We will begin with Deiter Rams. Rams having spent over 50 years designing products at BRAUN, has developed his 10 principles of good design.

As I explore the industrial design process, through the lens of developing an ergonomic power-assisted whisk that helps people with age or injury-related mobility and pain issues engage in this simple but often exhausting cooking task, I will be applying Deiter Rams’ design principle to that process.

A product must be innovative —there has been very little to no change to the design of the whisk since Julia Child introduced it to the world in 1964. Except for attachments to immersion blenders and the whisk has remained unchanged, a static manual tool.

A product must be aesthetic, understandable, unobtrusive, honest, and as little design as possible—using simple geometry and color will allow the product to be easy to understand and operate. The simple shapes and lack of gimmicks should let it sit quietly when not in use.

Thorough down the last detail and long-lasting —this principle informs everything you do within the process. Understanding the design means spending time with it through the exploration of sketching and ideation. Only through this process can one begin to understand the product. How all the pieces fit together, what’s needed, what isn’t. How it fits in the hand, is it a couple of millimeters too large? Does it communicate with the user well? Is it effective for its purpose? When one can satisfy these questions the product has a chance at standing the test of time because a product that lasts is a product that works.

Environmentally friendly —Creating sustainable products that do not harm is more important today than ever and there is great research being done with bio-degradable bio-plastics that I will suggest being applied to my product this application would not only be a feature of the product but also vital to us all.

Don Norman’s Human Centered Design looks at the different ways that humans approach and think about objects. Our interactions are based on our life experience, through this training we learn how things work and what to look for to interact with objects in our environment this happens on a conscious and subconscious level. I will be using affordances, signifiers, and conceptual models for the development of my product.

Affordances —are what allow an object to function as it is intended. For example, a pencil sharpener works because there is a pencil-sized hole for the pencil to slide into to access the cutting apparatus that sharpens our pencil. The hole affords the pencil access to the blade.

Signifiers —lets us know how to interact with the object. The pencil-sized hole in the pencil sharpener signifies that this is where the pencil goes to be sharpened. If you are an alien visiting our planet and had never used a pencil sharpener you may need additional signifiers such as an illustration of the pencil in the hole. Because we are not aliens and have a lifetime of experience with the pencil sharpener we don’t need the extra-illustrated signifier. Our life experience has informed our knowledge of the pencil sharpener, we know the pencil goes into the hole without thought. This is a —conceptual model Our life experience activated from our subconsciousness tells us how to use the pencil sharpener.

David Kelley, the co-founder of IDEO is an innovator and originator of the “Design Thinking” approach to design. Emphasizing empathy of your audience needs, quick thorough design ideation practices, and rapid prototyping.

Empathizing —taking a close look at the needs of the audience and asking questions; let us consider limited mobility, injury and chronic pain, and the task of whisking. I have learned through my research that three-quarters of the people surveyed experience pain in their hands or wrists. 80% of the same people say they would do the whisking task despite the pain or discomfort. Some questions to consider. Where is it causing problems, is it more difficult than it needs to be? Is it tiring? Does it cause pain? Learning what the existing products' pain points inform the design decisions to help create a product that is more effective easier to use and hopefully a more enjoyable experience for the end-user.

Ideation —what's another way can I do it? Come up with many ideas based on the learnings from the information gained through empathy. Here it is important to thoroughly explore even the bad ideas may in the end lead to something unexpected.

Rapid Prototyping —working in concert with ideation quickly creating a simple prototype of your product to find out if your assumptions are true —what’s working and where more attention needs to be placed. The cycling between ideation and prototyping serves to hone in on an effective functional design and one that is thoroughly considered down to the last detail.

Choose the Product —While considering this project —the exploration of industrial product design I needed to choose an appropriate object that would serve as a good vehicle for that exploration. Not wanting to get lost or bogged down in unnecessary parts or geometry the primary requirements for that product is that it must be simple in shape and form, allowing me to focus on the process rather than the minutia of detail. With this simple criteria in mind I went to working on listing and mind-mapping until I narrowed in on the humble kitchen whisk.

Research the Product —In this phase of the design process I will be looking at the history, milestones of development and the current market allowing me to gain a better understanding of what I will be designing. Following is a summary of this process when looking at the whisk.

The earliest reference to the whisk dates back to the late 18th century recipe book written by Lydia Child, “The Frugal Housewife”.

The modern whisk that we know today emerged and was popularized in 1964, introduced by Julia Child on her cooking show the “French Chef”. The whisk has essentially stayed the same ever since. Contemporary whisk design while having handles designed for ergonomics and comfort —as can be seen in the designs of OXO, are still almost exclusively static and manual. The exceptions to this come in the form of attachments for immersion blenders and standing mixing stations such as the classic Kitchen Aid appliance. This innovation of design while offering power assistance, spins from the center acting more as a mixing device rather than a whisking device which is often a side to side oval motion. This distinction is vital to the desired whipping and aeration of the food stuff being processed by the whisking task.

Assumptions —this brainstorming session sets out to list everything that is already assumed to be known about the product being developed culminating into an insight into the product and the audience. The goal of this process is to put everything that you know in front of you creating paths of thought and exploration from these known factors. In the case of the whisk I know that it is a hand held device. I know that it is a kitchen utensil used for cooking, I know it has a handle and wires that form the balloon, I know that in my lifetime it has allays been the same, I know from my experience with the tool is it is tiresome to use even becoming uncomfortable or painful over use in long durations. Taking these assumptions forward helps me to craft the questions for the users about their experience with the product, do they have the same or similar experiences, is there a pattern?

Understanding the needs —this primary research portion of the design process is where we find our empathy insight. Learning about what is working , what isn’t working, the pains that the user is experiencing with the existing product. This can be accomplished through, observation, survey or interview. Coupling the insights garnered from this research phase with the assumptions of the previous phase hopefully lead to an insight on how the product can be improved for the end user.

I sent out a 👉survey via social media asking for peoples experience with the whisking task. In particular I wanted to understand the experience of people with limited mobility due to age, ailment or injury. I learned that while over half of those surveyed say they have limited mobility and over 62% say they experienced pain or discomfort while engaged in the whisking task only 12% said they have avoided a recipe because of the whisking task.

Secondly in my research I wanted to consciously experience the task for myself, recording a 👉video for observational playback, I set a timer for 10 minutes —the outter edge of time required to whisk from recipe, and went to whisking. After just over a minute I could feel tension building in my wrist, arm and shoulder. I would considerer myself a healthy person and I do not experience mobility issues. and for me by the end of the experiment I was breathing through the strain.

The insight to this research is as follows;

▶ A. Though it seems like a simple task, in just a short ammount of time whisking becomes exhausting, uncomfortable and even somewhat painful.

▶ B. Though the task is at a minimum uncomfortable and sometimes painful, people almost allways do it anyways.

The best way to help people within my audience to engage in this fundamental cooking task is to design a product that features powers assistance to reduce the required movement, and ergonomic design for comfort and the reduction of muscle tension and fatigue during the whisking task. The benefits of these design innovations will allow people the freedom to engage in cooking for occupation, chore and pleasure.