A modular plant stand supplying the light it needs to grow
5 week project
Research
Topic Exploration
2x2 Matrix
The 2x2 matrix was designed with the idea that anything that could fit into an apartment would also fit into a home.
This left a small white space for a product that was small enough for an apartment and fell in the middle ground between simple plant pots and smart garden systems.
Design Opportunities
Compiling information from market research, observation, and interviews lead to synthesizing three design opportunities.
Users need methods of growing plants that have an overall smaller footprint
Users need a way to supply light to their plants
Users need some way to ensure their plants’ needs are met
Persona
Kate Fowler
Bio
Kate is a young adult living in her apartment in Manhattan. She lives in a tiny studio apartment and works half from home and half at the office.
Kate enjoys keeping decorative plants around the apartment, especially now that she spends so much time there, but struggles getting them enough sunlight.
Kate’s single north facing window makes it difficult to grow plants and can’t touch her walls without losing her deposit.
Goals
Get more light to her plants so they grow better.
Grow plants all over her apartment
Frustrations
Constantly has to rotate out plants in front of her window so they get enough sunlight
Can’t hang plants on her walls, so they all are just scattered around the floor.
Ideation
Initial Ideation
I explored a wide range of ideas as I tried to determine the best way to help users take care of their plants. I moved from aquaponics, to integrated floor lamps, to other pieces of furniture.
Finalized Concept
The final concept is a structure designed to give the plant light below it. Light comes out of the underside of the crossbeam and is diffused through a translucent window.
The structure can stack atop itself and requires no hardware in the entire manufacturing process.
Rendering and Manufacturing
Materials
The stand is made of ash wood and glazed with a warm brown oil-based varnish. The plate is glazed white ceramic.
LED’s supply light to the plant below.
Modular
When stacked, the structure turns into a seamless tower, allowing plants to grow up, down, or out.
The drainage hole allows for excess water to flow from the top plant to the bottom plant.
Manufacturing
Each U shaped crossbeam is comprised of two legs, the cross beam itself and the tenon which attaches the two pieces together through a mortise and tenon joint. These pieces are then glued together for extra structural strength.
Wiring between the legs and the crossbeam are also connected during this process.
No other fasteners like screws or nails are needed to attach everything together.
Each part of the crossbeam requires only a single pass-through with a 3-axis CNC and a drill press. These pieces are then glued together.
Packaging
The product ships in only a few different pieces to make assembly easy on the user. There’s a top and bottom crossbeam, end caps for the top and bottom, and the ceramic plate.
The box is 20 x 20 x 6 inches which allows for 1 inch of padding on all sides.
Home Assembly
