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issue: June 2011 ApplianceMagazine.com
Concept Appliances
Design Lab 2011 Top 25 Semi-Finalists |
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The 25 semi-finalists for Design Lab 2011 have been announced by Electrolux. |
Electrolux
has staged the design competition every year for nine years.
The competition is open to design students around the world, who submit
their designs for future appliances based a certain theme. This year's
theme:
Intelligent Mobility.
Electrolux received 1300 entries in 2011 and chose 25 concept
appliances to be their finalists. They come from 14 countries
around the world – three each from Australia, New Zealand,
and Poland; two each from Canada, the Czech Republic, France, South
Korea, and the United States.
Electrolux will narrow the field from 25 to eight finalists in July
2011. The eight finalists will present their concept
appliances to a jury of expert designers, who'll chose the 2011 winners
based on the criteria of:
• intuitive design
• innovation
• consumer insight
First prize is a six-month paid internship at an Electrolux global
design centre and 5,000 Euros. Second prize is 3,000 Euros and third
prize is 2,000 Euros.
"The top 25 are to be congratulated on their approach – the
combination of lateral thinking and creativity is inspiring," said
Henrik Otto, senior vice president of Global Design at Electrolux.
The 25 semi-finalists, Otto said, offer the most interesting solutions
for future living and best consider intelligent mobility
in the appliance design. They are presented in random order.
Robo TAP Cleaner
Country: South Korea
Designer: Gyu Ha Choi
School: Handong Global University The
Robo TAP
adds a new capability to current robotic vacuum cleaners: human guided
targeting. An indoor positioning system (IPS) is synchronized to a
small remote control attached to the user's shoe. Two show-taps on a
dirty spot alerts the Robo TAP to the spot. Two more taps will cancel
the summons and three taps tells the robot to go back to its
predetermined route. |
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EcoWash
Dinner Set
Country:
New Zealand
Designer:
David Stockton
School:
Massey University School of Design
The
EcoWash is a portable dishwasher requiring no electricity to operate.
Place the dirty plates and cutlery into the unit, add water and
dishwashing liquid, close it up, and crank the handle. The interior
rotates to wash the dishes. A small hatch on the bottom opens
to allow the water to drain. Washed and rinsed dishes can be spun again
to spin off most of the moisture using centrifugal force.
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EMS Cooker
Country: Czech Republic
Designer team: Simona Hruskova
School: Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague
The EMS Cooker is worn as a wristband to absorb kinetic
energy. The
wristband can then be removed and rolled out for use as heating plate
or wrapped around a coffee mug to keep food warm or to heat it up.
But can it really generate enough heat to actually cook a small pot of
food, as the "Cooking" photo suggests? |
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GULL
Air Purifier
Country: Poland
Designer: Tomasz Siemek
School: GWSP – Gliwicka Wyzsza Szkola Przedsiebiorczosci
GULL, which clearly takes its design inspiration from birds, is
designed to clean the air in a living space using lemon oil. The
designer said its removes up to 99.96% of air pollution and bacteria
while spreading a light lemon oil aroma.
Kinetic energy is employed here – as in the semi-finalist EMS
cooker –
to power the unit with a human assist. Human energy is
employed to
charge a small battery. The unit hangs from the ceiling or
stands on a
surface. |
Heat
Grenade
Country:
New Zealand
Designer:
Sam Evans
School:
Massey University
The
Heat
Grenade portable cooking device intended for use in
emergencies and powered by paper-thin batteries. The batteries recharge
from water absorbed from the air. It's easily stored and carried when
closed up, with its sleek, elongated egg profile. When open,
the four sides unfold and it becomes an operational cooker with a black
glass surface. A small control panel slides out from under
one of the cooking "petals."
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Honeycomb
Modular Induction Tiles
Country:
Australia
Designer:
Alfred Ching
School:
University of New South Wales
The
Honeycomb is a modular induction cooker system ideal for compact
homes or wherever a hot plate would be useful. The hexagonal modules
click together when and where needed, and into whatever configuration
fit the user's current need. It's controlled via a wireless
Bluetooth remote. The modules are stackable, making them easy
to store away. |
Intelligent
Mobility Scale
Bag
Country:
Czech Republic
Designer:
Karel Vránek
School:
Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague>
This
designer bag is scalable in terms of its size – folding
small when empty, and expanding to make room for groceries when
shopping.
The
bag also is designed with (apparently photovoltaic) scales on its
exterior. Sunlight causes the scales on the surface to
“bristle.” These scales are intended to "transform
solar energy" and use it to cool the inside of the bag, making it ideal
for storing and chilling food.
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Mixer 2050 – The
Marble
Country:
Brazil
Designer:
Eduardo Murara Nauiack
School:
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do
Paraná – PUCPR
It
looks to be about the size of a golf ball, but it's a
mixer. Put the ingredients in a bowl, toss in a Marble mixer,
and it will automatically bounce around inside the bowl mixing the
ingredients.
Rotor
blades are made of nanotechnology rubber that "makes them
flexible when not in use but hard as steel once in motion." This way
they’re safe and easy to clean, but effective when in use.
Keeping many of them in a bowl makes a nice design piece in the kitchen.
Mixing
time is set with a shake. Shake is a little to add 15 seconds of
mixing time; shake it hard to add a minute.
This
writer notes that the rubber used in the Marble Mixer would
certainly be effective in this application—and in thousands
of others. It is unknown if such a material is currently available for
product manufacturing. |
Mobile Induction Heat Plate
Country:
Finland
Designer:
Tommi Moilanen,
School:
Aalto University School of Art and Design
This
smart induction hot plate is intended to be a compact cooking
device for those on the go. Put the hot plate wherever you want to
cook. Your smartphone app is the remote control.
The app is also designed to be used with intelligent food packaging,
with NFC-tags providing instructions for properly heating the
food. A wooden handle makes it easy to carry and easy to store
by hanging it on the wall while recharging the battery. |
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Mobile Kitchen Kit
Country: USA
Designer:
Elizabeth Reuter
School:
Purdue University
This
Mobile Kitchen Kit contains everything needed to cook skillet
meals while taking up very little space. The lid is a cutting
board. The container itself can be used as a makeshift
sink. The container stores:
•
fitted, flexible induction
cooking pad
•
strainer
•
spatula
•
wooden spoon
•
cutting knife
•
peeling knife
•
sauce pan
•
skillet
|
Mywash
Country:
Australia
Design
Team: Saba Zare
School:
University of New South Wales
Mywash
is a communal washing machine designed for use with personalized
laundry baskets that also serve as washing drums. Operation is
performed by simply loading the baskets with laundry and, when ready to
wash, placing the basket atop the washer and dryer. The basket will be
automatically loaded and the user will be notified, and can then
control the wash cycle using a smartphone app from anywhere. The phone
application allows the user to chose the wash cycles and options. |
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Onda Portable Microwave
Country:
USA
Designer:
Matthew Schwartz
School:
California State University Long Beach
The
Onda portable microwave oven slides onto the packaging of
pre-prepared meals. As the seal of the packaging is broken,
the handheld oven creates a circuit connection. Paper batteries produce
the energy needed to cook the food. |
Ozel
Kinetic Blender
Country:
Malaysia
Design
Team: Uzair B. Abdul Rashid
School:
Universiti Teknologi MARA
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Kinetic
batteries are contained inside the handle of the Ozel blender,
replacing the traditional electrical cord. To recharge the battery, the
user removes the handle and shakes it as much as is required.
Inside
the blender, traditional rotating blades have been replaced by
nylon ropes. which swirl quickly to chop, mix, and blend. |
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Ping
Pong
Country:
France
Design
Team: Arthur Kenzo
School:
École de Design Nantes Atlantique (Shanghai)
Ping
Pong is a wireless cooking assistant. The Pings
(sensor/transmitters) are attached to a cooking utensil, such as a soup
pan, and the user takes the Pong receiver elsewhere in the house to
continue another task. The Ping will sends cooking information to the
Pong, allowing the user to monitor cooking from another room. |
Portable Washing Machine
Country:
Slovakia
Designer:
Adrian Mankovecky
School:
Academy of Fine Arts and Design Bratislava
Four
pre-installed cleaning programs are available for quick and easy
use garment cleaning by this portable washing machine. The user
separates the two components of the device, places one on each side of
the garment with a stain or odor, and chooses the suitable cleaning
program. The device cleans the spot using negative ions and steam. It
is powered with a sugar crystal battery. |
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Ribbon
Country:
Australia
Designer:
Enzo Kocak
School:
Monash University
The
Ribbon is an all-in-one hotplate, warming device, and cooler for
portable use. It wraps around a vessel containing food or drink for
heating or chilling. The black side provides heat while the white side
cools. A rechargeable thermoelectric cell battery can also reverse the
charging process– whilst not in use the cells convert excess
heat back into electricity. |
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Ringoo
Country:
Poland
Design
Team: Jacek Chrzanowski
School:
Academy of Fine Art im.W.Strzeminskiego in Lódz
Ringoo
is a small circular microwave heater for warm drinks. Any liquid poured
through the ring becomes hot. |
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Breez
Portable Dish
Dryer
Country:
Canada
Designer:
Andrew Parsons
School:
Humber College
Breez
is a portable, easy-to-stow dish dryer that helps the user
quickly dry hand-washed plates, avoiding the spread of bacteria and
germs that can occur when drying many plates with the same cloth. A
digital pulse motor concentrates air to a thin, 400-mph stream that
blows the plate dry when it is moved through the machine. |
Salvé
Bagel Toaster
Country:
Canada
Designer:
Kent Madden
School:
Carleton University
This
portable
bagel toaster is especially convenient for those who
can’t find time to eat breakfast in the morning. Place a
bagel in the toaster and it will automatically start rotating until the
user feels the bagel is sufficiently toasted. The toaster is energy
efficient, running on sugar crystal
batteries or recharged on a ceramic dock using induction. |
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Smoobo
Blender
Country:
New Zealand
Designer:
Roseanne de Bruin
School:
Massey University
This
device is a smoothie-making blender. Users put their favorite
ingredients inside the rubber ball, shut it, and start bouncing it
around. The bounce activates the motor and spins the blades, powered by
kinetically charged batteries. The Smoobo surface is made of uneven
rubber knobs to make the bouncing unpredictable and more fun.
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Sous-vide
Cell cooker
Country:
Hungary
Designer:
Adam Miklosi
School:
University of West Hungary – Institute of Applied Arts
The
Sous-vide Cell cooker is inspired by the professional slow cooking
trend. The Sous-vide cooks food at pre-determined times and comes with
web and smartphone apps to help the user plan a menu. Ingredients are
sealed in airtight plastic bags and in water bath for what may be
extremely long cooking times (the designer says 72 hours is not an
unusual cooking time) and held at temperatures that can be much lower
than traditional cooking (around 140 °F). |
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Take-away
Steward
Country:
China
Designer:
Qin Haitao Qin
School:
Liaoning University of Technology
The
Steward is a food delivery postbox system designed to keep
delivered take-away food fresh at your home or work place until you can
collect it. An integrated electronic system allows the user to order
food and set a password with the delivery company. When the food
arrives, the deliverer uses the password and places the food in the
postbox. The Steward will automatically hold the food at its optimal
temperature. The exterior is a solar panel coated material that powers
the unit. |
Wave
Country:
South Korea
Designer:
Kim Min Seok
School:
Seoul National University of Technology & Science
The
Wave washing assistant helps identify the severity of a stain and
helps pre-treat the stain. The contamination sensor determine what
needs to be done, then the Wave applies ultrasound and water to stains
and uses hot air to dry as required. When the Wave is placed in its
dock for charging, it can also communicate with the users' washing
machine, sharing information in order to achieve the best wash results
with the minimum use of water and detergents. |
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Warm
& Cool
Country:
France
Designer:
François Hurtaud
School:
École de Design de Nantes
The
WarmNCool is designed for the convenient storing and heating of
leftovers. Divided in to two sections, the airtight bottom section
works like a fridge, keeping leftovers cool. The top section stores the
heat generated from the operation of the refrigeration system. On the
following day, when the users wants to partake of the leftovers, the
containers are switched and thermo-electric batteries act like a
microwave to reheat the food. |
Mohe
Country:
Poland
Designer:
Krzysztof Luchowiec
School:
Akademia Sztuk Pieknych w Krakowie
Mohe
is a multipurpose appliance serving as a vacuum sealer, food
carrier, and food warmer. Food is placed in the special recycled bag
and vacuum-sealed in the Mohe. When the sealed bag is later
opened the unit will warm up the contents. The food storage bags have
an insulation of a special heat-shielding gel and an outer layer of
paper.
The
device, which is powered by inductively rechargeable batteries, can
recognize if the bag is open or closed and respond accordingly: if the
back is unsealed it will seal it; if the back is sealed it will warm
the content. |
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