A visual reminder device that blends technology with nature to strengthen personal connections.
Flower Connection is an innovative device that merges with your phone's call log to track communication with loved ones. As time passes without contact, the device's petals open, increasing ambient light as a gentle reminder to reconnect. This project addressed the challenge of maintaining personal relationships in a demanding world, resulting in a unique, interactive solution that combines mechanical engineering with digital technology to create a visually appealing and emotionally resonant product.
Problem
In today's fast-paced world, maintaining personal relationships often takes a backseat to professional and daily demands. This neglect can lead to weakened connections with loved ones, particularly family members like parents. The Flower Connection project arose from the personal realization of the designers that they should call their mothers more often, a common experience for many young adults navigating busy lives.
The challenge was designing a human-centered device that offered novel, playful, and interactive 👀 ways of seeing, 🗣️ ways of saying, and 💥 ways of showing.
👀 Ways of Seeing - Thinking how differently we look at things (how we observe, feel or make things) 🗣️ Ways of Saying - Thinking how we could share and communicate with others in a novel or accessible way 💥 Ways of Showing - Thinking how to present compelling and polished designs
Solution
The solution targeted a requirement to design a human-centered device offering novel, playful, and interactive ways of seeing, saying, and showing. The project aimed to apply design thinking to develop imaginative perspectives on everyday life, using technology as a medium and creatively applying the concept of affordances.
The device strengthens personal relationships by providing gentle, visually appealing reminders to stay in touch. It transforms the often-neglected act of regular communication into a positive, reinforcing experience.
Discovery
The team employed user-centered design principles, starting with personal experiences and expanding to broader user research.
The crucial insight was the two-sided nature of the problem: the desire to maintain relationships coupled with the difficulty of remembering to do so regularly. This insight informed the solution by creating a passive yet noticeable reminder system that doesn't rely on intrusive notifications.
Key insights led to the flower metaphor and the use of mechanical movement and light as communication tools, resulting in a device that mimics the natural process of a flower blooming and wilting. This influence resulted in a theme of growth and care, with aesthetic choices mirroring the organic forms of petals and the gentle glow of natural light.
Ideation
Sketches
Storyboard
Interaction Design
After ideating, we identified the form, technology, and interaction. Above all, we identified that the flower's pedals would be using mechanical movements to communicate with the user. Mechanical movements was something very much out of our comfort zone, so I took on the challenge of diving into the study of mechanical interactions. It was fun!
Process Shots
We experimented with the petal design and the internal mechanism over multiple iterations and prototypes before reaching our finalized version. Pictures speak a thousand words, here's a chronological process of our semester.
Final Design
Takeaways
- The value of interdisciplinary approaches in design, combining mechanical and digital elements
- My rapid prototyping and iterative design skills were significantly improved
- Real-time app integration for more detailed relationship tracking