This Nike-inspired integrated smart fitness system gives at-home gym workouts the boost it needs!

There have been some pretty innovative design solutions for home gyms in the age of COVID-19, ranging from adaptive gym modules that utilize smart technology for instruction to more discreet gym equipment that disguises as home furniture. While most of us are staying at home for these workouts, ensuring we all have the equipment needed can still get messy and some of us have neighbors living below and next to us, so we have to compromise when it comes to how loud we get. Swift Creatives, a Scandinavian design studio located in Aarhus, Denmark, recently debuted Smart Fitness, an integrated smart workout system that equips your home workout with all the gym-related accessories you might need.

The team at Swift Creatives got inspired by Nike and designed Smart Fitness for athletes at every level of any given sport to have a single system supplied with five smart workout accessories: a foam roller that doubles as a speaker, weighted jump rope, headphones, and water bottle. Foam rollers are a Godsend and essential for use following a heavy workout. Designed to help relieve muscle tension, increase your joint range of motion, and promote blood flow – foam rolling is an athlete’s bread and butter. Since foam rollers are supposed to be firm for purpose and by design, Swift Creatives took the opportunity to enclose a speaker inside the heavy-duty foam so that music can play while rolling.

The included jump rope is balanced and customizable for different workout weights and athlete heights. The jump rope’s cables can be switched out to either lighten the lift or load it on. Additionally, a built-in counter and timer keep track of every rope session so you won’t ever lose count. With integrated music connectivity, Smart Fitness can link up each workout accessory, like the breathable smart headphones, to your smartphone or smartwatch so that you can easily play music from your preferred streaming platform. Bringing its own unique edge to the workout, Smart Fitness’s magnetic water bottle also comes equipped with smart control switches that activate a UV-C LED light cleaning cycle so you can keep your focus on the workout.

Designer: Swift Creatives Studio

This Robotic Coffee Maker is designed to brew your perfect pour-over coffee!

Waking up to the sound and smell of coffee brewing after just a tap of your fingers might sound like you’re still dreaming. However, Bubble Lab recently teamed up with Swift Creatives in order to turn that dream into reality with a robotic pour-over coffee machine called, Drip. The app-controlled, fully-automated pour-over coffee maker emerges from the countertop as the water dispenser folds directly above your cup or mug and after just a tap, the water stream matches the flow of the beans and adheres to your chosen recipe, resulting in the perfect pour-over, every time. Whether you’re a barista who could use some extra pairs of hands or someone who just loves coffee, this sleek take on the pour-over is sure to leave your mouth watering.

Drip’s modern, minimalist style pervades the design, all the way down to the core of the machine. Specifically designed to optimize counter space, Drip could be mistaken for a sink tap. But it’s more like an iceberg: the coffee maker’s slim body that makes the show possible rests just below the counter. The body provides the dispenser with tempered water ideal for a pour-over. Drip is also user-adjustable and the associated app provides a social platform to share, learn, and curate your own menu based on preexisting, barista-approved, recipes. With its glossy, unobtrusive finish, from all angles Drip brings a sense of know-how and modernity to every kitchen and coffee shop.

Since its showcase at CES in 2018, Drip has made some fine-tuned adjustments, specifically in regard to Drip’s elemental simplicity. Beijing-based Bubble Lab reinvigorates coffee as an experience by celebrating the culture, production, and social significance of the drink. Bubble Lab might believe that less is more, but folded inside of that simplicity is an intricacy devoted to celebrating the experience of coffee,  providing an extra set of hands for overwhelmed baristas, and showcasing the side of coffee that’s sometimes overlooked: the artful and ritualistic nature that makes your nose wiggle with excitement and taste buds tingle with anticipation. All it takes is a tap.

Designers: Bubble Lab x Swift Creatives

 

HTC’s vision for AR is our most sensible one yet

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Augmenting reality can be tricky. So far we’ve worked with screens, trying to layer objects over the world as we perceive it, and that’s incredibly challenging because A. transparent screens haven’t really become mainstream (or cheap) yet, and B. real-time motion tracking is a computer’s worst nightmare and one of its biggest hurdles. While our vision of AR has been limited to display-screens and reflections, HTC and Swift Creatives may have paved an easier way for layering objects onto our world in a way that is easy, and more importantly, useful. Their answer? projectors.

A projector, by its definition, layers a projection on an object, so working with a projector that can simply project onto an object makes more sense than having a transparent display in front of your eyes that creates objects that seem believable, but can’t keep up with your head’s randomized movements. However, with HTC’s AR Lamp, it’s a lot like projection mapping. The lamp maps relevant materials and objects onto the world in front of you. Take for instance working at a kitchen counter-top. The AR Lamp works a lot like IKEA’s parchment paper, giving you bespoke guides and information you may need. It actively tracks your progress, updating as you go. (I imagine the AR Lamp could be an absolute gem of a device in training doctors for operations too)

Yes, while a lamp’s projection may not necessarily be as 3D as, say, something you would view from a Hololens, it’s much more useful, and less intrusive too. The fact that it isn’t body-mounted or worn, gives it a lot of freedom to be state-of-the-art and useful, rather than amateurish and wearable. The lamp allows for collaboration and communication with other people remotely through a live feed, and even comes with smart-voice recognition, letting you talk to AR-projecting device (probably a first of its kind… most AR devices are computers with controllers, and not smart-gadgets.) Its clean, Nordic design language allows it to fit seamlessly into all homes, changing lives and upgrading the meaning of the smart-home forever… and yes, it works as a lamp too.

Designer: Swift Creatives for HTC

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Augmented Reality for All

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Swift Creatives looks to take full ownership of the augmented reality space with the development of 4 distinct products and applications for everyday use. The common denominator across all the designs is integration into gear already being used in each scenario. Whether it’s in the lab or on the Tour de France, there’s a wearable AR device to help you hack your performance no matter what you’re doing!

Designer: Swift Creatives

Sport AR goggles: Wearable AR for sport, fitness and active lifestyles where sunglasses are a standard part of the equipment. Helps to enhance performance and improve abilities by better tracking and monitoring an individual’s activity.

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Enterprise AR Visor: A holographic headset designed for lab and manufacturing environments that enhances quality insurance and optimizes workflow. A natural extension of safety glasses, the Enterprise AR Visor displays important information to improve efficiency and quality insurance.

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Discreet Modular: Wearable AR that enhances the design process by helping architects and designers to visualize their ideas. This concept acknowledges that glasses are an important part of personal style by incorporating the technology into more stylish, fashion-led forms.

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AR Neckband: A new way of utilizing AR possibilities by concealing the technology inside a discreet, elegant neckband. Versatile and comfortable with a sleek design to provide quick and easy access to large datasets.

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