Product Design

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.

Drawn by the opportunity to work with industry innovators and creative faculty, students in the UO’s new sports product design master’s program are also finding their fellow students’ varied backgrounds ideal for collaboration. The uniquely Oregon program attracted a mechanical engineer, a soccer jersey designer, and a museum exhibit installer, among others, eager to explore the hands-on nature of sports product design. Several students formed a team that won first place in the QuackCon in October, the country’s first collegiate sports and technology hackathon competition.

Beth Esponnette envisions a world in which clothing is made to order on a 3-D printer that builds each item with no waste in a process that could include scanning a person’s body measurements. After winning a Faculty Research Award, Esponnette, an assistant professor in the UO Department of Product Design, hired Sarah Hashiguchi, a Clark Honors College student majoring in product design and minoring in chemistry, to assist with the research. The Oregon Quarterly winter 2016 issue profiled their work.

It’s not unheard of for a restaurant patron to sneak out with a spoon. But with a chair?  And at the request of the host?

Students in a product design class at the UO are encouraging diners to do just that on December 2, when the class, “Feast for Fifty,” invites community members to connect with student work over a shared meal.

UO product design students captured the top two spots at QuackCon, the country’s first collegiate sports and technology hackathon competition that synthesized engineering, programming, and athletics to create innovative sports product designs in a 36-hour blitz.

Most Americans haven’t heard of Kansei design, which studies how emotion drives consumer choices. For example, designers of the Mazda Miata sports car used Kansei engineering in developing the car’s gear shift. Their analysis spurred designers to change the throw between each gear so it’s shorter than most manual transmission shift lengths—leading the driver to feel more “powerful.”

Wheelchair rugby athletes at the Rio 2016 Paralympics this month are getting an edge from gear designed in part by students in a University of Oregon product design studio. A story in the October 2016 Portland Monthly shows how the US national team worked with UO in Portland students to create performance-boosting wearable designs, including arm guards and gloves.

UO Department of Product Design undergraduates won two of three possible $3,000 awards in the 2015-2016 INTERZINC Challenge, a theme-based competition which this year asked engineering and design students nationwide to design camping products made from zinc.

Associate Professor Susan Sokolowski published an article, “A Visual History of Women’s Olympic Uniforms (1900-2016),” in For Her on August 2.