newsio1

DECEMbEr 2009

‘The Dutch are taking over the automotive industry.’ (Stephen Bayley)

IONews31

Made in HollandexHibition at tHe KunstHal rotterdaM

advanced automotive designnine ide graduates baCK in delft

number 946

tHe Career of paMela MusCH

bachelor final projects

plaKKies: over 26,000 pairs sold

2 8 10 11 4

awards

industrial design engineers

Left to right: Sarkis Benliyan (Mercedes-Benz), Cees de Bont (Dean

IDE), Elmer van Grondelle (IDE), Koos Eissen (IDE), Fedde Talsma

(Volvo), Lowie Vermeersch (Pininfarina), Kees Kornmann (IDE), Matthijs

van Dijk (IDE), Wouter Kets (Audi), Adrian van Hooydonk (BMW), Bart

van Lotringen (DAF), Doeke de Walle (Pininfarina), Jan Jacobs (IDE),

Alexander Pothoven (Daimler), Bart Janssen Groesbeek (Ducati).

‘The IF Gold: one evening of fame’

I saw a DenHartogMusch design of a facade based on light shining through algae.

,,It will not be build however, we got a second prize: too strange, too innovative. It would have been wonderful, a facade based on light and growing algae, surrounding the elevator to a subzero bicycle storage in Amsterdam. The process of growing algae was very suitable on that location, next to the NEMO scientific museum. We have even talked about turning it into a public toilet, with algae cleaning the sewage water. Imagine a kind of brownish facade that gradually becomes transparent. That would be fun.’’

Could you give examples of your designs that we might encounter in daily life?

,,One of our designs is a traffic light that will replace most of the current fifty-year-olds. The ViaLina is a compact, modular design using LED-lights. It was nominated for the Dutch Design awards and was granted the IF Gold in 2005. A more recent design, which received a whole bunch of

awards, is an office chair for BMA Ergonomics. We are getting increasingly involved in designs based on the characteristics of the human body: chairs, orthopeadic orthesis and so on.’’

Have the awards brought in new clients?

,,No, I don’t think so. Clients appreciate awards as a proof of quality, but they are not bringing us a fortune. Receiving the IF Gold means that a design is considered to be the best of the fifty best designs. It’s the most prestigious award, and it made

me feel incredibly proud to stand on a stage next to Sony and Apple. But that was all: one evening of fame.’’

What was your graduation project?

,,A modular armature, based on a design concept made by a German. It was more of a technology project than a design, but that suited me: I consider technology to be just as much interesting as creativity. I chose IDE because of the combination of these elements, not because I wanted to become a designer or run a design office.’’

But you have your own office now, how come?

,,After graduating, I had lost interest in industrial design engineering and applied for a job at Heineken. Out of 120 candidates I made it to the top five, but ended on the second place. Exit Heineken. I was doing all kinds of jobs when I met Maarten. He pulled me back into design. After a couple of years, we were able to start our own office.’’

You based the office in Arnhem. Why there?

,,We looked at a map and decided this was where we wanted to live: a central location surrounded by lots of trees. We also thought it would be an advantage to be this close to Germany. In the beginning it turned out to be difficult to find clients in

this region and we have never profited of the proximity of the German market. We do however still like our location: it’s quite central if your clients are based all around the Netherlands.’’

How big will DenHartogMusch become?

,,Years and years we thought we were doing something wrong, being an office with two designers and a couple of interns. We have learned however, that our small size has advantages: a little ship is more easily maneuvered into another direction and less vulnerable in case of a storm. We do however have the ambition to make more of the ideas that are now archived due to lack of time.’’

What did you like about IDE and how could IDE be improved?

,,I would like to give the current students a more realistic perspective of job opportunities and the average salary. Not everybody will become an Adrian van Hooydonk and work at BMW. Even the R&D department of a big manufacturer like Brabantia, consists of only five to seven people. Where will the other students end up? What I have really liked during my studies was the kind of pioneering atmosphere in the field of sustainability, with people like Han Brezet. Very inspiring times.’’

Do you consider designers to be the front people in sustainability?

,,When I had recently graduated, clients were not at all interested in sustainability. Until they found out it could be profitable. Manufacturers started introducing sustainability merely out of commercial, pragmatic motives. They didn’t need designers for that and I believe they still don’t. Our role is limited, showing visionary and inspiring ideas: a beautiful thing to do!’’

Pamela Musch (42)

After graduating at IDE in 1991,

Pamela Musch applied for a job

at Heineken before running into

designer Maarten den Hartog.

They started their own office

in Arnhem and got married.

DenHartogMusch has won several

prestigious design awards. ‘We

signed a business contract before

signing our marriage settlement’.

NUMbEr

946

2

www.denhartogmusch.nl

Our readers have asked if IO News could put more focus on successful women. We will. This edition, for a start, contains an interview with IF Gold winner Pamela Musch, partner/director at DenHartogMusch.

The past few months have been exciting for our faculty. For the first time, we have received two VENI grants by the Dutch National Science foundation (NWO), an acknowledgement of the quality of our research.

Another record is the number of first year students: 370! I am happy with our popularity, although this large number is also a logistic challenge. We do have some concerns that a further increase might jeopardize the quality of our education. Remarkably, I noticed that among our fifty new international Master students, ten Italian students enrolled this semester. Ten designers-to-be, who chose to leave the Mekka of design, to graduate in Delft.

Finally, I would like to thank everybody who visited our symposium Advanced Automotive Design: a nice event with an excellent media exposure. I would like to see all of you again during our exhibition at the Kunsthal Rotterdam: ‘Made in Holland’, showing forty years of excellent design at IDE.

prof.dr. Cees J.P.M. de bont, dean

prEfACE

Col

um

nBingo!Recently I watched a presentation of a well-known designer,

and I got very confused. He was talking about “hacking

objects through critical reflection”, “using the disfunctionality

of products to reinvent design thinking” and “the use of

conceptual artefacts to stimulate situated social practices.”

The confusion was not because I couldn’t understand him.

The confusion was about something else: I could not grasp whether he was using those words because there was no other way to tell his story… or whether it was camouflage for things he didn’t understand himself.

In the design scene, designers and researchers often tend to describe their and others’ work in a language that is between technical jargon and street vocabulary, so-called buzzwords. Nouns become verbs, verbs become adjectives, etc. etc.; and they do not necessarily have to mean anything. It seems that people think that if you achieve a certain buzzword density, the language starts to do the thinking for you – and you can just sit back and relax.

The well-known designer forced us to create our own Design-Buzzword-Bingo cards. Not very far from now we will distribute those cards among our students. This is the explanation why soon you will hear people shout ‘Bingo!’ in the hallways, lecture halls and at design offices where they work.

I just can’t wait until a design guru starts explaining about the “retro-fitting of a user centred design experience”, and one of our students stands up and shouts “BINGO!”

Thomas VisserPhD candidate at the ID StudioLab

3

AgENDAwww.io.tudelft.nl/events

19 December 2009 – 21 March 2010

Made in HollandExhibition in cooperation with the National Archives at the Kunsthal Rotterdam.

Spring 2010

phD dayPresenting an overview of the PhD research of our faculty.

IDE researchers Ruth Mugge and Maarten Wijntjes have each received a VENI grant by the Dutch National Science foundation (NWO). Mugge’s subject of research is called “Form versus Function’’. People use the look of a product to evaluate certain functional attributes (e.g. quality, life span). An incorrect evaluation can have negative consequences for the use of a product. Mugge’s research examines the design characteristics that bring about such functional associations.

Wijntjes’ research is called “Natural 3d Shape Perception and Image Ambiguities’’. People consider their perception as equal to the perception of others. With 3d prints and laser projections, Wijntjes will investigate the forms which people observe. This knowledge can be applied to design visualization and 3d television.

IDE receives two VENI grants

4

How do you make a selection out of 4,000 projects?

Carlita: ,,We have read all graduation papers. Our goal was to make a selection of one hundred projects, preferably projects that have resulted in mock-ups, models and tangible products.’’

Is the Jan Jacobs office desk that we are sitting at part of the exhibition?

Timo: ,,Sure! Jan Jacobs was our 6th graduate, back in 1973. His desk has been a very successful design. Very seventies also, a modular and democratic desk: the round shape prevents anyone from being able to sit at the head of the table. We will also exhibit some fresh concepts. For example the ‘Elastop’, a desk designed by Nienke Nijhof. Her desktop consists of elastics, a very playful design concept, based on our leisurely way of working nowadays.

Carlita: ,,Design for a working environment is one of the seven themes in this exhibition. The others are design solutions for the protection of our country against water and other threaths, designs for healthcare, mobility, communications, leisure and a theme we have called ‘Holland and the world.’’

What are our designs for the

world?Timo: ,,Army equipment

for example. Soldiers of today are no longer hiding in

the bush, waiting for a communist attack. Instead, they are send to

remote areas for peace-keeping missions. This requires new concepts for uniforms and other equipment. Other examples are designs for the developing world. Most of these designs are far more than just an object, they are based on business models that help stimulate local economies.’’

Mobility sounds like cool concept cars?

Timo: ,,Sure, the C,mm,n for example. But mobility is a lot more, the ‘praatpaal’ for example, the improved design for the SOS phone alongside highways. I think this project represents the IDE approach very well: not only improving the object, but the whole system. We noticed by the way, that mobility is by far the most popular theme, although the Netherlands does not have much automotive industry. Appearantly, IDE is considered to be a good place for studying automotive design.’’

What can we expect of the ‘Leisure’ theme?

Timo: ,,Designs for Disney World and for the ‘Efteling’ for example. Leisure has become an industry. I like the paradox of this theme: engineers are problem solvers, it’s in their DNA. But what is the problem

here? People being bored. Why are they bored? Because we have designed products that do the hard work for us. It’s a weird assignment if you think of it.’’

Could you share a personal favorite?

Carlita: ,,My personal favorite is the New York bicycle of Wytze van Mansum, a state-of-the-art bicycle based on the image of the old Dutch ‘opoe-fiets’. Target group analysis shows that the people of New York recognize this bicycle as being typically Dutch.’’Timo: ,,I would say the redesign of Luud Schimmelpennincks shared vehicle running on a battery, the ‘Witkar’ by Robert Holslag.

Any new insights after seeing all these graduation projects?

Timo: ,,Interestingly, the graduation projects of people who in a later stage became successfull product designers, were easily recognizable among the 4,000 different reports. Based on their creative covers.’’

Made in Hollandretrospective of IDE graduation projects at the Kunsthal rotterdam

The exhibition ‘Made in Holland’ at the Kunsthal Rotterdam shows a history of Dutch

innovations, including old patents found in the National Archives. Part of the exhibition

is a retrospective of IDE graduation projects. Jan Jacobs, Timo de Rijk and Carlita

Kooman spent hours and hours reading all 4,000 papers.

’78

’03 ’06’06

’09

Nienke Nijhof

Elas-top: a workplace

with space for intuition

28-08-2003

Leonie Ideler

Woodstove for India

04-04-2006

Nienke de Wilde

Task specific outfit for

Dutch combat soldiers

09-06-2006

Wytse van Mansum

Design of a Commuter Bicycle

for Young Urban Women

28-08-2009

’73Jan Jacobs

Office Furniture Program

Gispen KT (Garden Office)

13-02-1973

‘Made in Holland’, 19 December 2009 - 21 March 2010www.kunsthal.nl

robert Holslag

Re-design Witkar

03-03-1978

Number

4,000

5

What was your graduation project?Creating a new business concept for Pearl Music Europe, a large manufacturer of drums. My job was to create a concept that would strengthen the position of the brand and improve distribution. I have performed analyses on product category, company, competition and customers, among other things. The analyses included a trip to the Frankfurter Musik Messe. The project resulted in a new strategic concept: an educational program. The goal is to position Pearl strongly in the global market: closer to the consumer by means of a booklet, a website and an event.

You graduated a couple of months ago. What did you do next?

I am currently looking for a job, preferably in market research or brand positioning. Meanwhile I work at a musical instruments store in The Hague.

What part of your IDE education do you believe will be most useful in your job?

I still have to see what it’s like in ‘the real world’, but I hope I will be able to make good use of the Delft way of developing a fuzzy idea into an actual concept or process. I have certainly enjoyed looking for new directions and new markets for a brand.

What, in your opinion, should be added to the IDE education, or intensified?

The financial aspects of the design process are not really covered in the IDE education. Many design exercises did not incorporate costs, although this is of great influence in real projects. Maybe it is not academic enough to incorporate that element in the curriculum, but I believe it could make projects more realistic.

Where do you see yourself in ten years?I hope to be living in a nice house that I can call home, with a good job that I enjoy every day. I am thinking of a market research or brand-positioning job right now, but who knows, it could be totally different within ten years.

Which question has, to your own relief, not been asked in this short interview?

Was it a tough job to become graduate number 4,000, get all this attention and even invitations to give presentations? My answer: Nope… I really liked it!

Arjan Koolstra (24)

The previous edition of IO News contained interviews

with IDE graduate numbers 4, 40 and 400. Number 4,000

graduated recently, on 4 September 2009. His name?

,,Our technology and equipment enables stage light directors to synchronize the stage light with what is happening on stage instead of having to spend a couple of seconds on preparations’’, says Menno Pleij, founder and director of Midiator.The jury was charmed by the out-of-the-box approach of Midiator, making equipment easier instead of more complex. The judges felt that the new show controller combines all the creative elements of a show and enables them to be under the control of one designer, synchronizing visual and audio events together via a simple user interface: ,,Like a beautiful rug it ties the visual elements of

a room together.’’ Remarkably, the judges chose not to award an Environmental Award this year, as they felt there was no product that offered a significant environmental advantage.

Visitors of the Alphatent and Grolschtent at ‘A Campingflight to Lowlands’ Paradise’ (21-23 August 2009) have already encountered the effects of Midiator’s technology and equipment: their product was hired to help direct the stage lights during Prodigy, Kaiser Chiefs, Arctic Monkeys and other bands. Midiator is part of YES!, the starting businesses incubator of TU Delft, providing techno starters with practical help, strategic recommendations and technical infrastructure for products and process development.

Midiator wins London pLASA Innovation Award

Menno Pleij (right) receiving the PLASA Innovation

Award of Adam Afriyie MP, Shadow Minister for

Innovation, Universities and Skills (middle).

www.midiator.eu

Midiator, an IDE techno starter, has been granted the Innovation Award

during PLASA, the yearly international On Stage Lighting event in

London. Over 60 products were nominated for a total of eight awards.

6

You did not graduate at IDE but in mechanical engineering, before starting a post-doc in design. What made you switch?

,,I liked mechanical engineering a lot, but not the working atmosphere typically associated with it: a small R&D unit, usually located in some grey, remote building in the periphery of an industrial area. In it, ten to twenty men, only men, work from nine to five. Coming from an art oriented family, this was not what I wanted.’’

Isn’t automotive design also associated with men?

,,Unfortunately yes. It has nothing to do with talent or ideas, but with the role automotive designers nowadays have in the industry and with the Umfeld of automotive design. The skills nowadays required to become a successful designer, are more in the field of interest of men: styling and visualization skills for example. Most of the women work at the color and

trim department. But automotive design is in principle not about the object but about society. Women comprise 50% of society, so one could imagine that fifty-fifty would be the ideal distribution.’’

What is your fascination with automotive?

,,Automotive is the most complex design domain, which is why I consider it to be the most fascinating one. Automotive design covers all kinds of perspectives: socially, culturally, technologically and so on. If you are able to design a car, you will also be able to design a coffee-machine. Another interesting factor is the macro economic importance of the automotive industry. For instance, over thirty percent of the Germans is currently employed in this industry. Our current society cannot function without it.

What is the solution to our automotive challenges?

,,I don’t believe in a design strategy that is only based on the improvement of our current cars. To be able to adapt to a future world, we will need bigger changes or even paradigm shifts in what cars mean to us. However, to come up with a new type of car is not my job. My job as a researcher is to create new knowledge on how to improve the design and development process of cars and is based on two themes. One is how to predict if a certain car concept will have ‘reason of existence’, the other is how to design ‘coherence’,

meaning that technology supports form and form supports technology.’’

Could the electric car be the solution?

,,We should not seek for the solution. It will have to be more like Darwin’s ‘On the Origin of Species’: a variety of solutions, any of which could evolve into the perfect solution for the time being. Designers should not focus on object features, but on whether or not the concept fits the context. Designers should first consider the ‘meaning’ of their concept, then how to give expression to it. Electric propulsion is only one of the technological means to do so.

Any positive comments on the automotive industry?

,,Sure! I am very impressed by the economics of mass production, the incredible value-for-money of a car. A brand new Citroën C1 costs less than 10,000 euro. For that money, one gets a thousand kilograms of high-tech knowledge. An object that has been tested on safety and environmental issues and looks great: look at the complexity and quality of the cast-steel elements, the suspension or even a single taillight. And the electronics will never let you down. Cars are so perfect that it has become normal to expect the engine to be running every time you turn the ignition key. All that, at a price of only ten euro per kilo. It’s a miracle! One kilo of coffee is almost as expensive as one kilo of car.’

You drive a 1977 renault Alpine. Old-fashioned fun?

,,The Alpine was made for speed , equipped with an overpowered, inefficient, combustion engine. A car representing yesterday’s thinking. Nevertheless, some aspects of it are very up-to-date: it’s a small, lightweight, aerodynamic, two-door car that fits four persons. Equipped with an ultra modern, efficient, small engine it would easily drive 35 kilometers to the liter. This car was made by hand and that makes me question our current tooling used in mass production as mentioned earlier. Are they the most appropriate? We need to manufacture huge amounts of cars before the whole process becomes profitable. I believe we need another business-model and manufacturing process.’’

How did you experience the Automotive congress?

,,I felt a touch of pride, seeing how successful our graduates have become. The three keynote speakers, Fedde Talsma, Adrian van Hooydonk and Lowie Vermeersch but also the new kids on the block, such as Doeke de Walle, Wouter Kets and Sarkis Benliyan. They are trying to implement the IDE design approach and to gradually transform the industry.’’

‘A car: only ten euro per kilo’Matthijs van Dijk inspired a new generation of car-designers

www.kvd.comwww.ide.tudelft.nl

Matthijs van Dijk (44), managing

director at ‘KVD reframing and

design’ and professor Applied

Design, is a key player in

automotive design and research

at IDE. Van Dijk inspired a new

generation of car-designers,

such as Lowie Vermeersch

(Pininfarina) and Sarkis Benliyan

(Mercedes-Benz).

7

Where do you live? ,,I live in Manhattan. I travel to Seattle regularly about once every month or two to stay in touch with the team in person. I used to live near Seattle, but I moved together with my fiancé, who has finished her medicine studies and is now a resident doctor in a hospital in Manhattan. We have looked for a house in the picturesque area of Greenwich Village, but that turned out to be incredibly expensive: the kind of do-it-yourself small units that I remember of my student years in Delft, at a price of 3,000 dollars a month. Been there, done that. We decided to rent an apartment on the 24th floor of a sky-scraper, in the heart of the financial district. Few people want to live there. Still expensive, but better value for the buck.’’

You used to live and work near the Microsoft campus in redmond. What is it like there?

,,Microsoft employs about 90,000 people worldwide, 40,000 of whom work in Redmond. It’s a huge campus: 135 Microsoft buildings and 1,5 million square meters of office space. A nice city to live, not as rainy as most people think. I particularly like the fact that it’s only half an hour driving to a snowboard area and only five hours to Whistler, the location of 2010 Winter Olympics.’’

How many Delft graduates work at your department?

,,It used to be eight. Currently, I am the only one.’’

Have you been able to explore the country, given the limited amount of holidays in the US?

,,Microsoft is not very anal about holidays: I am allowed to work as hard as I want, as long as I reach my targets. Even start-ups, who used to be notorious for their mad working hours, are now beginning to introduce a more relaxed work-life balance.’’

What was your IDE graduation project?

I graduated in 2003, on a project in cooperation with HP Labsin Bristol, supervised by Pieter Jan Stappers. It was called ‘Designing for a Frictionless Mobile Lifestyle’. The Masters program Design for Interaction didn’t exist back then. Our concept was a planning table: members of a family could gather around the table and plan their activities by moving pylons on a map. The map gave force feedback: if a certain activity would not fit the schedule, it would be harder to put the pylon on that spot. On the other hand, pressing a pylon hard onto the map meant giving priority to that activity.’’

What part of your IDE education has been most useful regarding your current job?

,,I work in teams with a variety of people with different skills and backgrounds. I think I profit most from the Delft way of tackling problems by following a structured design process. It’s a more useful approach than diving into a problem head first. Another advantage of IDE is that, although I am a designer, I have been educated as an engineer. Microsoft has an engineering culture. Bill Gates was an engineer.’’

What, in your opinion, should be added to the IDE education, or intensified?

,,Presentation skills! Compared to other schools, Delft graduates are not very articulate. Another thing I missed, was education on the importance of the look & feel of a product and the way it animates.’’

Has it always been your dream to work in the US?

,,It has been my desire to work in a foreign country, not specifically the US. I did an internship at Microsoft in 2001, graduated in England in 2003, worked for Philips Eindhoven for a year and then decided that I liked foreign countries and working with people with different roots.’’

Why user interface design, why not coffee machines?

,,Product design is more focused on the manufacturing process, I prefer design for interaction because it’s 100% about usability. Designing interfaces is what I like. The fact that I design them for computers is something that just happened. During my studies, I was probably one of the last students who bought a computer: I didn’t own one until my second year.’’

Your former colleague Tjeerd Hoek privately owned a Mac Book. How about you?

,,Some people still believe Microsoft fires employees who use an iPhone. I use Linux, MacOS and other OSes on and off as needed. I like to keep informed on the user interfaces of our competitors.’’

‘I was probably the last student who bought a computer’Microsoft senior UX designer Stephan Hoefnagels

IDE graduates find their

way in the international

job market. Stephan

Hoefnagels is senior UX

designer on the Microsoft

Windows team, one of

the key-designers behind

desktop features such

as the new taskbar, Aero

Snap and Aero Peek.

www.microsoft.com

‘Some people still

believe Microsoft

fires employees

who use an iPhone.’

8

Advanced Automotive Design

Top car designers return to Delft nest

Nine key players in the automotive industry, all educated at IDE, lectured at the 40-year-anniversary

symposium ‘Advanced Automotive Design’. In a discussion moderated by tv-host and NRC columnist

Joris Luyendijk, they discussed the future of mobility and gave free-of-charge career advice to students.

A retrospective.

The audienceFirst-year student Eva van Dée is among the first to arrive at the TU Delft auditorium. A true petrol head? ,,No. I don’t know yet if I want to graduate in automotive design. But I’ve had a couple of lectures on the subject and they were interesting. The teacher heavily promoted visiting this symposium.’’

Sitting in the front row, IDE alumnus Thomas Albers hopes to learn about the future of mobility. He is currently employed at a company in car, truck and packaging. ,,I graduated on the design of a caravan, at KIP caravans Hoogeveen. My caravan could be folded into a kind of giant lunchbox, improving the airstream.’’

Jim Schoorl has a special interest in one of the key note speakers: Adrian van Hooydonk. ,,I want to be here because Adrian is. He is my idol. It’s that simple. He does what I would like to do. I am not very good at automotive design yet, but I’m working on it.’’

fedde Talsma, Exterior Chief Designer Volvo,,We are all thinking about downsizing vehicles, making them more fuel efficient. It made me wonder: didn’t we have small, light vehicles already? The 2cv, the Beetle, Fiat 600. Since cars started bumping into each other, we decided to make them safer: we added safety belts and more weight. Then we added more equipment, more horsepower and developed a dress code: more length and more width means a higher status. As soon as everybody had a long, wide vehicle, we added height as a symbol of status. I wonder where the industry will go. If software can help reduce safety measures, we can light vehicles again. I’m not afraid of the regulations. I like that puzzle, I would feel hopeless without restrictions. But I do have a question: will consumers ever be able to return to less horse power, less length, width and height? Those are addictive features. People will not easily return to small cars. Let me put it this way: despite all our current technology, we still use paper and despite the quality of our printers, people still make paintings.’’

Lowie Vermeersch, Director of Design pininfarina

,,One of the most limiting conditions in car design are laws. For example, we still have to design our cars for crashes without a seatbelt, because one single state in the USA requires that by law. Every Ferrari is 15 centimeters too high because of that single law. Why don’t we design our cars not to crash, instead of designing them to crash very well? Why don’t we redesign mobility, instead of designing an object that leads to more mobility. We should start by redesigning laws. The future of car design will therefore not be a revolution, it will be as it always has been: evolution.’’

,,Cars should be your passion. If it’s only money

you want: buy stocks.’’ (Alexander Pothoven)

,,Figure out what you

want and go for it.’’ (Wouter Kets)

,,It’s a coming of age:

outgrow your teacher.’’ (Sarkis Benliyan)

Lowie Vermeersch and Adrian van Hooydonk

Bart van Lotringen, Alexander Pothoven, Adrian van Hooydonk and Doeke de Walle

9

Adrian van Hooydonk, Design Director BMW group,,I like the optimism of science fiction: the engineering features, the shiny shoes. We didn’t grow up with this kind of optimism. We feel faced with limitations. But we try to get around those. At BMW, we have set a speed record with a hydrogen car, developed an electric Mini and came up with ‘efficient dynamics’. However, our designers believed something was still missing. We therefore designed a concept-car. It has batteries and a small 3 cylinder diesel engine in the back: a zero-emission car in the city, able to accellerate to 250 km/h on the Autobahn, exhausting 99 grams of CO2 per kilometer. But how to design a super sports car without the supercar vocabulary, such as fat tires? Our concept-car shows a new vocabulary: operated with normal power, the front is open, once electric, the front closes and a radiated blue light. The aerodynamics, the air flow, are shown on the outside.’’

How about all electric cars? ,,Despite all our technology blabla, people will keep buying cars for emotional reasons: to impress their neighbours. In general, I disagree with the current focus on the exhaust: the exhaust could gradually become zero, but how will the electricity be made? By browncoal power plants in Poland, nucear energy in France? And how much energy does it take to produce that car, and get rid of it?’’

Stephen Bayley (critic),,A car is a terrible, frightening, destructive thing’’, says Bayley, who believes three big issues will define the future of automotive design. First, according to Bayley, the death of the heat engine. ,,The crazy logic of the petrol engine, that dirty sexy power unit, will not survive. Maybe we will have electric cars instead. We will save the world by making it a duller place: it’s unlikely that electric will ever lead to Aston Martin shapes.’’

Secondly, Bayley sees a fading of the national identity of both the car and its designer: ,,A Porsche used to be designed by the Germans in an obviously German style. But style has become global: the Toyota Yaris for example, is not obviously Japanese. It was designed in Belgium, by a Greek.’’

And third issue? ,,The Dutch taking over the industry. Look at the number of Dutch key players in the industry: totally disproportionate. However, will that change the industry? I don’t think so. The future of cars is not in Europe, but in China. They will develop cars like Gillette raisor blades: consumers will buy the battery, the car will be disposable. It will speak no language, it will be no authentic design statement. A microwave oven on wheels, with artificial noise.’’

What is their ride?Obviously, car designers tend to drive the cars they co-designed: Fedde Talsma drives a Volvo, Adrian van Hooydonk a BMW. Ducati designer Bart Janssen Groesbeek is passionate about motor-cycles and obviously rides a Ducati.

But how about Sarkis Benliyan? He graduated on a design for the BMW motorcycle department, continued his studies at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in London, where he was granted the Giugiaro award for innovation. He currently works in the interior design team at Mercedes-Benz. What would he drive? A state-of-the-art Smart? ,,I drive a 1986 Mercedes-Benz 190E’’, says Benliyan. ,,It was my first car and I still drive her. Only our best mechanics are allowed to touch her!’’

Another big question mark is Doeke de Walle, who won the Auto Telegraaf Design competition and received a second prize at the moto-AutoRai 73 Design Competition. Being a Senior Transportation Designer at Pininfarina, it must be hard to buy your own design: who can afford a Ferrari or Maserati? What would be his drive? ,,A Toyota Yaris 1.4 diesel.’’

Wouter Kets, interior designer at Audi, chose not to buy an Audi. Instead, he drives a car that will never be able to intoxicate his thoughts on automotive design: ,,A Landrover, probably the only car that hasn’t been designed, only engineered.’’

Bart van Lotringen graduated at IDE in 1987 and received a Master’s degree at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in London. Van Lotringen is Design Director at DAF, winning the Paccar Innovation Award in 2007. Does he use a DAF truck to commute? ,,My first car was a flaming red Triumph Spitfire. After that, I have driven a range of family cars and MPV’s. I am 45. It fits my identity.’’

And columnist on ‘new journalism and electric cars’ Joris Luyendijk? Does he drive a microwave on wheels? ,,A Toyota Avensis wagon. It is a car able to transport me from A to B. That’s enough.’’

Joris Luyendijk (moderator),,I am a trained anthropologist’’, says Joris Luyendijk. ,,I feel somewhat of an intruder, moderating a discussion with only beta people, whom I hated in highschool, for being so much better in science.’’ Luyendijk is impressed by the large number of IDE-graduates holding key-positions in the automotive industry. ,,I wish journalism would produce that many journalists for El país and Le Monde.’’

In the afternoon, when he is kicking back, Luyendijk recaptures the day. ,,I was amazed by the presentations of these men. Since we are at Delft University of Technology, I expected more nerdy clothing and manners. These men are all dressed in razor-sharp designer suits and they’re skilled speakers too.’’ The discussion brought no surprising insights to Luyendijk. ,,These men all act on executive levels. People that are high up the tree cannot be expected to express revolutionary opinions in public.’’

,,Become your own critic

and be aware that it’s not

a nine-to-five-job, but a

five-to-nine job.’’ (Adrian van Hooydonk)

,,Choose your own

direction’’ (Doeke de Walle)

,,Deliver quality;

a combination of what

you want and what

you’re asked to do’’ (Fedde Talsma)

,,The moment you think

you’re there, you’re lost.’’ (Bart van Lotringen)

,,The most important

thing: doing it’’ (Lowie Vermeersch)

,,If you need advice,

you’re already lost’’ (Bart Janssen Groesbeek)

Stephen Bayley

Doeke de Walle, Sarkis Benliyan, Wouter Kets, Fedde Talsma, Bart Janssen Groesbeek, Lowie Vermeersch,Adrian van Hooydonk, Bart van Lotringen and Alexander Pothoven

Wouter Kets and Fedde Talsma

The whole symposium can still be viewed via www.io.tudelft.nl/mobilityevent.

10

plakkiesPlakkies are slippers with soles made of car tires. In South Africa, car tires are dumped as landfill or illegally incinerated, with a devastating impact on the environment. Plakkies are made by ‘The Ubuntu Company’, a factory set up with the Dutch NGO KidsRights. The goal of the factory is to provide employment in the Townships of Durban. In this area, approximately 70% of the population is without a job and 30% of the people is HIV infected. This factory provides employment for 70 local inhabitants. Each employee gets a salary that is sufficient for supplying for his or her family. The profit made of the sales is reinvested into local children aid projects of KidsRights.

The patterns on Plakkies have been designed by South African textile designer Anabella Hilda Loubser in cooperation with township kids. The drawings of the kids were the inspiration for the design. The production of Plakkies is based on using as

many local resources as possible. All the leather is original African, as well as the tires used for the soles. The cork footbeds are imported from Portugal, which enables The Ubuntu Company to guarantee quality and comfort. In the near future, Plakkies aims to replace the Portugese cork with African resources.

Bachelor final projects,,The Bachelor final project is the last before entering the Master programme,’’ says Kees Nauta, who organizes the projects. ,,Students choose one of six companies and work for 420 hours fulltime on a design that could be interesting for that company. The participating companies are usually small businesses, but can be of any kind; we have worked with companies in child’s bicycle seats, wellness, street furniture, tea distribution, pottery, medical devices and so on,’’ says Nauta.

,,KidsRights wanted to conduct a project

in the townships of Johannesburg. They were thinking about a sustainable

plug-socket. We calculated the feasability of this idea and suggested a broader approach: the design of a simple product, to be sold in Western shops, manufactured with simple tools, by local, uneducated people. This challenge resulted in a range of product concepts, one of which was Plakkies, designed by Michel Boerigter.’’

Plakkies sold over 26,000 pairs in 130 stores, but it is not the only successful product that started as a BSc final project. In 2008, when the programm was introduced, Michel Holper designed a respiration mask. Nauta: ,,Delft University of Technology granted Holper the Ufd Imtech award for excellent BSc-projects, the product itself is now being improved in cooperation with the Erasmus MC Sophia Childrens Hospital in Rotterdam.’’

The third missionIDE Valorisation Manager Bart Ahsmann considers the Plakkies an excellent example of knowledge transfer. ,,Opinions differ on what knowledge transfer means’’, says Ahsmann. ,,But it is generally accepted to be the third mission of a university, next to education and research. It is meant to share knowledge and make it applicable.’’ Ahsmann considers knowledge transfer as a necessary strategy in closing the gap between the availability of knowledge and the use of it. ,,If we want businesses and institutions to be innovative, we need to transfer our knowledge to them. Bachelor projects, such as the project with KidsRights that resulted in Plakkies, are very interesting to small cap businesses. Contrary to multinationals, small caps usually don’t have time to wait for the results of a four year PhD-research.’’

Is licensing patents a key strategy in

knowledge transfer? ,,Not at IDE. Compared to other faculties at Delft University of Technology, we license less patents: IDE research is hard to protect by patents. Licensing patents however is not the only way of knowledge transfer. We have a range of activities: research by contract, educational projects, marketing the results of our research and educational activities, workshops and masterclasses for professionals and so on. We also publish books on research methods.’’

IDE students end their Bachelor with a final project in cooperation with

a company or institution. The BSc final project is an example of IDE’s

strategy of knowledge transfer. Some of the projects become actual products,

such as Plakkies: a sustainable flip-flop designed by Michel Boerigter in

cooperation with KidsRights and Jan Jansen. Over 26,000 pairs

have been sold this season.

Interested in Bachelor final projects? Contact:Kees Kornmann+31 (0)15 27 83017c.m.kornmann@tudelft.nl

Kees Nauta+31 (0)15 27 83016c.l.nauta@tudelft.nl

The faculty of IDE offers several educational programs in which students execute a project in cooperation with a company: next to the Bachelor final projects, also individual graduation projects and group projects on new business development and optimizing existing products. Whether or not a project suits your company, depends on your needs and our schedule.Interested? Contact: adviesteam-io@tudelft.nl

‘Met daai Plakkies

gaan jy ‘n slag

slaan by die

skoner geslag’(With your Plakkies you will

become a big hit with women)www.plakkies.co.za

“S”pace by Marijn Goemans

Habru V by Johan LandV

‘Jy lijk mooi in jou amperbroekkie en plakkies’(You look nice in your panties and plakkies)

Bachelor final project sells 26,000 pairs

Hokwerda Award

Eva Nieuwenhuis wins ‘rijkswaterstaat’ competition

IDE students present at Intel Developer forum

1st prize Sustainable Business game

11

IDE Design for Interaction students have presented at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco. Five other international design schools participated in the event. The IDE projects, named ‘KeyPing’ and ‘Tate’, made a big impact: strong concepts for interactive products, supported by working prototypes.‘Tate’ was developed by Casper van Huisstede, Bruno Scheele and Jasper Hartong, based on a design brief of Booreiland. Tate supports kids who switch from middle to high school by translating the easy communication they find on online social networks, into the

physical world. The concept consists of a personal social creature, Tate, that will mutate with every other Tate that the kids will meet in real life; a visual representation of their social network.‘KeyPing’, developed by Robert Leufkens, Mariska Rooth and Tristan Weevers, consists of an interactive board with various magnetic ThinKeys attached to it. The system can be personalized according to the user’s preferences. The system is intended for the communication of elderly with difficulties in maintaining and controlling social relationships.

Sharon Goh, student at IDE (Strategic Product Design) has won the Sustainable Business Game with her product concept ECOL: a composting device to be used in a kitchen. ECOL neutralizes odors and turns

waste into compost within a week. The jury liked both the product and the business plan and granted Goh with € 1,000 for the development of the idea into a business.

Awards for industrial design engineers!

June 2009, IDE graduate Jurjen van Boheemen received the Hokwerda Award for his design of a lamp for dentists. Van Boheemen, who graduated under the supervision of Johan Molenbroek and Armagan Albayrak, was granted € 17,000. His design is a radical

improvement of the current lamp: the beam of light can be placed parallel to the view of the dentist, resulting in more light around the mouth of the client. The intensity of the light is continuously adjusted to the luminance, resulting in less contrast.

Artificial moonlight, a sustainable business plan: Delft

industrial design engineers are winning awards. In the past

months, students and staff have once again received prizes.

Here’s an overview of some of the winners. Check out the

hottest awards on www.ide.tudelft. nl. Did you win an award

yourself? Send us an email: io@tudelft.nl.

‘MoonLight’ wins CIfIAL design award

The design ‘MoonLight’, an Integral Design Project at IDE, has won the CIFIAL ‘Feel The Planet Earth Design Competition Award. The project was executed by Doortje van de Wouw, Ana Maria Alvarez, Loucas Papantoniou and Stephanie Wirth, who designed a safe, low-energy light using high efficiency LED, a solar panel and pen-lite batteries. MoonLight aims to replace the dangerous kerosene lights that are commonly used in the remote regions of Cambodia and present a fire risk to straw and wooden houses. The award comes with a prize of € 12,500, which will be donated to Kamworks in Cambodia, the company producing the MoonLight. Last year, MoonLight received the Toon van Tuijl Design prize 2008.

www.kamworks.comwww.toonvantuijldesignprijs.nl

IDE first-year-student Eva Nieuwenhuis is one of seven winners in a student competition organized by ‘Rijkswaterstaat’ (Directorate General for Public Works and Water Management). Entrants were asked to suggest a text for a road-sign. Nieuwenhuis suggested ‘Matig uw snelheid! Smalle doorgang’. ,,A sign that would be very applicable in our student

house, where it’s very crowded’’, according to Nieuwenhuis, who received her text on a real sign, made of steel. ,,I will place the sign in the communal living room of my student house.’’ The kind of wall that already contains a couple of traffic signs that ‘fell of the truck’? ,,No, it’ll be the first sign.’’

12

IO News is a publication of the faculty of Industrial Design Engineering of the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft). It is published twice a year and will be sent to all professional contacts free of charge.

Delft University of TechnologyFaculty of Industrial Design EngineeringMarketing & CommunicationLandbergstraat 152628 CE DelftThe Netherlands

Telephone +31(0)15 27 89166Email io@tudelft.nlWebsite www.ide.tudelft.nl

Final editorsMichel Heesen, Angeline Westbroek

DesignHaagsblauw, The Hague

PhotographySam Rentmeester/FMAXHans Stakelbeek/FMAX

Printed byDeltaHage, The Hague

Print4500

ContributorsArjan Koolstra, Bart Ahsmann, Carlita Kooman, Cees de Bont, Dennis Luijer, Kees Nauta, Matthijs van Dijk, Pamela Musch, Stephan Hoefnagels, Thomas Visser, Timo de Rijk and Marketing & Communication IDE.

Interested in receiving IO News twice a year to keep you up-to-date? Send us an email or give us a call! Telephone +31(0)15 27 89166Email io@tudelft.nl

IO News is published on our website. Visit www.ide.tudelft.nl and download IO News in PDF-format.

Creating suCCessful produCts people love to use

Our mission is to contribute to the knowledge, skills, methods and

professional attitude in the field of integrated product development.

We aim to achieve this through education and research at an

internationally recognized scientific level. We study, innovate and

improve the development of durable products and their related

services for people, on the basis of the balanced interest of users,

industry, society and environment.

Because… it all happens between your graduation and the moment your mind ends…

How many people do you know? With how many do you actually take action to start something you like doing? I have been asking myself this question, because of my desire to connect people who want to be useful in their own way, but who lack the connections to make their desire grow into something real. For me this has been one of the reasons to join the Alumni Association. I wanted to connect and meet people with similar backgrounds. See if they too wanted to make a difference doing the stuff they love doing... and having a couple of drinks along the way. This all starts from the moment you graduate. In my opinion it will go on until your mind stops making you do stuff.

BECAUSE … you are already part of something MYTHICAL!

Our faculty supports its own Alumni Association, which is coordinated by three successful alumni: Deborah Nas (Sunidee), Martijn Arts (Total Active Media) and Dennis Luijer (JAM). The Alumni

Association has teamed up with study association i.d., two student assistants (Renee van Dalen and Timme Hovinga) and our IDE dean (Cees de Bont) to expose the opportunities for IDE and its alumni. IO-ALUMNI now looks beyond just organizing and encouraging social events. Nothing has been set in stone yet, but a story is emerging…

The present Alumni Association lacks a heritage and counts too few committed members to offer potential graduates a valuable network. There seems to be no real reason why anyone should join. This perspective can be flipped, by looking at our heritage: there is a future for our Alumni Association, because we share a well respected, connected and successful 40 years of IDE! A unique and well-documented heritage that has resulted in 4,000+ engineers working around the globe, doing amazing things!

In order for our alumni to create some leverage and acknowledgement by global peers and markets, we need to share more of what we have done over the past 40 years. Our track record speaks for itself, but we need more people to tell about it! The board of IDE alumni has formulated a

story to be able to do that. The goal of this tale is to magnetize both graduates and students to join its new main objective: connecting all 4,000+ engineers and creating a central point to connect to and DO stuff together!

Have you heard about that new alumni group? No… but I hear it’s MYTHICAL!

BECAUSE! graduates, students and faculty are now looking for a story… together

For this story to be truthful, it has to originate from those 4,000 unique perspectives. They carry out what they have learned and are living proof of the faculties’ standards. To help the emerging story along, the Alumni Association has taken the role of CENTRAL STATION for all of its graduates and students. Destinations of this central point: sharing experiences, exchanging leads, starting businesses or just hanging out! During ‘trips’ to those destinations IO-ALUMNI will collect our shared story, piece by piece.

We are searching ambassadors and gathering momentum to start up alumni-cells in different cities in Holland. FUN and USEFUL destinations for YOU, a growing story for us all!

What if…

… you were part of a mythical group of Masters & Bachelors? An influential group of skilled interconnected kick-ass individuals, so fantastic, that the mere mention of YOU being a unique partner in their combined awesomeness, opens up doors to insightful opportunity and full impact initiative…?

… the organization of this tribe of alumni is totally transparent, giving room for

interpretation and participation in its destination to connect the 4,000+ engineers on and offline. Please join to help make the story your own!

… the central station, of this ‘mythical’ TRIBE is fed daily by young interconnected insights and reinforced over time by a legacy of field experience. Acknowledging that industrial designers of new and old are pushing the design process and its frames to its absolute boundaries!

Sounds magnetic?

Add or destroy what you like at your local IO-ALUMNI event or check www.ioalumni.nl for the development of the story!

Dennis LuijerMember of the board of IO-ALUMNI and story coordinator

IO-ALUMNI drinks12 January 2010 - Eindhoven3 February 2010 - Delft

IO-ALUMNI …

because, BECAUSE, BECAUSE!Why join the IDE Alumni Association IO-ALUMNI? Dennis Luijer,

member of the board of IO-ALUMNI will give you some good reasons.

Join the IO-ALUMNI and help uncover the heritage of the 4,000+ IDE

graduates. Why? Because...