Real Product Design

I've been in the Furniture Design business for a good 12years now. After day in day out, year after year exposing myself to the "latest" Design trends from Milan, New York, London.....Blah blah blah, I'm now so sick of "Design". It takes quite a lot to get me excited about design now. No matter how innovative a piece can be or how beautiful the lines are, I run through them without blinking.

Nowadays, I am more attracted to things that are unintentionally designed. Or as Naoto Fukasawa and Jasper Morrison put it, "Super Ordinary" objects.

So it is by chance that I came across this "Product" two days ago.

This object was discovered at a Foreign labour "hostel". "Designed" from a purely functional point of view for a single purpose. It is a barbel with cement as weight. Probably made by either a vain or fitness conscious Bangladeshi using whatever he can scrap after a days work at the construction site. The cement was cast with a pail as evident from the shape of the weights. The barbel is simply a piece of metal plunged into the cement before it set.

Simple but it works.

There was some evidence that this was a second set made judging from the pile of rubble infront of the weights. Perhaps the initial set's cement were not mixed properly and it crumbled when dropped. Evidence of product improvement on the second set. Evolution of thought process already in progress.

It reminds me of my Design History lessons as a student. At the turn of the 20th century during the industrial revolution where Design came into importance. The first designs were mostly mass produced everyday items like pots and pans stamped out of sheet metal powered by a steam engine. Design was used as a tool or skill to serve the mass population and not the elitist snobbish crap that it is today.

Seeing that piece of object with the accompanying home made bench which was also scrap together with "parts" has energised my design thought. It made me wanna go back to my roots as a designer and design with a purpose, a real purpose. The Modern masters were right as always, as Le Corbusier put it plainly, Less is more.

Colonial Country

Been back from London for about 2 weeks now, jet lag was pretty bad because of the previous Scandinavian trip barely 2 weeks before. We took the Airbus A380 but I must say that the difference is not much from any other aircraft. I'd say the comfort level was maybe just 5-8% more than an upgraded B-777. Service was not fantastic either considering its SIA. All in all the flight was pretty average to me.

We reached London in the evening, weather was cooling, no rain. First impressions, narrow roads, lots of cabs, dirty sidewalks, lots of old buildings, lots of Indians and Indian restaurants.

Our hotel room was really small, seems to be the case in all developed cities visited so far. There was no WiFi as usual, TV programs were limited as well but the room felt clean though.
Dropped our luggage and went for dinner. We chose a cheap middle eastern ran Grilled/Fried chicken fast food joint. I went for the half Grilled chicken meal at 3.99 pounds with drink. Pretty decent meal though and filling.

The next day was pretty hot, around 25 degrees and I sweated a bit, that was the last day I saw the Sun. From then on the remaining 8 days was either cloudy, drizzling, raining or miserable or all combined. It got colder towards the end of the trip and by the time we left it was 10 degrees.

We spent the first 5 days on the job, going through the fairs, meeting retailers, architects, publishers. Visiting iconic stores collecting information. On Sunday I was finally free and done with work, unfortunately all the museums were closed and the stores closed early too! Crap!

I only managed to visit Modelzone and got some Revell kits and a couple of Vallejo paints. Price of the kits were almost the same or maybe S$1-S$2 cheaper than Singapore.

The typical tourist sites were as usual, packed with tourist! The Tower Bridge, commonly mistaken as the London bridge was fantastic, the draw bridge operated without any external cables and we were lucky to have witness a boat crossing it!

I find the bridge architecture impressive and did not notice that it actually has colour from pictures I have seen. The steel was painted in this light blue colour which I seldom see in Europe as all bridges appear dull and purely utilitarian.
Its quite refreshing!

HMS Belfast was parked just further down but as we reached there late, it was closing in 5 minutes so I did not get a chance to go on board.

The Clock Tower was next, or as it's commonly known as "Big Ben". The actual clock tower itself was heavily decorated with intricate motifs and design, elements of gold and stone made up most of it. Just further opposite of the river was the London eye, I didn't know it was smaller than the Singapore Flyer.

Buckingham Palace was boring, It looked more like parliamentary house than a palace. Nevertheless, I took some pictures there. The guards marching inside look like they were tired, in fact they were quite sloppy.

One of the evenings I took a walk to Kensington Park. Its like Central Park in New York. Very nice and quiet with nature all around you, the water fowls were being fed by park visitors, the trees and flowers were all in their final stages of bloom. Of course, the cool weather really help in the enjoyment of the park. It was a great escape from the urban landscape of the city, wish Singapore had one right smack in the middle of Shenton Way.

 On Sunday, I went to the weekend markets, first was Colombia Rd where they were selling plants and flowers. It was packed with locals and the plant and flower range was fantastic! Stall holders were shouting out prices similar to our local durian sellers and the customers were responding humorously, the atmosphere was fantastic! I really enjoyed Colombia Rd market!

Then I went to Camden market and was really let down by the Thailand style pasar malam atmosphere. The place was just full of immigrant Chinese and Indians selling Chatuchak style T-shirts at 3-4 times Chatuchak price! Every other stall was selling the same shit. I took a quick bite there and left disappointed, the rain didn't help either.

 

On Monday 27th Sept, I woke up late and was cursing myself because that meant I have less time as I was going to the RAF Museum. When I finally found my way there, I was awe struck!! Its was an absolutely amazing museum!! some of the aircraft inside were in flying condition!! I have never seen such a well kept aircraft museum! so much pride in their machines of war and how they won the war against the Nazis. Security in the museum was tight, I was caught several times crossing the line trying to get up close to the aircraft for pictures.

The most agonising part for me was my camera batteries running out of power!! I didn't make a count but I estimated no less than 50 aircraft were on display!! Lots of Spitfires and Hurricanes! The Battle of Britain hall was filled with German aircraft!! Me-109, Bf-110, He-111......etc. Some of the halls was under renovation so you can hardly see those aircraft except maybe for a tail or wingtip. Sadly the WW1 hanger was totally closed for upgrading and I didn't get to see the Se-5A. I had to be chased out of the museum as I didn't want to leave those magnificent looking aircraft but at last I had to leave.

 

The Imperial war museum was less impressive, most of the exhibits were repainted and looked new, there were tanks, aircraft, guns, mini submarines...etc.

There was a WW1 hall which was impressive though. They even made a stretch of trench with mannequins sound/light effects and the smell was horrible but realistic!! Quite eerie though as it was very dark.

 

Next up, Natural History Museum. I can't even begin to describe it. It was absolutely amazing. It saddens me to see such a magnificent museum knowing that most of the children of other parts of the world including Singapore will never get to enjoy the benefits of such a museum. It was literally filled with History, Real fossils, Dinosaur bones, specimens(This is the sad part though). Some of the collections were privately own till the museum bought them over after their owners deceased. I saw the extinct Dodo bird specimen which I had read about so much since I was little. Saw exotic birds and animals specimens which otherwise I will never get up close in nature. Basically, British explorers pilferaged the forest of the world in the 18th-19th century and put them all in this museum. Educational but sad.

I didn't get to enjoy good food while I was there, most of the time I went in Tesco and got my 2pound quick meal which consists of 2 sandwiches, a bag of crisp and Juice or coke. It was the cheapest/fastest way of filling my stomach. I had steak, fish and chips, burgers, nothing fantastic.

I also visited Hannants which was just next door to RAF Museum, they had excellent displays of finished works there but the store itself was a let down as it was not well stocked.

The Underground(or the Tube as its more commonly called) was easy to navigate compared to Paris and Tokyo, of course being in English help too.

It was an enjoyable trip for me overall, most of the enjoyment being in the RAF Museum. As I left London, it was entering early stages of Autumn and I can see hints of it in the trees. There's a bit of nostalgia when you sense the change of seasons, we don't get that often in Singapore. It's a nice feeling.

Scandinavia Trip 25th Aug to 5th Sept 2010

I have just returned from my 6th overseas trip this year, this time its Scandinavia. The whole trip brought me to three countries in total. First stop was Denmark followed by Sweden and ending with Finland. I was in a delegation consisting of people from various furniture disciplines representing Singapore.

It was quite an interesting trip for me as I have discovered. The Scandinavian companies that we visited were very closed off to Asia, especially China. They seem to have a lot of apprehension against Asia and especially about expanding their businesses there.

The trip was filled with visits to factories, retailers, mueums, institutions, fairs....etc. which was why its was so tiring. Good thing was the weather had been almost been perfect throughout except for a day or two. For me at least it was perfect as the cool weather suited me best. Some of the delegates find it cold, especially the women.

Denmark, was our first stop and the most expensive city of the three. Copenhagen is a nice clean city, there were many cyclist commuting to work and they have special lanes dedicated to them. I even got a chance to ride around when I discovered an unlocked hotel bike lying around. Food was really expensive there and our first dinner cost S$50 for a slab of ribs.

Sweden, the second stop was slightly cheaper in terms of living standards and we stayed in two really nice hotel and lodge. Stockholm was a really nice modern city littered with old and newbuildings and waterways. The Swedish meatballs were really fantastic!! So were the girls!!

Finland, Helsinki our final stop was a real surprise to me, all my previous thoughts of it was totally wrong. There were many older buildings compared to the others and was less clean, Naturally that translated to a lower standard of living. They use the Euro dollar though, so it's still expensive to us. The best thing that happened was finding a few hobby shops by accident. I bought some Zvezda airliners and vallejo paints and was extremely happy as I had bought nothing till that point and it was my last day before leaving for Singapore.

Overall, a very interesting trip filled with lots of moving around, extremely great but expensive meals, great weather, great people, great hobby stores. If I had to choose one to go back to, it would be Finland.

Enjoy the Photos.....