So fear not…the Supercase will fight against mess to create one tidy space so you can keep all your stationary equipment together. It’s easy to use. No mess and no need to buy a pot and a pencil case. Its only £5.99 and available now.

Once again, Supercase saves the day!

A universal definition of good design may be difficult to find, but there are certain patterns that remain the same when applied to different industry sectors and product types.
Defining what makes a “Good Design” is difficult. However, there are some principals that certainly contribute to a product working well. So here are our top tips for getting a thumbs up when designing!

Usefulness – Everyone expects a product to do what it promises. Really good products exceed this, and are a delight to use. Take the packaging that Apple products arrive in. It is smartly designed, and adds to the child-like feeling of unpacking a new toy, and of course – it protects the products – exactly as it was designed to do.

Usability – Depending on people’s needs, the product really should have user-friendly interface or ergonomic design. Carefully researching how products are actually used (often called ethnography) provides information about people who may be interested in that particular product, and how they would use it.

Looking good – Of course, “looking good” is subjective. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. However weighing up factors such as the lifestyle, culture, age, gender, education, occupation of the users helps to design something appealing. It has also been observed by design writers that the easiest route to create something desirable, is to create something that is better looking than the competition! Hmmmm?

Producible – Producible products are “those manufactured in large volumes by using appropriate production methods that take into account the impact on the organisation of new components, assemblies and processes”. Well designed products show almost as much consideration of how they will be manufactured, (and dissassembled/recycled) as how they will be used.

We do our best to stick to these principals. Feel free to have a little look at our product range. We’d love to get your feedback!

Hello. We occasionally get asked for advice about taking an idea forward and getting into the marketplace. We thought it might be of interest to put together some tips.

Stuffed full of sweaty gym kits, and often forgotten for days in lockers or just under the desk, the gym bag is the perfect breeding ground for odour-causing bacteria, especially in this current warm weather. But finally there’s a solution to the gym bag whiff – the Anti-Smell Sports Bag. The Anti-smell sports bag is a unique product designed to help stop nasty niffs from PE kits, shoes and sports equipment that are left hanging around.

The bag works just like a shoe “odour eater” insole, utilising an active carbon filter sewn into the inside of the bag to help neutralise smells. The patented carbon filter, which we’ve called ”pong patch” will last a year, and can be easily cleaned using warm soapy water.

And…

They are incorporated 3M reflective stripes and are currently availablewith in red, yellowand alowkey black version for stricter schools.

BUY THE ANTI-SMELL SPORTS BAG NOW!

But following this principle only, we would be deprived of ingenuous designs and people would never dare to leave the traditional paths.

Examples come from the works of industrial designer Mark Newson, hired to think out of the box. His designs are considered among world’s hottest designs and are being sold for record prices (the sculptural “Lockheed Lounge” is the most expensive piece of furniture ever to sale at an auction).

What does a man who already designed (almost) everything, think about choosing the right materials? “It’s the same skills you apply in design, just the material changes”.

We don’t know exactly the process from idea to the object, but his objects are bravely approaching various matters: fiberglass, plastic, metal, wood, marble. Mark Newson is playing with expensive materials like Carrara marble to design mass-made lookalikes, endowed with a particular kind of desirability.

So the whole selecting process speaks about the unspoken things that make the artist an artist: perception, intuition, imagination and other unpredictable factors?

Obviously, choosing the materials mainly depends on the effect the designer wants to create. Maybe the secret behind being different in a world of sameness is changing the perspective.

“Design” is a funny old thing. It’s easy imagine that designers sit all day long and wait for their muse to strike, others think that designers are constantly seeking for inspiration reading books, visiting museum, learning all kinds of artsy stuff.

All of us are right and yet there are those who find inspiration for design by simply examining the society they live in. Observing human behavior helps the designer understand people’s needs.

International designer and all round superhero Philippe Starck seems to be using this principle in his work: designing not for art’s sake, but for the final result and for the benefit of the customer. After all, that’s what design for life actually means: checking the background of the individual and adapting to his real needs.

The designer’s job may be seen by some as a bohemian, perhaps useless occupation and some designs seem to prove it. Our crazy French hero Philippe Starck brings a deeper vision about the role of the designer as a character in the story of human evolution.

He can bring a new angle of view, evolutionary, aesthetic or sometimes both, a starting point for a new invention. The message of the modern designer to the next generation is “invent a new story, invent a new poetry”.

Philippe Starck also takes special delight in rethinking everyday objects and giving them new look and functionality. The advice for designers is to look at people, find out how they live and what they desire, before starting to use the paper and pencil. We may be a long way from the Design Excellence of Monsieur Starck but we’re trying – see here Concentrate’s design approach.