Razeena and her husband own a pool shop in Emmerentia. We met her hanging outside her shop with her beautiful little girl. She was very happy to talk to us and told us about her massive family, her quiet dreams and her colourful beliefs.

If her story inspires you, start designing your product and send your thoughts/scamps to  stuart@studio4332.com

I’ve noticed Marthinus when i get lunch at 44 Stanley. He’s the local security guard and one helluva nice guy. He was a little shy at first in front of the camera but soon opened up and we found his interview to be incredibly touching. He has amazing skills and even made his own tattoo machine from an old hair dryer. He then went on to tattoo dragons on his own arms – one on the left and the other on the right forearm. He also loves metal work and tribal designs. If his story inspires you, start designing your product and send your thoughts/scamps to  stuart@studio4332.com

Here’s how it works :

1. We give you a theme and inspiration.

2. You design a product.

3. You send your idea to us.

4. We choose the best ones and put them into production.

5.You get famous.

The Theme – Connections

Jozi is a big city with loads of interesting people but we often don’t get to meet them because of our busy lifestyles and the high walls we live behind.

What if we could meet these people and find out their story? And then use their stories as inspiration for product design.

We have done a number of interviews of normal people in the area around us and found some really interesting stories. We’ve posted the first 2 here and will be posting more soon. Your task is to watch these interviews, find one that resonates with you and use it as inspiration for your product. Don’t like these ones? That’s cool, grab a camera, go nextdoor (or to the video shop, or the cafe down the road or wherever) and meet the locals – and capture it. Then use your own interview as your inspiration. Please can you also send the video to us so we can upload it and let it inspire others too.

What kind products of products do we want you to design?

Anything from furniture to crockery, clothing, accessories, goodies, etc etc etc – so long as they are inspired by the interviews. Please have look at our existing products to give you some idea of the kinda stuff we do. Please also bare in mind that while we don’t have a specific budget for the products, we don’t have limitless cash either. So if you are thinking of designing a car or a time machine, that’s cool but we won’t be able to make it – if it’s cool enough however, we will exhibit the idea (in written/scamp form) at the launch.

You could be famous

Goldmind is a creative conference  we are launching with Dion Chang and Flux next year in Joburg, and where we will be launching these products – hopefully your product.

If your product is chosen, you and your thinking, process, scamps etc will be profiled along with your product and will be invited to Goldmind and to the VIP launch event. You will also be featured in our store, alongside your product. So get thinking.

What do we want from you?

To start off with we just want written ideas and scamps – whatever you think is necessary to portray and sell your idea. The more detail the better. The more thought out the better. Don’t take it to design stage just yet though – rather submit it and start designing properly once we give you the go-ahead. If your idea is chosen to be made into a product, you will be part of the producion process.

Ideas and scamps can be submitted to stuart@studio4332.com

Questions?

Contact studio4332 executive creative director Stuart Stobbs on stuart@studio4332.com

If there’s one thing i think about all the time, it’s my funeral. Well ok not really. But if i did (and i had loads of cash) i could get Requiem for You to create me a perosnalised song for my funeral. Exciting huh?

Here’s what they say in their mission statement : “REQUIEM FOR YOU is the lasting celebration of the person departing from this life, cast as a biographical concert. With REQUIEM FOR YOU, a culture which is concerned in a dignified way with death at the artistic level has been revived. Major composers, such as Mozart, Brahms, Verdi and Berlioz, have created everlasting works for posterity. They have produced musical memorials for themselves and others and hence made great persons immortal.”

So i can be like Mozart and live forever through music? woohoo.

You gotta see the team who work on your death song. very cool, especially Tash-boy

The services they offer are composition (in any number of styles but usually classical), production of the tune (using anything up to a full orchestra) and of course the performance of the overture. you obviously wont be able to hear it as you will be in a coffin.

very cool though

Here’s another example of personalisation. This time it’s local and is actually a project we were involved with. At The Rosebank you can have a cocktail or two (i can recommend the Apple Pie) at The Circle Bar. And in this bar are semi private ‘pods’ where you can  chill with your closest friends, business partners or romantic pick-ups. And whats quite cool is that there are 8 light switches which you can play with to adjust the lighting to fit the occasion. Simple but fun.

See more about the hotel here

These guys do some cool stuff. Weird but cool. They design personalised jewellery based on scars people have – simply send in a photo and they’ll create a one of a kind piece of jewellery for you. So whether you burnt your hand as a kid or had your baby cut out of you – you can immortalise the wound in 9 carats.

5.5 Designers, a French design group created a range of products called ‘Cloning’  – chairs based on bum imprints, lamps on eye colours, vases on body shapes.

Here’s what they say about it :

“Inspired from the medical technics of cloning, “Cloning” is an authentic service of creating objects at your own image. The aesthetic of this collection is defined by the physical data taken on your body.

The object shapes are the results of a process consisting in taking data from your physical characterisics, the color of your eyes, of your hair, your pilosity, your weight, your mensurations, and then these data are treated in order to become coefficiants of the  object shapes.”

Check them out here :

5.5 designers

Or more here :

ID article

The massive rise of technology has gone a long way to making the world less personal. Everything is being run by computers, products are being spat out by the million in china and we are all becoming faceless numbers.

Many brands too are very self involved, churning out huge advertising productions about themselves – a one-way communication with their audience. For these brands it’s not important what their consumers think, emphasis is instead placed on creating a big shiny exciting brand that consumers will simply fall in love with.

In spite of this, or probably because of it, there is also a move back towards an appreciation of things being more personal.

Individuals want to be communicated with on a personal level – and help create the brands they identify with.

People don’t want to just be faceless numbers – they wanted to be treated and communicated with like the individuals they are. They also want to buy products which are designed and manufactured specifically for them.

Around the world, products and services are already being designed for individuals – based on their bodies, their likes and dislikes, their personal pleasure etc etc.