Designer : Mikhail St-Denis

James Salvidge own words :
In the UK today the introduction of new technology has meant that people have a far greater choice of how they access the post office services. Consequently, people are visiting post offices less, making the current service unsustainable. As a result the Post Office has already closed 500 post offices and has proposed the closure of 2500 more.

In the rural areas of the UK, the Post Office still plays an important economic and social role. So it is important that the services are not lost completely as this could make life for the elderly and poor increasingly difficult and also reduce the opportunities for social contact and communities to interact.

The project brief was to look at the role of the Post Office in a rural area and then to design a new service to be created in its place, one which was more sustainable and enabled the continuation of the postal services.

My concept was for a compact, automated post office unit which could be easily moved between villages, with each one being capable of supplying the services to around seven villages; saving materials and energy as fewer have to be produced

Following a timetable would allow the locations to be pre-arranged, the benefits of doing this are that larger villages, which have a greater need for the services, can be allocated more time and smaller villages less time. It also allows the people using the services to know when it will be situated in their village. As well as parcel and postal services, via a wireless internet connection it can provide users access to all the online post office services, including their insurance and bank services; allowing them to withdrawal their cash, pensions and benefits.

By constructing the mobile section out of relatively lightweight materials and by incorporating a trolley into the structure of the design, it will easily moved by the employees of the royal mail. To ensure it remains in location, via the screen, authorised employees will be able to activate the internal locking mechanism, which will securely lock it onto the post box; at the same time it will automatically lower itself to the ground, preventing it from being moved.

It would be a financially viable solution to problem facing the Post Office because it removes the need for a permanent structure and does not need an employee to supervise it. It can be entirely maintained by the Royal Mail, using their vans to transport it before their daily collection of post and parcels.

Designer : James Salvidge

Using silicon cells embedded in its glass surface, the SOLo Lounge Table collects and converts solar energy to clean and efficient electricity. Its USB, lighter, and standard 3 prong outlets can be used to power your personal electronic devices. In a typical outdoor setting, the SOLo can harness over 17 kilowatts of solar energy every year.

Source : ProductPage via BornRich

The basic idea of the design background is the passion of human activities in visualizing graphic and colors trough basic painting activity. How the conservative ways and behavior are blended with digital-modern tools and people are brought into the basic feeling and sensing their old-fashion style in producing visual onto a media in term of digital life style.

Palette is a hardware system design concept that designated for digital artist, painter, design visualizer and people with passion in visual arts. The system were designed based on the background of basic painting behavior and its physiology activities. Palette is designed to have connectivity with other devices such main PC system, Main monitor or other wireless peripherals. connectivity between them are wireless and the user interface screen surface of the palette is using photo-optic visual sensor with color recognition as its main advantage.

The innovative value of palette is its capability to recognize analog color into digital format and the concept of special computer which in the way of hardware and software structure are made specially for graphic-visual work.

Palette’s physical form analogy is taken from wooden palette and reflect the concept of mix-figuratives form between ‘digital’ and ‘analog’; classic meets modernity. The whole design are surfaced with black reflection glass-illuminating looks which combined with wooden coloring and texture in minor parts. The present and mix of black reflection and wooden fixtures emerge classy-modern status which based on the aesthetical concept of “conservative meets digital”. Hm…the words “conservative meets digital”, I couldn’t agree more.

Source : GizmoWatch via Next-Gen PC