Modular System Design

TRIAPLANTS

OVERVIEW

Triaplants is a easy-to-assemble modular air plant system that help to enrich the emotional and aesthetic aspect of the living space. It is designed to creatively decorate living spaces and enhance the balance of human and plants.

TEAM MEMBERS : Jeffrey, Win, Nolan

DURATION: 2 Months

MY ROLE

In this project, I worked on user experience design, engaging user interviews, brainstorming, user analysis, execute testing and iterations. Handling CAD modeling for 3D printing and physical prototypes making

CHALLENGE

How might we design our product that both achieves low-maintenance and aesthetically appealing, in order to elevate the quality of living spaces without adding significant care burdens for users?

Project requirements: Physical + Digital

DESIGN PROCESS

01- Initial Idea & Primary Research ( Interview & User Research)

02 - Secondary Research

03- Three rounds of iterations & testings

04 - Final Solution

05 - Future Planning & Reflection

INITIAL IDEA & PRIMARY RESEARCH

- Initial Concept - Feng Shui & Interview

Arrangement of house plants & Attract users

By learning about “Feng Shui” Concept - we found out that plants can provide emotional support/value to the living space (provide good health) to reach balance and harmony.

- Interviews (General Questions)

WHAT THEY NEED!

- Persona

BUT

- Need Key

After conducting 10 interviews with college students about this idea, we found out that not too many college students care about “Feng Shui” when it comes with plants.

Then we conducted interviews with more than 20+ people about some general question of house plants, we found that most of people do not want to spend too much time and energy taking care of their plants. However, they still want to have some plants or "green" at home to either decorate their living space or bring vitality to their place.

To help communicate information about users that we collected during research, we created a provisional persona.

Who:
Young people between the ages of 20 to 35 with a busy schedule, especially college students or people with jobs.

Situation:
Indoor plant-based decorative elements that enhance the ambiance and aesthetic appeal of living spaces, are limited by available space and time for care.

Improved situation:
Option for vibrant home decoration without significant space, time, or attention.

SECONDARY RESEARCH

After receiving feedback from interviewee and generate the need from our target users, we started moving into the secondary research to find out how to achieve our design thinking, and what are we looking for in order to meet the need. And first thing we did is to find out what types of plant fit to our design need. The reason is that it is an essential part of this product is able to easily take care the plant itself and then decorate the living space. So which type of plant should be include in our product is the first priority to achieve our goal.

- Shopping Plants

- Scholar Papers

#1 ITERATION & TEST - Undeveloped

The first iteration stage, we start visualize our design thinking by thinking about the questions, working on sketches, and finding some possible solutions or inspiration to achieve what we want. By working from border vision, we can filter and narrow down our design direction to specifically target on what users need and want.

- What if questions

What if plants can take care of themselves？
What if someone or something else can take care of the plants
What if fake plant can be “real”?
What if one simple plant or object can make the entire home vibrant
What if plant can be planted anywhere in the room, eg: on the wall
Is there a kind of plant that already satisfies the needs itself?

- Creating & Visualize options

- Design Opportunities

Robot + Succulent + water storage 
Sensors + digital interface
Fake Plants + photosynthesis substance + living mechanism = real plants?
Wall Art + Plants that are easy to take care of 
a modular system that adapts to limited space
Smart Home system taking care of the plants

- Decision Making

We decided to make modular plants that can be integrated in to home system.

After talking to several people about these ideas, we found out that modular plants design is the best plan to achieve our design goal.

“I might actually buy this” 
“This one keeps the plants simple” 
“The idea is interesting and looks so cool!”
“Good to be on my desk”

#2 ITERATION & TEST - Developing

For the second round of iteration, based on previous decision making, we start working on more specific sketches and looking into more specific inspiration to level up our understanding about how and what. In this stage, we began to build up some paper models and cardboard models for testing purpose. We also conducted several testing to make sure our plan is working.

- Inspiration

We looked into some modular design to find the best way of assembling the independent plant holder and form into a decorative piece for living space

- Sketch Models

- Sketches & AI images

We started using paper and sticky notes to make a quick low fidelity model to visualize our thoughts and understand the way of how to assemble and how to display.

And then we started working on placing real plants which are air plants to the our module to see how they actually look like for future development. We found 6 targeted users between the ages of 20 - 25. We asked them to put the modules on their table and decide which one they prefer: mid size.

- Interagtion

#3 ITERATION & TEST - Developed

In this round, we began refine our design solution by working on testing and see how other people interact with our design. We did few rounds of testing on how they assemble our modules, and made a survey to get feedback on the shape, number of modules, and color to finalize our design solution. And we began to working on the refine prototype to meet looks like product.

- User testing

We conducted several people to try out our designs by assembling in the way they like.

Age: 20-40 / 5 Students /3 Employees 

  • 1 * (real condition + survey)

  • 1 * (remote real condition + survey)

  • 2 * (simulated condition + survey)

  • 4 * survey only

- Survey

We also implement survey to finalize our design. By asking about the number of modules, the color, shape, and instruction, we finally had the result and move on to our refine stage.

- Refine & Develop

FINAL SOLUTION

- Design Philosophy

  • Sustainability : Using eco-friendly materials like PLA to minimize environmental impact.

  • Innovation and Versatility: Modular design offers unlimited creativity and adaptability, suitable for various spaces and user’s  preferences.

  • Aesthetic and Functional Harmony: Combining modern aesthetics with functionality.

  • Good to Plant Health: Meeting the needs of plant growth.

- Product Objectives

  • Meet user needs : To allows busy young people to both feel vibrant and not have to take care of it.

  • Customization: To meet the personalized needs of various customers. It can be customized and put together to suit environment.

  • Plants cohabitant: We proposed a concept of "Plants cohabitant". Plants don't just need to be taken care of, they can also connect to smart devices to take care of themselves.

- Product Advantages

- User Journey

- Business Model

- Final Design (Rendering Images)

- Final Design (Physical Prototype)

- Others (Components: Connectors & Dimension)

- APP

FUTURE PLANNING & REFLECTION

  • We need to spend more time working on user testing to validate the shapes and modular system to meet what users want and need

  • We need to develop more variation on shapes to test out which one works the best

  • Exploring more ways to connect individual modules

  • Considering the system that integrate in the individual module ( How to link modules to app? Where should the sensor be located?)

  • Considering more about what kind of material should be applied to the final product

CITATION

[1]Lee, Ms., Lee, J., Park, BJ. et al. Interaction with indoor plants may reduce psychological and physiological stress by suppressing autonomic nervous system activity in young adults: a randomized crossover study. J Physiol Anthropol 34, 21 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40101-015-0060-8

[2]Chang, C., & Chen, P. (2005). Human Response to Window Views and Indoor Plants in the Workplace. HortScience HortSci, 40(5), 1354-1359. Retrieved Dec 4, 2023, from https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI.40.5.1354

[3]Susan Loh, Marcus Foth, Yasu Santo,The more-than-human turn in human-plant interaction design: From utilitarian object to living co-inhabitant, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Volume 181, 2024, 103128,ISSN 1071-5819, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2023.103128. 

[4] Tina Bringslimark, Terry Hartig, Grete G. Patil, The psychological benefits of indoor plants: A critical review of the experimental literature, Journal of Environmental Psychology, Volume 29, Issue 4, 2009, Pages 422-433, ISSN 0272-4944, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2009.05.001.

[5]Margaret M. Bradley, Peter J. Lang, Measuring emotion: The self-assessment manikin and the semantic differential, Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, Volume 25, Issue 1, 1994, Pages 49-59, ISSN 0005-7916, https://doi.org/10.1016/0005-7916(94)90063-9.