DesignBuyBuild_16_2015

Art For Art’s Sake?
It started with stainless steel light switches and before
you could say “form and function”, premium electrical
accessories were featuring in schemes like the international
Red Dot design awards. Were they any better than their
predecessors, or was it just art for art’s sake? Probably the
latter, but they looked good on the wall.
Meanwhile in the mass market, the pressure on prices was
leading us down the path of bulk offshore manufacturing, with
fractions of pennies shaved of the unit price by minimising
tooling and materials costs. So, even when the industry
was really bringing exciting technical and energy saving
innovations like low-cost LED lighting to you, not just
cosmetic improvements, the irony was that they often look
exactly the same as their predecessors because re-tooling was
too expensive in a price-led market. All too often, that fractionof-a-penny
pinching extends to componentry and, at the end of
the day product quality and reliability.
At Timeguard we have always traded on superior branded
quality and a few years ago we decided to buck the trend and to
reinforce our investment in superior componentry with superior
designs: better performance AND better looks. In all honesty,
we (and probably most other manufacturers) were accelerated
along that road by the latest generation of designers to our
R&D teams – this new generation has been reared on the likes
of Apple, Ikea and Zara Home, and take good product design in
every aspect of life for granted.
The evolutionary design of our electronic Programastat wall
thermostats and heating controllers marked a watershed in
our approach, but the real revolution was our approach to
outdoor LED lighting. We simply could not see the point of
the industry presenting what was revolutionary technology that
looked like the dinosaurs it was replacing. So we gave our
London-based designer free rein to tear up the rule book – but
with one key proviso. We did not want design for design’s
sake: each design feature had to have a function.
Conversely, each new function we were adding provided a
design opportunity: so essential cooling fins (missing from
cheaper products!), became rows of pins making up featured
metallic backs of new design LED lights. The need to diffuse
LED beams for courtesy lighting and expand the beam for
effective security became diode arrays and reflector plates.
Thus we achieved the magic trick of keeping both the engineers
and the product designers happy at the same time – no mean
feat, I can assure you. More importantly, this approach helps
us – and you – to visually communicate the benefits and value
of the energy saving technology you are offering to your
customers.
You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear – you’ll get
caught out soon enough. So, it stands to reason, design with
assured, branded quality are the true artform for today’s market.
www.timeguard.com
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