Garden X

Garden Furniture
Semester project, MA, Team member, 2
Cooperation with KÖLBL KRUSE GmbH
at Folkwang University of the Arts, Germany
2020.11 – 2021.03, Winter
Direction by, Prof. Anke Bernotat, Judith Schanz

This project uses the undeveloped area on the southeast side of the Folkwang UdK as a design carrier. By researching and integrating information about gardening needs, the relationship between the environment, user needs, plants, and product design is further improved.

It provides a series of modular garden system, that can be flexibly assembled and used according to needs.

Key areas of the World Heritage Park
The location at which the project is implemented is divided into two parts. In the undeveloped property in Kölbl-Kruse and the area around the campus of the FUdK design department.
The area near the place, the UNESCO World Heritage Zollverein, is a landscape area with cultural value, and it is also one of the landmarks of Essen. The Zeche Zollverein and the internationally known Red Dot Design Center as well as the museum attract a large number of tourists every year who are very interested in participating in various activities.

Our project team carried out a more detailed analysis of the points of interest of the individual target groups, as well as the basic and constructive needs of the location, the planting and the basic equipment. When compiling the information, we have used different colors to indicate the individual needs of the various user groups.
From the overall analysis of user requirements for the construction of green spaces, seven different categories can now be filtered out. These are partition and functions of areas, road and connection systems, facility, information display and organization, basic plant needs, plant species and others. We were also able to determine that different requirements can each be assigned to a product category.

We adopted the concept of ” Square food gardening ” viewed more closely. It’s a highly efficient planting program that Mel Bartholomew from North America in the 1970s. Farmer can do this with the 1-1.2 square meter basic planter with one size of 15 cm or more and use the soil in it for cultivation.
By combining field research and the concept of “square food gardening”, we derived the idea of using the lowest-sized raised beds as a module and listing them repeatedly and having them combined to create a higher and larger raised bed.

The concept with U-shaped structure, comes in two sizes each the Map the functions of a table or a bench. The three are all 1 m long and 16 inches wide (that’s the average width of a normal seat). The height is 80 cm, 40 cm and 5 cm (the thickness of the frame), respectively. One of which has been connected to the board. The other is without the respective Board has been connected. There are two 1 cm diameter holes on the longer frame and on the shorter side there is a hole. So can to connect the bolts and nuts of various accessories around the possibility of having six different modules from a set of modules To create shapes.

There also have appropriate assembly instructions for each products with different functions are created to allow users of the products to access new assembly modes can be referenced and explored.