Reflection.

Product service system

Modular Vertical garden system.

Assignment 2 was a little different to any another assignment I have encountered in the past studio assignments over the years. The description and the requirements of the assignment to me were a little bit vague at first but after reading up articles of research in relation to different product service systems it finally started to make sense. The biggest difference to this assignment from all the other was that it was a group assignment and it being a group assignment everyone had very different opinions and views on design which created the biggest challenge of all, which came down to including a little bit of everyone’s thoughts into the final design.
The variety of systems we could have went by and pursued would be health, food and transportation. We research all three and some had more systems within them than the others for example health and transportation which amongst those two had some really good system and there was no reason of refinement and improvement. Food was the category we went by because we saw a big gap in the health food sector and figured that a product system needs to be put in to improve involvement in this category with a sustainable manor.

The modular vertical garden system was the finished product we came up with which works in a PSS system within the community garden for the maximisation of space and involvement inside the community garden population. Designing the system wasn’t a problem; we came up with it within the first week of research but coming up with a product that runs that system was the biggest challenge of them all. Every week we would come in with a new product to fit into this system, it ranged from starter pack baskets, hydroponic pots, fernery, a moving wall and a number of different concepts for a vertical garden. Most concepts and ideas were unrelated or already on the market that’s why we had to think deeper into a product that is different and provides necessity. The modular vertical garden system was a great idea and concept it was easy to construct with minimum instructions for the users and its design was well suiting for a community garden after looking at it from developed renders in its primary setting. Our biggest challenge in the design was the selection of an appropriate material. We wanted the material to be appropriate in an outdoor setting which prevents it from UV radiation as well as rain and heavy winds. PP was the selected material since its worked with all categories of degradation, our biggest downfall was that our pots came in a white colour which we came to realise in the final days of completion, white meaning it is a virgin plastic not recycled giving us a bad choice on material selection. This was a great lesson learned from this mistake and would be carried through material consideration in the years to come.

The project in my opinion went well.Learning and researching diffrent PSS models and their succes in this current economy was a great benefit to understand and implement.PSS should be included in many products for the boost of sustainablity adn the economy in this current stretch of time.

Every group member contributed evenly and had constructive opinions for the final design. My favourite part about building this model would be the model making, model renders and offcourse working with my group members. The model surprisingly took us 4 days to make; we were all skilled in the workshop so we worked on separate parts at once which came out with a great finish in the end.