Two designs by UO teams were among the Top Ten products and installations at WantedDesign 2017 in New York as selected by Dezeen. Studio Gorm—the design office of Assistant Professor Wonhee Jeong-Arndt and Associate Professor John Arndt of the UO’s Department of Product Design—won the 2017 American Design Honors earlier this year.
UO Sports Product Design Program student Irving Perez has one of the best ideas since night baseball: new uniforms for baseball players. Except for newer fabrics, professional players’ uniforms have hardly changed since the mid-1800s. That look — buttoned shirts and belted trousers akin to jodhpurs — seems unlikely to change anytime soon because players like the tradition.
The UO Department of Product Design will host the 2017 Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) West District Design Conference April 23-24. This year’s theme is “DESIGN: HYBRID.” Registration will continue onsite.
The Holistic Options for Planet Earth Sustainability (HOPES) conference, an annual gathering hosted each spring term by the University of Oregon’s School of Architecture and Allied Arts, is one of the only student-run sustainability conferences in the United States.
The event features lectures, panel discussions, workshops, exhibitions, and nightly mixers. It is free and open to the UO community as well as the general public.
The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded an Art Works grant of $20,000 to the UO’s Department of Product Design for “Unparalleled Oregon Product Design,” a week-long series of free educational workshops, lectures, and exhibitions in uniquely Oregonian design.
Some 40,000 people from 60 countries will see designs by two UO faculty members exhibiting at the Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair in February. Because 80 percent of exhibitors at the fair come from Scandinavia, the invitation to the Americans is a coup.
Putting a brand on a sports product or an athlete is big business and requires careful consideration, Associate Professor Susan Sokolowski noted recently in an article on the Adobe Creative Cloud website. “The branding should be strong and recognizable to play up the benefit of being associated with a sports star, but people also should be able to understand the relationship between the parent company and athlete sub-brand,” she said. “Look at athletes who’ve had successful partnerships.
Product design students at UO have developed innovations to improve the mass transit experience for people with disabilities, especially those who use walkers or wheelchairs. In Associate Professor Trygve Faste’s studio course “Design for an Aging Population” students surveyed and interviewed bus riders, held focus groups, accompanied riders on trips and rode as observers before designing their projects.
John Arndt and Wonhee Jeong-Arndt, both of whom teach in the UO Department of Product Design and operate Studio Gorm in Eugene, have received the 2017 American Design Honors. The award recognizes up-and-coming American designers who embody excellence in creative design and superior entrepreneurial ability. “I'm exceptionally proud of the work that John and Wonhee are doing, as it honors a great American art form while making it relevant in today’s design world,” said Jerry Helling, president of Bernhardt Design, which sponsors the award with WantedDesign.
A team from the University of Oregon Department of Product Design has taken on the challenge of protecting military service members during chemical or biological attacks.
Susan Sokolowski, associate professor and director of the Sports Product Design Program, and undergraduate student Juliann Larese have made it to the final round of a Department of Defense competition to design clothing better suited for “warfighters”—soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen. Winners will be announced in January.
