Further ideas

After already conducting various quantitative and qualitative research for clothing storage and other items, etc, pens, jewellery and other small items, I had found that the number of products that were on the market were sufficient anything that i would design would just end up being an improvement on other products which already existed. I wanted to find something new and innovative to design and i thought that plant storage would be the answer. Australia has a harsh climate (especially now with all this chaos) and I thought finding a way to improve and prolong pot-plant life would be a suitable enough problem when referring to our target market.
After asking a few apartment homeowners/renters about their idea of plant life in their apartment 9/14 people ranging from ages 23 to 45 said they'd prefer to keep their plants on their somewhat small balcony, out of the way, but would not mind having it inside, if it didn't take up any space. Out of those 14 people, 10 of them said they most definetly do not have the money or time to maintain the plants that were either already there, or were a gift from someone. Seeing as I plan on designing something that will have to prolong the life of the plant and provide as least maintenance as possible, any research on materials and or other designs would be very helpful.

As the design has to be modular, which in effect means the design has to be flexible, I thought it would be a good idea to design my product so that it could sit comfortably on a wall, where there is a maximum amount of space and does not take up any room on the floor.
The biomimic nature of my design comes from a few different forms in nature, the modular form, lets you move the plant pots among the wall depending on where the sun line is at each time maximising the effect of the sun in any apartment .
The biomorphic nature comes through the use of smooth flowing lines in the design without any sharp edges, to give an almost flowing feel to the atmosphere, it is somewhat hard to do this with some materials without the use of heavy machinery and so i will have to focus on using materials that can be mass produced with ease while still maintaining a biomorphic feel within the design.

In my design I am also concentrating on prolonging the life of the plant and not just concentrating on the aesthetic form of the design. Plants in the harsh climate of Australia store moisture deep within and such plants like the one above, use their cupped leaves to collect water and also absorb moisture in the air to keep themselves alive. Materials like bamboo can be used to increase water absorption especially in the drier conditions and it is also an extremely durable material, especially when used in the right way.

 I have based part of my design on the cup like nature of these leaves which is a natural way for this plant to gather enough water and nutrients to survive. As plants can sense a heavier moisture content in the air among other things, some plants will actually move and or shift their position (e.g. open their inner flaps) if they sense it is about to rain or if they sense the sunlight is about to hit them. My design, which is based upon the movement of the flower, is able to be moved to ensure maximum efficiency inside an apartment where getting enough sunlight during the day could be a big problem. My design can be placed up or downwards on a wall depending on where the sun hits your apartment everyday, and the plant pots can be moved in the direction of the sun if need be.

My Design

I'm still researching possible way to change and improve my design and i have yet to find a way to connect each plant to the other in order to make it modular, but there are many different types of joints, including the dovetail joint, which could be used quite effectively.
Another point to make is that, even though plants might not last long indoors due to lack of sunlight, I am researching different types of plants which need minimal sunlight and minimal maintenance to thrive and i was thinking about making my design into a special and much fresher way to hold herbs and spices, as that could possibly be another problem.

Concepts, Idea's and Research

After going through many idea's and quite a few different concepts my three main ideas were still very weak as they did not properly adhere to the design brief and the need I was trying to establish was not general enough to stick.
Three main ideas:

 This was meant to be a shelving unit for pen/pencil storage inside, however the nature connection was not evident in any part of the design.

This 'spider' key holder did not address a problem with enough conviction as not enough research was done to identify the problem in the first place, hopefully that will be rectified.

 This jewellery box design did not at all look like a product that would be successful, the leaf design did not work at all and the movement was restricted.