Possibilities | an invitation to product development.

Almost every small business today is looking for “the great what’s next” — how do we navigate the current challenges and what will things be like when we’re through them? This is becoming increasingly difficult predict but like everyone else, we’re working on it.

Of course no one really knows what’s coming. I have no answers to that question and I’m skeptical of anyone who says they do, but as with many firms, we’re looking to pivot and become more agile in order to be ready for what’s next, and this is a story of one way in which we are pivoting.

As an Industrial Design Studio, the balance of sharing the work we do publicly and generating business for the studio is always tricky. For some, it’s a way of life. They create new work and exhibit at the many superb design weeks around the world seeking licensing and commissions. But the work we do and the needs of our clients aren’t well suited to that model; we’ve dabbled there but lean more toward a consulting firm model. This past year has overlaid the Covid pandemic, making all this that much trickier — so whether you’re the design week sort or the consulting sort, how do you share what you’re doing with your audience, when you’re unable to get in front of them?

We’re trying something new — and as with all new things, there is a risk. We’re placing into the public realm, conceptual work we’ve been working on for some time. It’s out there and you can see it here. Now many in the field of product development are uncomfortable with this, and I have to confess I have a measure of unease about it as well.

So the risks: some would say we are exposed to plagiarism. Others say the risk is that companies looking for a unique solution, may be put off by the public nature of this approach. And while I certainly understand the nature of our business and the need to be unique, there are a couple of aspects to this that bear laying out.

A key aspect of this work of ours is that it is intentionally incomplete. We know that for a manufacturer to be successful with anything we’ve designed, they need to own it. Owning it means participating in what it is and what it can become and that presumes that the end result will differ either more or less from what we’ve set in motion. What we’ve laid out are starting points, aspects, moods and compositions that need to be furthered by a team with a more specific focus.

Another aspect of this is the fact that for anyone working in the field of contract office furnishings, whether manufacturer, designer, sales and marketing, whatever the discipline, we’re all working on essentially the same problem — effective manufactured products to support people at work. Of course the manifestation of the solution will differ from firm to firm based on culture, geography, market position and manufacturing competencies, but we are all looking at the same context trying to draw meaningful conclusions.

So we have put out into the world, in a digital way, an interpretation of solutions to a number of working scenarios. We partnered with Parcel, a brand strategy and design firm to help us curate and position each piece and create the platform to showcase them.

I am sure that many manufacturers are working on similar things, albeit in their own distinct way. Our hope in sharing this work in the way we have is that if we connect with a manufacturer going in a similar direction, the alignment will be easy as we’ve already got the ball rolling. We’ve thrown out the first pitch to react to, either to edit, redirect or pursue.

That’s why we’ve called it Possibilities. The world is full of possibilities, the trick is to manifest them in a meaningful and reasonable way — and that’s our invitation.