Top picks from Dubai Design Week’s Global Grad Show

Courtesy of Aalto University

Courtesy of Design Academy Eindhoven

Courtesy of Ilteris Ilbasan

Courtesy of Peter Alwin

Courtesy of Kenneth Tay

Courtesy of ESADSE

Part of Dubai Design Week, the Global Grad Show at D3 features 145 projects from top universities, divided into three sections: Empower, Sustain and Connect. Here are a few of our favourites.

1 Wearable Shelter

“A great design delivers both a diagnosis and a cure. It identifies an unseen opportunity or unexpressed need and suggests a solution,” says Brendan McGetrick, curator of the exhibition. This year’s Global Grad Show projects offer answers to a diverse range of social needs – from a portable cart aimed at street vendors in Havana to systems facilitating the growth of vegetables in urban settings. But one idea that struck a chord was the Wearable Shelter by Gabriella Geagea and Anne Sophie Geay of the Royal College of Art, London. Envisaged as a direct response to the Syrian refugee crisis, the Wearable Shelter is a jacket with large storage pockets that can be converted into a sleeping bag or tent for four people. The piece is made from Tyvek, a light material that’s durable and waterproof, and lined with Mylar, a polyester material used by marathon runners to keep warm.

2 Lusia

Created by students from Aalto University, Helsinki, Lusia is a barbecue and picnic set that looks great but is also easy to use and transport. Its simple construction addresses issues of heat adjustment and ensures that it’s easy to clean, which makes it ideal for urban dwellers. But it’s also a social enterprise, designed to be manufactured by prisoners in Finland.

3 Miito

Sometimes the best ideas are the simplest ones. Consider this: the minimum fill line on your average kettle is set at about 500 millilitres. This means that if you want a single 250ml cup of tea, you waste 50 per cent of the hot water, and use twice as much energy as is necessary, every time. Nils Chudy and Jasmina Grase of the Design Academy Eindhoven present Miito as an energy-efficient alternative. It’s a kettle that will heat the exact amount of water needed, directly in the vessel of your choice, ensuring that you save electricity every time you prepare a hot beverage.

4 Ubuntu

For this design, Ilteris Ilbasan of Umeå Institute of Design in Sweden took his cue from 2014’s ebola outbreak. Ubuntu is a containment bed that could rapidly increase response time and reduce cross-contamination in the case of such outbreaks. The Ubuntu package includes zip ties and a roll of Tyvek, which has antimicrobial properties. Instructions for how to assemble the bed are printed on the fabric, and the only additional materials required are bamboo sticks. It takes about an hour for one person to construct the bed, by looping the Tyvek around the poles to create a comfortable mattress. The design means that the patient is separated from others and benefits from an element of privacy. Once the mattress has been used, it can be easily replaced to reduce the risk of contamination.

5 Asha

Each year, about 7.8 million babies are born with low birth weight (less than 2.5 kilograms) in rural India, resulting in a child mortality rate of about 20 per cent, notes Peter Alwin of the Umeå Institute of Design. Many families can’t afford to travel to hospital for regular treatment, which led the Indian government to implement the ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activists) programme, comprising women who live in rural communities with basic knowledge of childcare. Alwin has designed Asha to help with the task. The simple yet rugged, solar-powered, hand-held device measures vital statistics such as weight and temperature, which can then be marked on a special blanket in permanent ink, creating a reliable, consistent health record for the child.

6 Synchrony

Synchrony is a therapeutic music platform that aims to help children with autism, and their parents, develop intimacy and understanding through improvised musical play. The instrument is designed to sound harmonious, regardless of musical ability, which guarantees a mutually enjoyable, stress-free music-making process. Designed by Kenneth Tay of the Art Center College of Design in California, Synchrony creates a safe, non-verbal space that encourages social interaction, a key challenge for autistic children.

7 Aeon

Shaped to represent the Tree of Life, Aeon, by Mathieu Delacroix and Charles Haumont of École Supérieure d’Art et Design de Saint-Étienne, stores personal digital data, with a view to passing it on to one’s descendants. It links to a cloud storage system where photos, videos, music, documents and other personal material can be stored. When the user dies, two authorised witnesses symbolically break Aeon to deliver its content. Through this simple gesture, the data is sent to the user’s predefined heirs, as a form of digital inheritance.