We're thrilled to share the news that our design for Snoozeal^® - the world's first daytime treatment device that tackles the root cause of sleep-disordered breathing and apnoea - is a Bronze award recipient at the 2020 IDEA Awards, from the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA).

Snoozeal^® was designed for Signifier Medical Technologies (SMT), a medical technology company focused on the development and commercialisation of innovative and non-invasive solutions for patients with snoring and sleep-disordered breathing conditions.

SMT are innovative pioneers in challenging the wisdom of conventional snoring and sleep apnoea treatments, and they're incredibly deserving of all the awards received for this ingenious device.

​What is Snoozeal?

Snoozeal^® targets the root cause of sleep-disordered breathing - not the symptoms.

Snoring and sleep apnoea is a problem for many people whose tongue muscles relax during sleep, causing partial airway collapse. Snoozeal^® is the world’s first therapy to target the root cause of this problem, working throughout the day by using safe electrical currents to stimulate and improve muscle function in the mouth and tongue. 

IDEA Awards 2020 - Bronze award

Snoozeal^® wins Bronze in the 'Medical & Health' category of this year's IDEA Awards (International Design Excellence Awards), an annual awards ceremony from IDSA that celebrates exceptional achievement in design across a variety of industries.

The virtual awards ceremony was livestreamed earlier this week, with all category winners announced by the various members of the jury.

2020 marks the 40th year anniversary of the IDEA awards, which are recognised as the world’s most prestigious and rigorous design competition.

We're pleased to share that Snoozeal^®  also won the prestigious iF DESIGN AWARD for Design Excellence in the “Product” category - meaning 2020 is an excellent year for those of us with snoring problems!


Explore more about Snoozeal / the IDEA Awards

• Read the official press release from Signifier Medical Technologies
• Visit the Snoozeal website
• Visit the IDEA Awards website

In our recent #walkandtalk video, Andrew explores the project in depth...

Research and development: more often associated with large corporations, it’s actually a valuable business process with benefits for companies of every size. In the creative industries, where the need to consistently engage, educate and entertain demands innovation, adopting research and development practices could be vital to the sector’s prosperity.

PDR is a partner in Clwstwr, one of the nine Creative Clusters programmes funded by the UK government. Here in Wales, Clwstwr’s focus is on developing new innovations within the Creative Industries around screen (typically experiences for television, film and digital devices) and news.

What is Clwstwr? from Clwstwr on Vimeo.

How PDR is supporting Clwstwr

Working with the other Clwstwr partners, PDR is providing participating organisations with the tools they need to explore new products and services. Drawing on our 26 years of design innovation experience, we are helping Welsh creative companies to gain a stronger understanding of their markets and customers, supporting the exploration of innovative ideas.

Already, we have worked with a number of promising organisations who are looking at new and exciting ways to engage their audiences. Each project has allowed us to equip creative companies with simple and actionable R&D practices, with the intention of driving growth both for individual businesses and the wider creative sector.

Innovative ideas

We believe that every single participating organisation has benefited from the Clwstwr project. Each company has presented a unique and interesting concept. A couple of projects stand out for us.

The White Tent Company is a murder mystery events host. They wanted to develop an engaging AR and VR experience for their customers, using handheld devices. For a smaller company without previous R&D experience, the prospect of testing a totally new idea was a little daunting. By introducing them to a few simple and affordable techniques, PDR was soon able to help The White Tent Company conduct effective research.

To determine how this new service might work in practice, we encouraged the events company to storyboard their concept and find ways to discuss their ideas with prospective customers. We introduced to them ways of developing low cost prototypes, that helped their customers to envision new concepts and generate excitement amongst their audience. By going through this process, the company was able to understand which aspects of their idea needed further development. They also gained valuable insight into their customers’ interests and the kinds of experiences they would enjoy.

The Box is a project from Omidaze, a Welsh theatre company. They were keen to develop new educational tools to improve youth engagement in the democratic process. This project is an excellent example of how R&D can lead not only to economic benefits, but social benefits too.

Supported by PDR, Omidaze identified confusion amongst young people about their local political representatives; they weren’t sure what their representatives did, how they could provide support, or even how to contact them. The Box project facilitated in-depth discussions with young people, encouraging them to document their attempts to connect with local representatives. The findings revealed opportunities to simplify the process for young people, which in turn has informed the focus of the project going forward.

Impact

Every participating company has learned new methods which will help them to innovate, understand their market and grow their business. This will have long-lasting benefits both for their own organisations, and for the wider sector. 

We relish the opportunity to work with the creative industries in Wales and to develop new methods of research geared towards them.

Valuable relationships have been nurtured across Wales’ creative industries thanks to the Clwstwr project. We want to maintain those relationships and see the investment in innovation continue. We look forward to working with universities, broadcasters and the wider creative community on projects that benefit the industry long after the five-year Clwstwr programme has come to an end.

Learn more about Clwstwr, or discover PDR’s research and development portfolio.

The award recognises our project 'Brace' with R&D Surgical.

Watch our Director Jarred Evans and the team as they 'unbox' the award for the first time...

Brace uses contemporary materials and mechanisms to create a more comfortable, clinically effective and discrete solution for the condition pectus carinatum, also known as pigeon chest.

In a statement about the project, iF Gold Awards said: "Discreet and elegant, these medical braces for pectus carinatum update a complex product solution with the innovative and fresh use of materials and details. Created especially for teenage users, these well-designed medical braces reduce the stigmatization associated with traditional braces."

• Design policies are becoming more thematic focusing on societal, economic and ecological challenges like healthy ageing, circular economy, smart cities, social values, big data, artificial intelligence and internet of things.

• Design policies are moving full circle focusing on industry and the public sector as well as supply and demand across the Design Ecosystem.

• Visions are not enough, there have to be tangible metrics and evaluation indicators.

• A design policy that overlooks the environmental sustainability dimension is way off the mark.

• Design policy is still competing (and always will) with other policy domains in an increasingly crowded policy landscape and therefore must focus on what design can to achieve wider government priorities and not be a wish-list for the sector.

• We need a better understanding of how design can contribute like ethical use of data, the advances of artificial intelligence, progressing the internet of things and the omnipresent challenge of behaviour change towards environmental sustainability.

For me the value of these events is always the litmus test that what you are doing in your own practice resonates with what’s happening elsewhere. At the end of last year, with my fabulous colleague Piotr Swiatek, we developed the BEDA position paper on ‘Next Generational Design Policy for Europe’ and based on the insights shared at the International Design Policy Roundtable in Taipei, I think we’re bang on the mark. Thoughts welcome though of course!

So we’re going to go out on a limb here and say that we think that most of Patagonia’s profit comes from Selling. More. Stuff.  

And, as we consider Patagonia to be industry leaders in consumption-side services, we think this will also be the case for the majority of outdoor brands returning increased profits.  At the risk of repeating ourselves, production-side ecodesign might reduce the environmental footprint of an individual product, but if sales keep increasing, then the company footprint will continue to grow.  All this leads us to one inevitable conclusion; the only way to really improve the environmental performance of the outdoor sector is, as Patagonia told us back in 2011, not to buy that jacket.
 
The challenge this poses for most companies is obvious; if a business doesn’t make profit from selling more product, how does it create sustainable value for its stakeholders?  How does encouraging consumers to form long-lasting, caring relationships with their products make good business sense?  We believe the answer lies in a reconceptualisation of the relationship between products and services; brands need to design business models that can deliver value for them and their users during the lifetime of a product so that they are less reliant on revenue at the point-of-sale.  Or, as Al has previously described, their focus should be on realising the value-in-use of their products and services and not only on the value-in-exchange.
 
With literally millions of sustainable business models that brands could adopt, and a fair proportion of those based on maximising the value through the lifetime of products, how do brands go about choosing the right approach for them?  We could go on forever on this topic (in fact, initially we did, which it why it has taken us so long to upload this ‘blog.  Even now, it’s a doozie in terms of length).  However, based on examples of great practice within and beyond the industry, we offer our top three tips for those businesses who want to pay more than lip-service to durability for sustainability:

1. Share the vision

There’s no getting away from it; the transition from selling products to creating value through durable product/ service market offers is a strategic one that affects everyone in the value network.  For that reason, it’s really important to establish the direction you want to go in and look for opportunities to capitalise on shared values with your stakeholders (including your customers).  Establishing a shared vision is what drives the business model, product and service design - and ideally to design out, or at least minimise, any trade-offs against sustainability objectives.
 
When Riversimple set out to develop an ultra-low emission vehicle, they first established a clear purpose: ‘To pursue, systematically, the elimination of the environmental impact of personal transport’.  This purpose has driven their customer value proposition - selling the service of mobility, rather than vehicles; their service design - a monthly contract that includes the cost of insurance and fuel; and their product design brief - prioritising weight minimisation, fuel efficiency and ultra-low emissions at point-of-use.  In doing so, Riversimple have acknowledged that there are some trade-offs to be made regarding the environmental impact of lightweight composite materials used in construction, and in the emissions associated with hydrogen production.  In the meantime, they are pursuing projects on lower-impact composite materials and processes and keeping a watching brief on the ongoing research into green hydrogen.  Their business model also makes Riversimple responsible for the end-of-life of the vehicle; it is in their interests that the vehicle stays in use for as long as it is the most fuel-efficient option.
 
We’re always wary of using Patagonia as a case study (they must be getting bored with it by now), but they are so far ahead of the game in terms of service offers in the outdoor industry that it’s almost impossible not to.  Until 2018, Patagonia’s mission statement was to ‘build the best product; cause no unnecessary harm; use business to protect nature; and not be bound by convention’.  Their definition of the ‘best product’ included criteria of functionality, repairability and durability.  This has driven their customer value proposition (long-lasting products with services aimed to extend lifetimes; service design (successfully prioritising repair and reuse over recycling through the WornWear initiative) and product design, including those pesky trade-offs around durable water repellency that we discussed last time.

2. Stop, collaborate and listen

Sorry, we did it again.  Bear with us - it’s warm and sunny and perhaps a bit of silly season has crept in … and who doesn’t like a bit of Ice Ice Baby (apart maybe from Eminem, Queen and David Bowie)?  But, we genuinely believe collaboration is the key to creating successful product/service offers, whatever their purpose. 
 
Collaboration across the existing value network can help to ensure the shared purpose that brands have outlined is not only understood, but acted upon.  We were lucky enough to work with Riversimple and QSA Partners on a feasibility project that engaged the value network in offering sale-of-service of vehicle components a couple of years ago (we can’t take any of the credit for the product and service design outlined above, though).  We quickly identified that it’s important to make sure that people in the value network understand how the shared purpose affects their relationship to the business, and to identify where existing business objectives can be aligned to achieve the purpose.  This saves a lot of wasted time, effort and heartache in the long-run.
 
Maximising the value of a service might also need require expansion of the value network.  When Orangebox began to remanufacture chairs, they introduced new partners to take care of the remanufacturing logistics and processes while they continued to focus on core business activities.  When a sustainable public procurement tender was released for complete office refurbishment, Orangebox collaborated with several other companies to deliver an award-winning solution.
 
We think there’s real potential for greater collaboration across the outdoor industry.   For example, let’s consider the existing status of repair services.  Our not-very-scientific analysis indicates that extending existing warranty and repair services are often the first steps that brands take in product lifetime extension.  Most often,this links the service to ‘problem’ products, relies on consumers being engaged enough to search out repair and requires significant resources to run - indeed, a number of brands encourage ‘do-it-yourself’ repair guides which promote longevity without putting strain on repair services.  In this form, warranty and repair offers little opportunity for creating value-in-use, and it is not in a brand’s interest to promote greater uptake.  However, what would happen if the outdoor industry worked together to develop a global network of repair services?  And who would be involved in delivering the service?  Perhaps, like Vaude, it might make use of engaged customers through repair cafes?  Or maybe the service offer might be ‘preventative maintenance’, offered as part of a lease for interested consumers, or to brands that already offer local rental schemes, such as Rent-a-Plagg and Vaude?  Such a model could open up opportunities for companies to practice more effective product stewardship and gain value from multiple users, or resale of more products at end-of-life. Of course, it’s not that simple.  All of these potential models come with risks - which leads us to our final tip…

3. Prototype, prototype… and then prototype again

The road to product-service systems is littered with good intentions, as Vaude’s experience with Ecolog will attest.  It’s possible to create a technically perfect service, only to find that those pesky consumers don’t use it, that it leads to unintended environmental consequences that outstrip its benefits, or that the value network isn’t able to cope with the realities of the new business flow.  When Orangbox ran a pilot-study on their chair remanufacturing scheme, they found that the social enterprise originally engaged to conduct remanufacturing was not able to manage the flow of products being returned, or to remanufacture to the specified standards.  The transition to a more service-based business model can be slow, might occur through multiple iterations, and take businesses into hitherto uncharted waters where there might be sharks.  That’s why it’s so important to find cost-effective ways of testing the riskiest parts of your business model. 
 
Intentionally or not, Patagonia offer a useful example of how outdoor industries can engage in business model prototyping.  Their first resale venture through Ebay provided a relatively low-cost way to test consumer readiness for an e-commerce platform.  Physical resale platforms at flagship stores in the US informed Patagonia about the appeal of used gear to their regular consumers.  Pop-up events at own stores and partner venues would have contributed to the company’s understanding of the appetite for repair and reuse.  We may sound cynical here; that’s not the intention.  We genuinely believe that Patagonia pursue the Worn Wear programme to achieve their pre-2018 mission (see 1), and also to contribute to their current mission statement: ‘We’re in business to save our home planet’.  Better to do that by gently stepping into new ways of working, than to plunge in and regret it later. 
 
For smaller companies who are considering changing their business practice, but are intimidated by the scale of Patagonia’s prototyping and the resources they have at hand to facilitate it there are much simpler, bite-size approaches available for testing new value propositions, products and services with customers and the value network.  What’s also great is the wealth of information out there to learn from, both within and beyond the industry.  Patagonia and Vaude have both published the details of their service experiments.  Online resources such as the Ellen MacArthur Foundation website and publication Circulate provide detailed case studies of business models aimed at extending product lifetimes.  The European Outdoor Group and other industry trade bodies can play a massive role in providing opportunities, support and guidance for making durability count.  It’s a great time to try new things!
 
If you’ve made it this far, then congratulations!  It’s a long read but one that we think is really important, and we’d love to talk more about it.  Please do comment or ask questions via LinkedIn. 
 
For our fourth and final ‘blog, normal service will be resumed (1,000 words or less - we have been warned!), and we’ll be talking about transparency initiatives.

Read the next in this series of blogs: Ecodesign reflections on Outdoor by Ispo Part II. Including the user in life cycle-based design

“After 2 years of commuting from Bristol – paying the high Bristol rent prices and travel expenses on top, we decided to ignore the stories of fire breathing dragons and eternal rain and move to Cardiff. Having been here 2 years now, it’s been the best move we could have made... big enough to provide plenty of pubs / clubs / restaurants and nightlife yet small enough to cycle around in 20 minutes.  Couple that with Cardiff being one of the most affordable big cities in the UK with plenty of green space / cycle paths and both Surf and mountains within 40 minutes – we love it!
 
Best city in the UK? I do not know if I am qualified to make that decision but it certainly works for us above the other cities we have called home: Brighton, Birmingham, Sheffield, Leeds, Oxford and Bristol.”

Ben’s right, Cardiff is a compact city with lots going on. It is the heart of rugby with the Principality Stadium hosting rugby games and arena tours from the greatest performing artists (Rocketman himself, Elton John, just performed at Cardiff City Stadium). Those match days bring the city to life with the excitement felt by everyone. The Welsh spirit, especially when it comes to Rugby, is incomparable to anything I have ever experienced to do with sport. 

Next up is Jo who is a designer on the Policy team. Cardiff is her hometown and has never left, so if that’s not enough to convince you I don’t know what is.

“Cardiff has many beautiful green spaces; with castles, lakes, rivers and wonderful coffee shops nestled in them or nearby. The food scene is tasty – markets and pop-ups are really helping, plus restaurants with award winning chefs; from pizza to lobster, vegan roast dinners to tacos! Lots of local bars and pubs stock craft produce from local breweries, vineyards and distilleries, with friendly atmospheres and great social activities in most areas (Canton / Pontcanna is probably one of the best spots to find all of these things). Sports-wise, there are so many leisure centres and sports teams as well as independent gyms and running clubs. And, if that wasn’t enough, within about 30mins drive you could be adventuring in the mountains or at the coast. Dwi’n caru Caerdydd | I love Cardiff. (Ok, I’m a bit biased, but it really is a fantastic city!)…”

So, what about working at PDR? Well here is what Piotr one of our researchers had to say about it. 

“Doing research on design management and policies for my master’s back home at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, led me to many interesting publications coming from researchers working at PDR. I was curious to know more about PDR and their work, so I applied for an Erasmus Internship. I spent a very insightful three months in 2013 in this unique place that blends theory and practice and went back to Poland with some great memories of picturesque Wales and friends I made there. I didn’t hesitate when a vacancy at Design Policy team opened and submitted my CV. It was successful and this May I celebrated my five years at PDR! No day is the same, which constantly motivates me to learn and develop. I look forward to the next five years of stimulating work challenges and thought-provoking chats over coffee and cake with PDR colleagues.”

Like Piotr said, as a consultancy every day is different, with a variety of projects there is lots going on all the time. Everyone is kind and supportive and I’ve made friends for life during my time here. But of course making the move can be difficult. Before arriving here I had no idea where to live, how easy it would be to visit other places and how much it costs to be here etc. But as Ben said earlier it is one of the most affordable big cities in the UK. 

The average price for renting a bedroom is £331, compared to Bristol £431 and Camden, London where the average is £1,051 (based on BBC ‘How good is your place for young people?’). Bills aren’t included but that is a pretty good price to be paying, when you compare to other places, each month. 

Travelling from Cardiff

The train links from Cardiff Central to London Paddington are great. There are direct trains that take about two hours into the heart of London. However, the train can sometimes get expensive so there are coaches that can take you to London for pretty cheap prices. We’re also a three-hour train from Liverpool and two-hour train from Birmingham, so are pretty well connected. 
If you have a car, then we are straight off the M4 taking you to West Wales or straight into the heart of London. 

For further afield, we have Cardiff Airport which is about a 30 minute drive away or 45 minute via Airport Bus. From here you can fly to different locations for city breaks whether it be Malta, Faro or even Iceland - it’s got you covered.

But if you can’t find the destination you’re wanting there is also Bristol Airport. With regular, direct coaches from Cardiff which take about an hour and a half you’re good to go. Alternatively, you can easily access Heathrow via the M4.

So from what I’ve said here Cardiff is great. I love it. You may even pick up some of the Welsh language whilst you are here (Cardiff Met offers free Welsh lessons to all staff). Combine the all that Cardiff has to offer with a job at PDR, you will really have it all (or close). 

Cardiff Service Design (CSD) is a mix of individuals with an interest in service design who thought it was time to make a network – Piotr and myself are 2 of the original 8. During a chat on a damp March evening, we started to plot out what this community could be and wanted to open it up to others. Wanting to get stuck in, PDR were really excited to host this first CSD meet up at Milk & Sugar | The Old Library (our home from home for events) to start exploring the potential for this community.
 
It was really important to us to create an inclusive atmosphere - a really informal, warm welcome event. We had a few lightning presentations (prepared and impromptu), discussions and activities focused on shaping the future of Service Design in Cardiff. In our minds we had an impression of what CSD is at the moment, but we wanted to know what it could be. We had some questions to ask. Where could we evolve? What did people want to do?
 
I wanted to see ‘who you are & where you are’, so cracked out the trusty instax and some sharpies and got snapping for those who wanted to get themselves ‘on the map’ so to speak. Around the room we posed some headings of topics to get a feel for what people envisioned for CSD plus the bonus ‘pick & mix’ for anything that didn’t fit a category.
 
Alistair, our User Centred Design Lead, facilitated a great little icebreaker for the group which involved tracking down the author of a personal fun fact. From world record deadlifters to scars caused by Duplo blocks, everyone got stuck in to some interesting conversations and learnt a bit more about each other. (Though I am now aware of how common scars on foreheads are, but less commonly made by Duplo…)

Working in Service Design means that you generally have a vague idea of the other “Service Designers” out there, but let’s face it, there are probably lots of people who work in designing services who aren’t Service Designers… or maybe don’t even know that it’s a thing, but that’s okay. We opened it up to anyone who:

- Is working in or around the Cardiff area on the design of services

- Is interested in Service Design

It was great to see so many fresh faces - and what a spectrum! We had entrepreneurs, government organisations, service providers, as well as design providers and pockets of groups in-between. Meeting like-minded people but with different skill sets and backgrounds was something I personally wanted to get out of this event.
 
With abundant delicious nibbles and beverages in hand, people seemed at ease just chatting about services, catching up with old names and meeting new ones. A few lightning presentations helped us to get to know each other a little more. Everyone is now aware of Alistair’s passion for inclusivity as well as his incredible jelly shoes.

From the event, a consensus of sharing good practices and knowledge was reached. There’s a hope that there will not just be quarterly events but also informal, yet themed, monthly catch ups to share what’s on our minds. With the response repeatedly being that we “set the bar pretty high” I’m really excited to see what we as a collective come up with for the next big event (possibly July/August – TBC). I think it’s safe to say that pizza and cheese are definitely things to look into for the future of CSD!
 
For more updates or if you want to get involved follow the community on Twitter @CardiffSD

“only service design maps directly onto established categories within economics which divide up activities into the extraction of raw materials, manufacturing and services.”

|   Open access chapter
|   Full Book

This consideration of services in economic & market terms, previously primarily the domain of ‘service marketing’, is gaining traction within the design community. And I think rightly so, if we seriously intend design(ers) to have an impact at a business level, we must be able to communicate at that level. Matt Edgar’s recent blog post on what he means when he talks about services is a good example of this.

This resonated with my research, tracing the roots of how we talk about services in design currently, and how we can move this forward. In service marketing, the concept of service-dominant logic and value co-creation have been developing since Vargo & Lusch first proposed it in 2004. However, the practice of service development was still based in a value-in-exchange model as opposed to value-in-use. In effect, organisations were designing and selling services with a product development approach, attempting to embed value into a service and sell that value in a transaction.

Staff from the Latvia Public Service experimenting with role play and digital prototyping techniques.

Is this design’s opportunity?
In my experience of applying the design process to business and organisational challenges, the two most fundamental differences when using a design process instead of other service development approaches is the inclusion of ongoing user research, and an iterative prototyping process. Both methods are used to identify how a service can and will provide value to people in use. Yu & Sangiorgi’s 2018 paper agree that a design approach fills the gaps in new service development, allowing organisations to design with an understanding that the value of the service is not embedded by them and delivered to people, but co-created with these people.

Prototypes externalise the proposed future service in a way which allows those outside of the design team to experience and shape the service in development. When an organisation moves to recognise that value is co-created with others, prototyping services in a way that they can be experienced by people is a key component in identifying whether the services do provide the intended value.

However, when it comes to prototyping ‘intangible’ services, there is an inevitable uncertainty. Can you accurately represent services that rely on the passage of time, human relationships, multiple physical environments and mobile technology in a prototype? And should you try? We have some strong methods and thinking already in this space, I often refer back to Roberta Tassi’s Service Design Tools for example. But other design practices have much more developed prototyping practice and can point us in the right direction for developing service design.

Borrowing prototyping theory
Arguably what most people think of when they think of prototyping is products; prototypes you can pick up or walk around. In product design we know that prototypes can have different purposes:
 
A model of four prototyping categories (Erichsen et al. 2016)

|   Full text pdf

Erichsen’s model from the automotive industry recognises that not all prototypes are for the same purposes, therefore not all prototypes need to be planned in the same way, or with the same degree of accuracy or fidelity. One thing in particular worth noting is that not all prototypes are for external audiences, and not all prototypes are for ‘testing’.

If we really want to dig into prototype theory, Interaction Design or HCI is the place to look. Lim and Stolterman’s ‘Fundamental Prototyping Principle’ is a great summary of this understanding:

“Prototyping is an activity with the purpose of creating a manifestation that, in its simplest form, filters the qualities in which designers are interested, without distorting the understanding of the whole.”

|   Full text pdf

 A Desktop Walkthrough prototype

Designers should plan prototypes based on what they want to learn. They recognise how being economical with time and materials can enable them to achieve these aims, without destroying the audiences grasp of the overall design. This idea of prototypes having various ‘qualities’ that can be manipulated to the designer’s own ends is developed through McCurdy et al’s ‘mixed fidelity’ model. They propose various dimensions of fidelity that can and should be controlled for the prototypes intended purposes. In Interaction Design/HCI They identify the following 5 dimensions:

• Level of visual refinement
• Breadth of functionality
• Depth of functionality
• Richness of Interactivity
• Richness of data model

|   Request full text

If you’re like me, seeing this written down for the first time was such a clear articulation of everything I’d come to understand about building interactive digital prototypes, sparking my desire to investigate it further. Specifically, my research will be looking to uncover what might be the 5 dimensions of fidelity to consider when we prototype services.

What is clear is that there is no one approach to prototyping that can satisfy all needs within service design. Prototyping an end to end service will inherently differ from the prototype of an individual touchpoint along that service journey, the designer needs to recognise this and control the qualities of the prototype to achieve their aims. Recognising this level of control we can have and consciously planning prototypes based on it, is the first step to better service design prototyping.

Fuelled by a lot of Gelato, a few of us were lucky enough to spend a few days walking through the various design districts and witness the design delights which Milano has to offer.

VENTURA CENTRALE

Contained within nine to fifteen vaults, brands such as Yamaha, Freitag and Rapt Studio created immersive, multisensory experiences. There was a strong focus between future materials and technology which created impressive installations, encouraging attendees to engage and connect with our senses. Moreover, sustainability and celebrating good design (or bad design in Freitag’s case) were other highlights within the design district.

Below are a few of our favourite pieces from Ventura Centrale.

HUMAN SCALE: BODIES IN MOTION

Humanscale, manufacturers of ergonomic products created an installation called ‘Bodies in Motion’ which explored human movement. Using 3D scanners to identify core joints within the human body, people were encouraged to move freely and witness their own bodies moving through beams of light.

FREITAG: UNFLUENCER, DE-SINNING THE DESIGNER

The Bag manufacturer Freitag collaborated with film designer Georg Lendorff, hoping to provide visitors with a more honest and more inspirational experience. When Milan Design Week is all about celebrating good design, this installation tries to highlight the exact opposite.

We were each allocated a numbered ticket on entry. They asked us, as designers, to think about our worst pieces of work: Had we considered a products environmental impact? Was it fit for purpose? Or was it just horrendously ugly? Lendorff's immersive, walk-in light installation- Projections onto thousands of threads hanging from the ceiling- provided visitors' a sense of space and time to contemplate their criminal offences to design.

When our number appeared on a digital display, we were summoned to a confession booth. Here, we confessed our design and consumption sins to a fellow sinner, in the hope of finding ways to improve for the future.

All designers leaving the installation were given a tagged bag and therefore can identify themselves as ‘de-sinned’.

TAKT PROJECT: glow ⇄ grow

The TAKT project ‘glow ⇄ grow’ harnessed modern materials and technology to create a subterranean experience to excite the high tech cave dweller. By slowly dripping UV curing resin over a pulsating, fluctuating string of LEDs, polymer stalactites slowly develop as the light freezes the liquid material, mimicking the millennial process which has fascinated us since we first recognised the beauty and magic in nature’s processes.

DNP: PATTERNS AT TIME

In contrast, DNP’s advanced printing technologies have inspired AtMa Inc and noiz through the magic and mystery to modern materials and printing processes. Electrically charged ink can be manipulated by varying the current passing through the printed material so that patterns can be hidden, graded or emphasised.

WALLPAPER* HANDMADE X: WITH LOVE

Wallpaper Magazine has curated a number of designers, artists and architects to create an immersive experience. Bang and Olufsen, Layer Design, MUJI, Paul Smith and ISKO were among the few.

​Layer Design + NIO collaborate to create ‘PAL’ a smart scooter concept

Milan Design Week most certainly did not disappoint and we have come away from this experience with new found knowledge and inspiration from both the big players in the design world but also upcoming talent and smaller design projects who are pushing the boundaries in design.

Travelling on a variety of different projects, from EU-funded to the medical industry, the job continues to fulfil my endeavour to understand users and identify their needs and desires. Working across different departments in PDR has exposed me to having mentoring from a range of different individuals in new product development, Eco-design and policy. This has not only built upon my user-centred design knowledge but also allows me to apply the research methods I have acquired to a wide range of different scenarios.

From in-context observation, to consumer interviews to workshops, the international travel has allowed me to conduct these research methods with a wide range of different demographics across a multitude of countries.
Washington Monument, USA.

I love talking to people. Travelling internationally presents a map of users which share common themes. The need for consumption is evident in many of the major cities I have visited. People want rather than need.  I want the new iPhone X so I buy the new iPhone X despite nothing being wrong with my current phone. We are trend consumers always enticed by the strength of marketing and owning the newest, which we tend to perceive as the best.
In the chill of Budapest, Hungary with my colleague Carmen.

I have visited places I never thought I would go, for example Taiwan. Getting off the plane in the sweltering heat in Taipei. With the taxi driver then navigating his way through the hustle and bustle of the traffic. It was a place I never would have expected to go. Even when going with work, there is always the opportunity to have a bit of time to explore. This was also the case in San Francisco. Cycling across the Golden Gate Bridge, visiting MOMA and wandering the streets for an Irish bar when the six nations was on - there were awesome times squeezed in between work.
In a taxi in Taipei, Taiwan.

As a mere graduate starting out, I felt fear starting my new job. But all these fears dwindled and my confidence grew as I started working on an array of new and different projects from the get go. Now working as a user-centred designer, I am forever learning.
Grenoble, France.

The quality and importance of Dominic’s work was recognised with the award of a highly prestigious Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education in 2015. Dominic continues to push the boundaries of possibility in how design can be used to improve patient outcomes and deliver effective healthcare services by working with numerous health boards and surgeons.

We congratulate Dominic on achieving this award and recognition.

1. Engage the whole Design Ecosystem.

2. Practice what you preach – use co-design.

3. Align with bigger picture.

4. Learn from best practice but make it relevant to your context.

5. Promote your policy, the value of design and your achievements.

6. Monitor, evaluate & improve.

I also had a chance to contribute to the design policy workshop with local stakeholders, where we discussed the potential focus areas for Istanbul design policy. It was a true testimony of designers’ problem-solving attitude, as the discussion centred around the main challenges of living in Istanbul, such as city resilience to both natural and human-made hazards; traffic; urban regeneration and benefiting from cultural diversity; leaving the issues of the design sector, education and support for further discussions. Using design as a horizontal enabler that helps to solve different complex challenges seems to be a growing trend in design policy, after waves of strategies focusing in their first generation on branding and business support, and then on public sector renewal.

‘We learnt today that policy is necessary’  
WORKSHOP PARTICIPANT

There seems to be a lot of interest in how design can contribute to social and economic development in Istanbul and throughout Turkey. We are keen to share our expertise and further engage in design policy development process, supporting next iterations of policy ideas, building a broad consensus, supporting implementation, to monitor and, where possible, evaluate these design actions.

‘With this modern and winningly unconventional design, Layr has eliminated the stigma associated with wearing a urine bag, thus making their use far easier for patients. Integrating smart technology into the product enables additional functions and advantages – which taken together add up to a groundbreaking product whose design had remained static for decades.’

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Hong Kong

Design was strategically embraced by HKSAR Government in a 2017 policy address. HKDC is seeking to shape HK's future with design as a new growth competence. We have trained 750 civil servants in the last few years. It’s another level of expertise to move from design thinking to design doing. The design policy is implemented through funded projects and top-down stewardship. We are in an action-driven phase.

“In the past month, I’ve had 20 enquiries from government departments who want to use design thinking. It’s important to be selective and only collaborate with departments that see the strategic value of design and not just the quick wins.”

EDMUND LEE

The German Design Award is one of the most widely recognised international design awards, honouring first-rate entries in the field of product and communications design. According to The German Design Council, “Prizes will only be awarded to projects that truly represent pioneering contributions to the German and international design landscape."

Declared by the Jury to be a groundbreaking product, Layr offers a revolutionary approach that brings clear clinical, practical and psychological benefits from a user-centred perspective to the problems of overnight catheterisation.

It replaces the mid-20th century PVC bag with an intelligent, connected ‘flask’ capable of bringing clinical expertise to the home, whilst eliminating the practical difficulties associated with existing systems. 

Jury statement

With this modern and winningly unconventional design, Layr has eliminated the stigma associated with wearing a urine bag, thus making their use far easier for patients. Integrating smart technology into the product enables additional functions and advantages – which taken together add up to a groundbreaking product whose design had remained static for decades.

PDR's Director, Jarred Evans, stated, "This is another major international design award for PDR and for Layr. Knowing that we design products that make a difference is extremely important to the team at PDR and it is fantastic to receive this consistent level of recognition."

"Knowing that we design products that make a difference is extremely important to the team at PDR and it is fantastic to receive this consistent level of recognition."

• Design support objective;

• Regional challenges and policy drivers;

• Project managers;

• Target audience;

• Designers and mentors;

• Desired impact.

 
Activity 2 focused on strategies needed to engage and recruit the stakeholders identified in Activity 1, and explored the structure of the pilots at a conceptual level. The framed design supports had nuanced objectives, but fell into two main categories:

1. Developing a tailor-made design support intervention for SMEs in collaboration with existing support services;

2. Evaluating current support offering/s and supporting SMEs in the journey of application to engagement.

 
Similarities that emerged across all framed pilots included:

• The need to promote the value of design internally and externally;

• A strong focus on collaboration in developing and delivering the pilots.

 
Partners will begin to engage with stakeholders in the coming months to finalise the development of their pilot and to start to recruit their target audience and mentors. At the next meeting in March in Santiago Del Compostela, pilot implementation plans will be presented.
 
Keep updated for future posts and press releases.
 
The USER-FACTOR website: http://userfactor.eu
Twitter: @user_factor

Recently I was honoured to be asked to speak at the Malta Design Week, this was as a result of working with an excellent group of colleagues, The Valletta Design Cluster. The Valletta team and PDR are working together (and with other partners) on a large EC funded project to support design-led innovation in SMEs.

In planning my talk, it occurred to me that I am far more experienced in talking to non-designers than I am to designers. This is because I often find myself in situations where I am trying to convince an audience that design can be an effective tool for innovation. In those situations, I often find myself faced with the age old problem of trying to define design. Better people than me have failed to tie that one down, so I won’t try to solve it here! But, in reflecting on my attempts, and the attempts of my colleagues, I think I have noticed something interesting. That is, when we fail to describe what design is, or present some bland explanation like ‘design is a problem solving process’, we often fall back on describing how we design instead. But, I wonder, do we as designers do ourselves a disservice when we creatively present our thinking processes to the uninitiated? The front-end is fuzzy, but we’ll clarify that with a double diamond process consisting of a problem space and a solution space, within this we’ll iterate, in stages; but don’t worry, because we’ll use stop/go gates to take us to the market. The diagram below makes this nice and clear!

Shapes and Gates, the potentially confusing design approach

Whilst it might not be easy to determine quite what design is, it is probably much easier to understand what someone paying for design wants. They want what they want from all business functions: to reduce risk. This is the same need whatever form of design is under consideration: Communication, reduce the risk that the message is misunderstood; Products, reduce the risk that the market doesn’t buy; Service, reduce the risk of dissatisfaction; etc.

If we take the case of the Kitchen Appliance manufacturer concerned about the trend towards the Internet of Things. In this case they’ve been successfully designing new kitchen products for 50 years, but the prospect of an internet enabled food mixer seems at odds with their design approach. We come in to investigate user needs, to look at kitchen trends for the next generation of potential customers, and link their brand with what we discover, that Millennials haven’t learned to cook, but they’d really like to. Yes, we did start fuzzy, explore needs with users and develop solutions. We did provide new internet enabled kitchen concepts and produce a product development strategy. But, most importantly we reduced risk, we reduced the risk that the company would invest in inappropriate development, and we reduced the risk that the next generation of customers would reject the company’s products.

When we talk to our partners in these terms of risk, they get what we do more easily, and it allows us to push design into new areas. When we worked with Welsh Government to streamline their innovation funding application process for Welsh Companies, we spoke about risk. We used design not only to improve the application forms, but also to communicate the process to applicants. This meant a better understanding of the application process, the monitoring process, and the audit processes entailed. We aimed to manage expectations on the decision making process, encouraging more companies to apply. What we were attempting to do was to address the risk of company frustrations, the reputational risks to the innovation funding team, and the risks of not adequately stimulating innovation in the region.

As designers we have our own ways of working, and the structured creative process is an amazing innovation tool – but to communicate the point of design to our main audience, non-designers, we must find ways to talk their language as well as our own.

“The Design Economy generated £85.2 billion (GVA) to the UK in 2016, almost three quarters of the value of UK financial services and insurance.”

Source: Design Council’s Design Economy Executive Summary 2018

 
This platform gave me the opportunity to talk about Design for Innovation and explain how creating policies that help support the use of design in SMEs is vital to economic growth. Through sharing good practices and utilising design tools our aim is to create an impact on SMEs that will help both to lower the number of businesses with no design elements in their processes and increase the number that implement design as strategy.

Design Action Plan was also discussed as it is recognised as a recommendation by the Design Council and is an ongoing project for the Design Policy team at PDR.

Both of these projects are concerned with the engagement of users and stakeholders. Design processes engage users - allowing for the co-creation of ideas and solutions. From looking at health care to education and from the way that businesses are supported to bills on assisted dying, it really allows us to engage citizens to design for life.
 
It was great to see that our D4I partners from GAIN were in attendance and also that they were running a workshop on the creation of a national design entity. Montserrat Rodriguez was a particular help as she was able to give her perspective on the D4I processes- allowing for a more rounded discussion around the project (as well as acting as my very own personal translator).

It’s a really exciting time for Spain- not only because they are looking to create a national design centre but also looking ahead to its future design policies as decision makers there recognise that it isn’t just about the options available but also the co-creation of solutions with citizens to make life better.

I, for one, am very interested to see this seed grow.

Figure 1 – Musculoskeletal model

Finite element models (FEM) simulate engineering and mathematical problems. We developed our model of a femur with a healthy cartilage layer (Figure 2), and applied boundary and loading conditions that replicated the real world conditions of a hip joint.

Figure 2 – Meshed FEM depicting femur and cartilage

Bone remodelling was simulated over time and included some of the different layers which form cartilage. This model enabled us to study the degenerative effect of cartilage due to osteoarthritis (Figure 3).

Figure 3 – Degeneration of cartilage over time

We combined the results from our three models, and generated an osteoarthritic hip model using a combination of musculoskeletal gait and multiscale data of the cartilage. This hypermodel provided us with the opportunity to assess the effectiveness of treatments for osteoarthritis of the hip, for example by total hip replacement (Figure 4).

Figure 4 – Incorporating a total hip replacement into the FEM

The workshop ran for 4 days, with modelling continuing into the early hours!

On the final day each team presented their findings. It was a good opportunity to see how other groups had tackled integrating the models. The whole experience was valuable, as I worked with individuals from the University of Sheffield, Oxford, and the Manufacturing Technology Centre (Figure 5) – each person’s background gave a unique insight as to how the model could be developed.

Ensuring that your own contribution of work could be incorporated into the group’s final model was a lot of pressure, but through good team work and communication we were able to create a successful multiscale model that met the aim of the workshop.

Figure 5 – The modellers

• Collaboratively-develop regionally-appropriate methods that will enable the provision of custom made devices used to correct facial deformity to a greater number of people in India, and to test the feasibility of the new approach.

• Identify and prioritise new collaborative research projects to overcome the challenges identified.

• Develop community, training and industry partnerships that will help to implement the research.

PDR’s Dr Dominic Eggbeer and Dr Katie Beverley recently travelled to India along with Peter Evans from Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board’s Maxillofacial Unit at Morriston Hospital for the first exchange visit on this project.
 
As part of this visit, a stakeholder engagement session was held with surgeons from different areas to look at how they would use the technologies and to find out the real challenges that they face. User journey mapping was used to understand the process involved for them currently and a problem definition exercise was carried out with the attendees. These results will be turned into a proposal as part of the project.

Dominic explained, “The first of four exchange visits allowed us to work with King George’s Medical University to develop a strategy for implementing 3d design engineering and manufacturing technologies. The Department of Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery has a vision to be outstanding globally for patient care, teaching and research. It is a pleasure to work with this department, the wider hospital, local industry and research sector to help them realise this vision. We are grateful to the UK India Education Research Initiative for funding this opportunity, which is already producing tangible benefits.”

Whilst in Lucknow, Dominic, Katie and Peter were also invited by Prof. Mehrotra, Vice Dean and Faculty in charge of the DHR-MRU, King George's Medical University, to present at the National Conference on Medical Tissue Bioengineering.

Peter gave a presentation showing how his team use additive manufacturing and other forms of manufacture in the prostheses lab at Morriston Hospital. Dominic presented examples of the work carried out at SPD and Katie’s presentation posed the title: Can a circular economy approach support health initiatives in resource-constrained environments? It explored the notion that the new laboratory would need to become self-sustaining in order to pay for the democratising of such a treatment.

“The Department of Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery has a vision to be outstanding globally for patient care, teaching and research. It is a pleasure to work with this department, the wider hospital, local industry and research sector to help them realise this vision”

 
DR DOMINIC EGGBEER, HEAD OF SURGICAL AND PROSTHETIC DESIGN
PDR
 
Long term, this exchange of experience between India and the UK will lead to large-scale research projects, education and training programmes and commercial ventures.
 
The design methods developed during the project will be applicable to healthcare challenges and other regions, creating a platform for long-term sustained impact.