GE’s Supra division came back to FUSE to get an industrial design for an update to their E-Key. This was a dedicated device beyond the realtors cell phone that would beam an infra red signal to open the iBox. Our industrial design was tied to the electronic internals provided by GE.
Service: Industrial Design
Growler Hiking Boot
Keen came to FUSE wanting to build a lightweight hiking boot. We delivered multiple named concepts and arrived at a design that would ultimately become the design above. By using an eye stay and protective toe bumper elements that reference KEEN’s hallmark Newport sandal we were able to provide a product that feels like a a design sibling.
CONVERSE CHUCK TAYLOR CONCEPTS
Nike came to FUSE for our take on an update to the classic Converse Chuck Taylor.
OTTO LOCK
OTTO came back to FUSE to help them style their brilliant lightweight bike lock. We started with sketches and finished with a complete surface Model to provide photorealistic renderings and ultimately exterior control for engineering.
FUSE named this division of DWFritz and we did the identity design for OTTO.
OTTO Bike Tools
OTTO came back to FUSE after we helped them with their break-througn iphone app enabled rear deraillieur tuning system. This time they wanted concepts for bike tools. This would certainly complement their tuning system. As you may know, FUSE named this division of automation specialist, DWFritz, and we did the identity for OTTO.
BIP Concrete Chairs
Slabtown In Stumptown
A very clever guy came to FUSE with an idea. A better way to set up a grid of rebar that floats within a slab of concrete. This wasn’t a totally new idea, but Kerry, the guy, had a host of improvements he wanted to add and he had a plan to make these really sell. These concrete chairs turn the painful time eating chore of setting up a grid of rebar into literally a snap. The rebar just pops into place at just the right height.Our job was to make them super strong and super cool. We made them feel like the super utilitarian future by instituting this octogonal theme throughout the structure. The octogonal base not only provided visual branding but also helped with keeping the rebar layouts in the field straight. FUSE designed all 27 variations that accomodate different sized bar and different heights. FUSE also redesigned the BIP logo along the way.
Foamposite
A New Way to Make Shoes
Prior to founding FUSE, Tory worked as an industrial designer within Nike’s Advanced Product Engineering Group or APE. On of the projects was to hunt for new opportunities within the Basketball category. Tory was in a small team that included former Ford Engineer, John Tawney. Tory and John had a dual agenda: Of couse we wanted to uncover a great opportunity for Nike Basketball, but they also wanted to reduce the labor it takes to build a pair of basketball shoes. The team presented a handfull of good ideas including this one that was titled as “Game Day”. The idea was to make a super lightweight shoe that would allow players to practice all week in their heavier training shoes and then jump higher and run faster on Game Day with these lighter kicks. We built the first prototype shoes out of molded EVA only. No heavy outsole, so the shoes were feather light.
The shoes were great but had a too short life span so John put a 4 way stretch fabric skin around the pre-molded form and compressed it. It was amazing. Super light and super strong. A true composite. At a review their boss asked Tory what the technology was called and Tory spouted “FOAMPOSITE”. The name stuck.
Beyond the advantages for better fit, visually Foamposite afforded designers the ability to play with form and really sculpt their products.
Soon after, the project headed to Nike’s Taiwan R and D facility for commercialization. The team there traded compression molding for pour-in- place molding using liquid polyurethane. John and Tory are both on the patent.
Air Footscape
Air Morphous
The Footscape was designed around an anatomically correct foot form, not the normal Last. A Last is the form shoes are built on and they are part anatomy and part art. This project was initiated by FUSE principal, Toren Orzeck, while in Nike’s Advance Product Engineering group. Birkenstocks were coming back into the mainstream so building an anatomical correct foot form seemed like a good idea.
A neutral runner with laces running down the lateral side of the shoe. The design of the upper enhances comfort by moving the laces away from the superficial tendons and arteries that run on the peak of the dorsal side of the foot. Instead the Footscape puts them on the lateral side. This eliminates the point loads caused by the laces. Not only is the shoe more comfortable, but it is also is visually different telling the running consumer there is something going on.
This shoe has gained “classic” status and is still made in a variety of materials and colorways in Nike’s Sportswear line. Alot has been written about the Footscape and here’s one article:
https://www.sneakerfreaker.com/features/all-time-greatest/all-time-greatest-nike-air-footscapes/
Big thanks to Sneaker Freaker for some of the images in this post.
Crane Chair
Sitting Is The New Smoking
This project was born within FUSE during the time when became widely recognized that standing was better than sitting. This period saw the advent of work surfaces that raised and lowered. These were expensive desks and the other thing is it’s hard to love a desk or at least want to spend big money on a desk. We know you can make a desk from an inexpensive door and sawhorses and most importantly you can put the desk up high to support standing. What is needed is a chair that can support this posture. Even better would be a chair that can go from traditional task height to stool height, maybe even allowing a worker to perch or lean against that chair. Easily done with locking a few casters!
Also, for the facilities managers who must purchase chairs for an organization the Crane chair supports all the work surface heights a facility may have.
We submitted this design to premiere office seating manufacturer Herman Miller (HM) and they picked up on it, flew our principal to HQ and launched a project to build a prototype. The project hit a snag when the HM design manager went on maternity leave but this led to our participation in multiple projects at HM.
Page Wide Web Press Control Station
With Great Control Comes Great Power.
HP came to FUSE to get help creating a control station for their almost battle shipped sized Page Wide Web Press , the T1100S. This super sized printing press uses arrays of HP’s patented Ink Jet technology and applies it to a web (paper substrate) that is up to 110″ wide by literally forever. This sort of printer creates the 4 color images one would see on a corrugated box. The print is laminated to corrugated or other substrates in a finishing operation.
Our job was to come up with a work station that would encompass an array of monitors that not only control the print job but also monitor multiple live views of the print/machine in progress and provide an expert system database if any adjustments or repairs are needed to the printer or the print.
The Pillar design includes a flip down keyboard tray if needed and is modular should an HP customer want more than 3 monitors. Of course, our design would need to compliment the T1100S and be built in materials and processes that reflect the relatively low production quantities.
We were told the operator of this printer would never be sitting so we created a Pillar of adjustable and replaceable touch screens. The Pillar design includes a spacer that can be added or omitted should the operator be short or tall in stature. To house the hardware that runs the control station, we created a cabinet with cleverly disguised filter vents to avoid the accumulation of the paper particles that live in this environment. This project premiered at the DRUPA show in Germany in 2016.