This shovel-attachment lets you use your foot to help break the soil, without breaking your back

Posted on 08/01/2020 by Sarang Sheth

I can just feel like the punchline for this article should be “Can you dig it?”

This is the Kikka Digga, just like its energetic name, it helps energize the act of digging by reducing the strain and load on your back, allowing you to dig faster and better. The Kikka Digga, with its universal fixture, snaps onto all standard shovels, spades, and pitchforks. With a secure, two-part design, it secures to the base of the handle, and gives you a footrest that helps you transfer the load and make digging easier.

Imagine lifting something very heavy without any help. You bend down, pick up the load, and lift either with your knees or your back. Either way, it causes physical strain, limiting the amount of work you can do. Now imagine using a seesaw to lift the same amount of weight. Instead of using your back, you use a lever with a fulcrum, making the work significantly easier. The Kikka Digga works the same way. Once you push the shovel or pitchfork into the ground, place your foot on Kikka Digga’s footrest. This footrest immediately acts as a fulcrum-point so instead of lifting the shovel and soil upwards, you just need to pull down and back as the shovel pushes the soil up and forward. If you want to get into the mechanics of it, since the Kikka Digga works quite like a seesaw, the attachment’s positioning is crucial. It sits at the very base of the handle, giving you a longer lever-arm to tug on… and if anyone’s studied basic physics in the seventh grade, it helps drastically cut down the amount of effort you’d normally apply, letting you easily shovel dirt, soil, cement, sand, snow, all without breaking a sweat, or worse, breaking your spine. *insert punchline*

The Kikka Digga is a winner of the European Product Design Award for the year 2019.

Designer: Nick Skaliotis

This award-winning wheelchair integrates right into an airplane seat for easy boarding and de-boarding

Posted on 03/01/2020 by Sarang Sheth

Securing a Discovery Of The Year Award as well as a Platinum Winner Award at the European Product Design Awards in 2019, The Row-1 by Ciara Crawford surely has stumbled on a brilliant solution for a problem that no designer recognized before. The Row-1, simply put, is an inclusive-design wheelchair that lets disabled and elderly patrons at an airport go straight from the check-in desk to inside the airline, and de-board the flight at their destination. The wheelchair works exactly how you’d expect it to, allowing the disabled to cover large distances within an airport (with help from airline staff), but where it really shines is in the way it rolls right into the aircraft and secures itself to the airplane seat.

“1 million travelers with disabilities took 23 million trips over the past two years, spending $9 billion on their flights”, says Ciara, a design graduate from the University of Limerick, Ireland. The Row-1 aims at bettering their experience by eliminating the need and the associated discomfort of changing seats every time a disabled person boards or deboards a plane. The Row-1 wheelchair comes with a nesting design and inward-folding rear wheels that help it integrate itself comfortably into a seat the first row, giving the patron extra leg-room while keeping them closer to the washroom too. This way, the passenger never needs to change seats through their entire journey, with the exception of passing through the security check. The wheelchair is even equipped with its own seatbelt that proves useful within the airport while traveling on ramps and air-bridges, as well as inside the plane. The same wheelchair goes from the airport of departure to the airplane, and finally escorts the passenger out at the airport of arrival. The wheelchair even comes with its own joystick-panel for manual operation, as well as space under the seat for storing handbags.

The Row-1 Wheelchair System is a Platinum Winner of the European Product Design Award for the year 2019.

Designer: Ciara Crawford

The Petal Chair’s slanted side-rests let you sit normally, or meditate with your legs folded up

Posted on 19/12/2019 by Sarang Sheth

Regular chairs have backrests and armrests, the Petal Chair, well, has petalesque forms that double as backrests and arm-supports. Meet the European Product Design Award-winning chair that looks to flowers for furniture inspiration. The chair comes with three gently curved petals, almost resembling an exotic orchid. The chair’s diagonally slanted armrests are wonderful for relaxing your weary limbs as well as sitting in the yogic lotus posture, with your legs folded inwards. To reinforce the chair’s sense of comfort, it comes with pillows for cushioning, suspended using extendable straps that you can height-adjust for that comfortable sweet-spot. “The Petal armchair is designed to change the position of the body and improve blood circulation. It gives the ability to take a break and restore your mental balance”, says the St. Petersburg-based design studio, Alter Ego.

The Petal Chair is a Bronze Winner of the European Product Design Award for the year 2019.

Designer: Alter Ego Studio