4b0ut ik3g0 ↝
We asked ourselves how companies and designers could create products that do not destroy the planet but keep it green and healthy 🌳
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Current consumption changes the planet ☁️
The ‘circular economy‘ offers sustainable practices that keep materials in use ♾️ to protect our environment.
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The ‘circular economy‘ offers sustainable practices that keep materials in use ♾️ to protect our environment.
But there is one problem: These practices only work when they are supported by the design of our products. Sadly, ❌ most products fail to do this.
Current common design practices ↑, they make circularity difficult.
So we searched long and hard for a design approach that enables all of these practices. And when we found it, it came with an unexpected superpower:
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So we searched long and hard for a design approach that enables all of these circular practices. And when we found it, it came with an unexpected superpower:
Open Multipurpose Parts !
Yes, it turns out if you assemble products from parts that have many different uses, circularity suddenly becomes quite simple.
Multipurpose parts means parts have many use cases not just one, almost like LEGO bricks.
The problem now: We have to find and invent these parts and redesign everything with them. A LOT of research is needed.
So. Let’s start the journey…
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… together. It’s clear that such a goal can only be achieved when many work together. Y0⊍ make the difference:
Together
So we invite you and everyone to work with us on this vision, whether in close collaboration or independently on compatible solutions in other contexts.
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Let’s create a distributed multipurpose part design revolution for hyper-circularity!
ヽ(✿◠‿◠)ノ ♻️✨
MULTIPURPOSE PARTS? Quick Check Box
Ikego is not about objects, but about the parts you build them from. We search for highly universal parts that can be creatively reused and recombined in many ways for many objects.
Many ore maybe ♾️ objects from just a couple of parts?
This is the Ikego experiment.
We use construction toy systems as a metaphor because they are simple and easy to understand, which enables creative expression and collaboration. The brick system perfected by the LEGO company or erector sets come to mind as examples.
… a wall, a door, ⟳ a face, pavement, ⟳ a flower pot, a bucket …
… a wall, a leg, a pillar, a chassis, a screen, a handle …
„There is no trash in a LEGO room.“ Neil Gershenfeld (MIT, Center for bits and atoms), source
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How to create them? Here is one possible way:
▷ 1 Start with the object you want to build. Create a useful solution. And make sure your parts work for it.
Experiments with the Ikego system go back quite a while. In the beginning, we tried to create multipurpose parts first – we guessed – and then tried to build objects with them. That approach failed. The parts weren’t useful, the objects didn’t work. We only made progress once we flipped the process—starting with the objects and deriving the parts from them. For us, starting with the parts simply didn’t work. While this may not be a strict rule for everyone, it’s a perspective maybe worth considering.
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▷ 2 Find at least two alternate use cases for each part used. If you can’t find any, redesign the part until you can, and go back to step 1 ↑.
There is a famous story from the LEGO design department. When designer Mike Psiaki was tasked with designing the Porsche model (10295), he struggled to perfectly capture the curve at the rear end using existing LEGO parts. The element designer Yoel Mazur suggested introducing a new part into the catalog specifically for this purpose. However, Mike Psiaki was determined to find a solution using existing pieces. Despite this, the element designer created a new part anyway, which indeed solved the problem perfectly. Subsequently, all designers in the department were given time to play with this new part to see if there were any good ‘nice part usages’ (alternative applications) for it. At LEGO, before a new piece is approved for production, it has to demonstrate its ‘system-wide’ value, ensuring it isn’t just a specialized solution for one specific car. They tested if it is truly a multipurpose part. The result was a clear yes! Following this test, the part made it into the system. Today, there are indeed many applications for it.
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When you introduce new parts and perhaps new ways to connect them, try to find solutions that open new lanes for the overall flexibility of the system. Ideally you find something that works well in combination with existing parts. Tolerance is key. If something requires specific diameters or dimensions that cannot be replicated with hand tools, it is a slight disadvantage. However, this is not a dealbreaker. In such cases, try to use solutions that already exist on the market and are widely used → Hack Into Existing Systems! Ideally, these are common, easily accessible, standardized, well-documented, and already open (with expired patents). – Ikego is not about reinventing the wheel. It’s about finding wheels that fit.
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That’s it!
Btw. if you want to learn more, we also shared a white paper about design with multipurpose parts.
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Visions & insights
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By giving our products the superpowers of Open Multipurpose Parts, we could solve the sustainability crisis while even improving the quality of our products and our lives.
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Technology empowers us. And Open Multipurpose Parts are definitely another step toward turning us into superhumans.
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Imagine your entire home is equipped with Open Multipurpose Parts products. You live in a super dynamic building kit. Ask your AI assistant for remix ideas, and adjust things anytime. Next level freedom.
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I think early adopters of products made from open, multipurpose parts will be people or institutions that can see an immediate and direct benefit from the convertibility of the products, such as young families, offices, exhibition spaces and nomadic individuals. More users will follow from there. For them remixability is a distant future option on the horizon rather than something that needs constant updating.
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If you pay close attention to the world around you today, you will discover parts in some places that have more than one possible use. There are also “upcycling projects” for many things. Design with Open Multipurpose Parts aims to do more than just increase the number and distribution of these parts and solutions. It is about visibility. Remix ideas are collected and immediately accessible. Upcycling projects depend on someone finding the right idea at the right time and in the right place. Open Multipurpose Parts aims to make thousands of ideas available at any time and in any place.
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Products are always the result of professional collaboration. Designers, manufacturers, and marketers work together to bring products into our homes. The circular economy extends the chain of actors who deal professionally with products: repair, remanufacturing, repurposing, and recycling are tasks for professionals. The actors at the beginning of the chain (designers, manufacturers, marketers) must take the requirements of the actors further down the chain into consideration and enable their work. The decision to use Open Multipurpose Parts at the beginning of the chain is a way to do this. The handover of the products through the chain works, the circular economy succeeds.
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Design is hard. Creating products that people want to buy is not easy. Open Multipurpose Parts make this task even harder. It’s not for wimps. But it’s worth it!
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Structural systemic solutions: Behind modern products lie enormous, complex, global systems. These are necessary for our products to come into being. The problem is that these systems are largely unsustainable. They are destroying the current shape of the planet. Transformative design must be capable of changing these systems and allowing new systems to emerge. Ideally very product is a nucleus for a different world. A virus. Products made from open multipurpose parts — let’s build them to be just that.
COLLABORATIVE
CURIOUS
WORLDCHANGING
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Image Credits: garbage image by “Dying Regime”, CC-BY 2.0 Generic | all other images by Studio Mifactori, CC-BY 4.0
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