.

Q: Outside of the design, do you find yourself liking the function?

Answers:

All: Yes!

Q: Outside of the function, do you find yourself liking the design?

Answers:

All: No.

Q: Is this product, if it was designed in a better way, important enough to buy?

Answers:

All: Would purchase if it was nice enough.

Chris: No, but I think people would, especially moms.

Make It Better Project

For our next Thinking and Making project, we were split up into groups of 3 to 4. Each of us brought in 3 objects that we thought were poorly designed. Out of the twelve objects, we then picked the one we thought was the worst. Blake, Meghan, Brittney, and I are going to be redesigning a bandaid holder. We thought the bandaid holder, picture shown below, was useless. It doesn't hold the bandaids well, it isn't appealing to the eye whatsoever, and it just isn't as simple as it should be. The progress of our project will be posted throughout our design process. 

Objectified Notes

·      Best things of industrial design are the things that we don't realize were designed.

·      When we wake up, everything in our world was designed.

·      “Every object tells a story, if you know how to read it"- Henry Ford 

·      The goal is to improve people’s everyday life without them even knowing it or thinking about it.

·      A lot of people react positively when designs are easy to understand and easy to use- we have too many unnecessary things everywhere. People want simplicity.

·      Unobtrusive designs almost feel like they aren’t designs.

·      Each part in a design offers functionality.

·      If it isn’t necessary then it shouldn’t be there.

·      The smallest almost unnoticeable pieces of a design are part of it and functional.

·      Design is moving from tangible to intangible.

·      Design is the search for form.

·      Designers understand what people need, even more so than they do themselves.

·      Design is to create a comfortable environment where people feel good.

·      A harder part of museum is getting rid of everything that isn’t necessary.

·      Designers job is about what is going to happen, not about what has happened

·      Philosophy is fundamentally non-disposable.

·      Companies use design as a way to create value and raise prizes

·      There is design that costs more and some that cost less, some is good, some is bad.

·      The idea is that good design is something that distinguishes you. Target had that in an attainable way.

·      Designs become a part of the family. A vase becomes the vase mom always used or the chair becomes the chair that dad always sat in.

·      Ask yourself if you would buy it yourself.

·      Design is about mass production. Using industry to produce cereal goods.

·      Like we are afraid to admit that we are in the 3^rd technological world.

·      Why do we feel that we need to keep using things from the past?

·      Are the things we doing really having an effect and making a change?

·      Why would we have poorly designed projects when we have tons of good designs out there?

·      Design something that is better with use.

·      Wearing in instead of wearing out. Relationship is more satisfying as time goes on.

·      Working to stimulate people’s minds.

·      Needs to be plugged into natural human behavior.

·      A lot of designers design for the 10 percent that already have too much stuff when the other 90 don’t even have the common necessities.

·      Have to know that most things will once end up in landfills. Products are living in such a complex environment.

·      Now we have to think about what happens with our designs after people are done using it, how will it be disposed of?

·      Designers creating scenarios around objects. Teach people consequences on what they decide to use.

·      Consumers imagine how an object will affect their lives.

·      Value of design will be measured in the future more than it is now and how it will enable us to survive on this planet. 

Good Design Project Summary

During this project I learned about good design by watching the videos, reading the books, and learning about color schemes. By doing all these things, it changed the way I look at designs around me. Everywhere I go I find myself looking at things and asking if they are good design and if the color scheme that was used is a successful one or not.

My final poster shows good design. It shows how something as simple as a ring holder can be functional and decorative. The simplicity of the object also shows that the smallest things that we often don’t think about are also design. I believe that the best way to create a poster of my object was to also keep it simple. I only used one image so I created a balance between the ring holder and the text to keep it from being boring.

I chose to use a limited palette color scheme for the poster to create an overall unity. The ring holder itself is plain black and I didn’t want the background or text to be overbearing and to take away from it. I decided to make the “o” in the word “on” bright pink so that there is also a bit of emphasis on the phrase. I did this because you use the object by indeed putting rings on it.

The toughest part of the project was the designing of the poster. I am photography major that doesn’t have much experience in any other forms of design. I am learning to open up my mind to other artistic elements and to stop thinking just through a camera lens. Although it was difficult for me, I found it interesting to learn in a way that leans more towards graphic design. It has also been interesting trying to teach myself InDesign, but I am already seeing improvement in that aspect.