A Step Ahead

A Step Ahead

In our design and engineering class, we took a dive into the mindset of a designer, how we approach a certain audience with our designs, and the best process to approach it from. This project revolves around the concept of designing a tool specifically for the elderly interested in gardening. There is a designing challenge in our audience in which the uniqueness comes from their gradually decreasing ability to do things that only an able-bodied young person can. This includes their senses such as hearing and seeing, body strength, and sometimes even cost. In doing our research on our audience, we learned a designer's approach to making the best design possible through something called empathy. Empathy is understanding and addressing the problem directly rather than attempting to lower their expectations on what the world or they could do for themselves. In terms of applying it to an action project, it connects to us and our audience. We don’t understand their problem, but we also just can’t volunteer to help out every old person in the world directly in order to solve that. We did research on common problems with age, and I personally interviewed an elderly gardener to help with the action project. In terms of mathematics, we looked into primarily geometry and the types of tools there are in its most basic functions. Without further ado, below you will learn about the creation of a weed puller called Clawforde, made through the efforts of me and my partner.

A Word From The Audience

We gathered a fair amount of experience to prepare for this action project beforehand, having gone to home depot as a class to observe tools and talk to staff, I interviewed an elderly woman who I frequently volunteer to help tend to her gardens, and we talked with a designer guest who explained the thorough process of her approaches on our designs and how she goes about her own. In my experience, I had already heard a few complaints about the designs of tools while working around my interviewee's garden so designing this tool felt very familiar to me, especially with the already given advantage of personally knowing my targeted audience, not just on a social aspect, but on the technical side as well. I noted the biggest takeaways from the answers I had received from my interviewee and have honed in on what I believe would make for an interesting design, such as: 

1. Tools being cheap and effective is always nice, don’t go as far as full plastic though.

2. Elderly have a lot more strength in their legs than their arms, so it wouldn’t be the worst idea to focus on utilizing that.

3. Heavy tools are ridiculously impossible to utilize. Not only is this coming from the interview, but it’s also something I overheard happening with an employee and customer at the Home Depot

These are the three key points that I had taken away from my interview, I especially found the leg power being interesting to me. It became the main focus point of a unique weed puller that still utilized the ability to perform the task manually, while requiring a lot less effort than current day tool designs.

Speaking of current day tool designs, me and my partner had taken a look at a few and noted the flaws or general notes that were observed so that we knew what to work around or build on. 

Firstly, the designs aren’t cheaply made based on observation, and for the most part they can almost somewhat reliably pass off to the elderly audience without much issues.

- All weed pullers are designed to utilize the foot from the examples I’ve seen.

- A weed puller designed with purely plastic is an ineffective tool based on how much pressure is constantly applied to make it work.

- Their handles are primarily made in only one size with no customization.

The Clawforde Experience

We collected the general ups and downs of these experiences and we created a tool designed to surpass all of the others in its form of design. Complete with colorized hand-drawn visuals, instructions, and the mathematics of our tool, my partner and I are excited to introduce and show you what the Clawforde experience is all about.

Conclusion

Creating the perfect tool is difficult for any designer, nonetheless if it's a high schooler composing one for just a school project. Does that mean there was little to no effort, no heart, no love put into this design? I don't think so. Although there are a few flaws here and there with our design that we have recognized and noted, we've created a tool to a degree we find worthy of being in one's garden. A few other pieces of feedback for anyone else that participates in this action project is this:

- Simplicity is best. Explaining a complex tool will often lose your audience unless you have something like a prototype or a comparison to be made to an already existing tool.

- Always remember your audience and focus. For this project, our audience was the elderly and our focus was designing a tool for gardening. Can you imagine your tool being used in a garden or does it feel more like a farm tool? 

That'll wrap my conclusion up on this unit, overall I found it quite fun to participate and perform in with my partner and interviewees. Thank you for reading.