For five years already IKEA-designer Mikael Axelsson is researching the possibilities of designing electrical appliances that can work off the grid. There is a need for that, IKEA’s head of design Marcus Engman explained, because there is a trend in the developed world to become less dependant of the grid. ‘At the same time there are still two billion people around the globe who don’t have any access to a grid,’ he said in the activation session The Principles of Democratic Design.
Democratic Design is IKEA’s axiom to create a better everyday life for the many. It’s based on five guiding principles: form, function, quality, sustainability and price. Axelsson showed some of the products his research resulted in, including a lamp that gets its energy from a weight that can be pulled up just like old clocks have.
A terracotta box that extracts heat from the inside when made wet and therefore functions as a simple refrigerator is another example.
Everyday activities
The participants were subsequently asked to work in teams to explore the energy potential in everyday life activities for off-the-grid products. Seven teams gave it their best shot and some came up with several ideas that particularly seemed to spark the interest of Engman. One of these was a wind-up electrical toothbrush, another a mechanism that would generate energy from opening and closing a kitchen drawer. Engman: ‘That is particularly interesting since there is a trend of installing light in such drawers.’
There was an idea to make a skipping-rope that would store energy while jumping in a lamp and a bedtime music device. The harder a kid will jump, the longer it will be able to read in his/her bed in the evening. Engman commented that he liked the idea because playfulness is an important element in design.
Another idea was named the Biobat: a barrel with a heat exchanger that would extract heat from fermenting waste to provide warm water for a douche. Who knows, maybe we will see some of these ideas on the IKEA shelves in due time.
Top photo: Participants prototyping their ideas (photo Leo Veger)
THE PRINCIPLES OF DEMOCRATIC DESIGN was one of two Activation Sessions exploring the theme of climate action and the home at WDCD Live Amsterdam 2017.