Making life simpler

Product designing is all about making a thing useful and appealing to make it a better product. But somehow the concept,which is simple enough to be incorporated in our daily lives by anyone with a little creativity,is reserved for trained designers. The fact is that people in rural areas are best equipped to understand their problems. So the solution lies in training them. I am glad this workshop has confirmed my belief, says Iyengar who stayed at Khandala Padga village for those four days to understand the needs of the villagers better.

At the end of the workshop,Iyengar had helped the students design a better bus ticketcomplete with information on the bus route on the ticketand the compartmentalised vegetable bag.

For the vegetable bag,the students first worked on a paper model and then used cheap material like old cloth and canvas to make the product. Just like any engineering student would, beams Iyengar. Her sessions would start with simple questions like: What is the product? Who is the user? What is the problem it has? And how can it be eliminated?

The biggest challenge,says Iyengar,who usually spends a fair amount of time travelling,giving presentations on design and user interface,was to understand the perspective of the children and find topics or things that they could relate to. By product design,one would think of a cellphone design or website or some high-end product that is not common in rural areas. But it extends to everything and one doesnt need a degree to make life simpler, says Iyengar.