Just finished reading the above titled book by Jonathan Chapman - very interesting.
He compares products that people don't invest any emotional attachment in - for example mobile phones that folk just dispose of at regular intervals as the next model comes along - with products that people cherish over time - for example a pair of lovely leather shoes - positing that designers in a sustainable world should be trying to incorporate elements into their products that encourage long term cherishing instead of throwing stuff away.
He doesn't mention them directly, but it's always seemed to me that one of the great things about bikes is that they fall squarely into the latter category. I can like a bike (alot!) when I pull it out of its box, shiny and new, but it's only after I've been riding it for ages, and maybe personalised it by swapping the saddle, or the grips, or tweaked the gearing, or whatever, that it becomes my bike.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Stuff
Emotionally Durable Design
(6 posts)-
Posted 12 years ago #
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"but it's only after I've been riding it for ages, and maybe personalised it by swapping the saddle, or the grips, or tweaked the gearing, or whatever, that it becomes my bike"
Yes, but it's hard to assess how many people now don't just think of bikes as an other consumer item to be replaced when something wears or there's a new model available.
There can be little doubt that the ever increasing number of gears owes more to fashion than function (for most users).
Posted 12 years ago # -
The problem is that a lot of technology fails to repay any emotional investment beyond the point that it is obsolete. It's unusual for a piece of technology to buck this trend but it happened with the Soviet NK-33 rocket engine. The US used a few very large rocket motors in their Saturn Vs the Soviets used lots of little ones in their Vostocks. When the race to the moon was won by the US the unused Soviet engines were ordered to be destroyed but 150 of them were put into storage until the mid 1990's when one was taken to the US for testing and found to be the most powerful LOX/Kerosene rocket engine ever created (power to weight ratio). They are now used to launch satellites. You have to love that Soviet era design.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I'm vaguely horrified by how much I spent putting slick new wheels/bracket/chainring/cog/gold OMG-you-hipster-twunt chain on my sister's old 501-gaspipe racer during her fixie conversion, but that was the first bike I rode that was so fast that air resistance was the limiting factor, so it stays profoundly vague.
Posted 12 years ago # -
@uberuce, that air resistance moment is why I keep looking wistfully at the atomic zombie Marauder lowracer plans (and my arc welder and grinder...!)
:-)Posted 12 years ago # -
The aero's making me look seriously at *run for the hills* cycle-specific clothing.
Posted 12 years ago #
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