Author: Xiaqing 夏晴

Hi，Team 10.How have you been lately? We have simply produced the model and shot a usage video. We look forward to your reply.

If you have reviewed the feedback, please select appropriate solutions for further development. Additionally, provide information regarding dimensions, materials, and functional zoning to assist us in creating the model—this will facilitate our video shooting later on. Perhaps we can also set a specific timeline to help us better plan our work.

Hi,Team 10,How have you been lately? Our team has reviewed your proposal. We apologize for the delay in providing feedback, as we have been quite busy over the past few days. Below are some of our thoughts and comments. First of all, our target users are elderly people living in old residential communities who engage in gardening both on their balconies and in the flower beds downstairs in the community. The problem we need to solve is: for residential buildings without elevators (only with stairs), how to enable these elderly individuals to better store the gardening tools used on the balcony and then carry them downstairs for outdoor gardening activities. It should be noted that gardening tools pose a certain degree of danger, so an additional consideration is how to better secure sharp tools to prevent them from falling during transportation, while also ensuring that the tools do not restrict or hinder the elderly's movement when they go downstairs. In summary, the core challenge lies in figuring out how to properly store these tools and then carry them downstairs for outdoor planting tasks. We have selected some suitable solutions from them and marked them with red boxes. These solutions can be further optimized. (1-1) The Nostalgic Case The Nostalgic Case provides excellent protection for tools, preventing them from falling out, and also allows for easy access. However, if the storage case adopts the same material, size, and weight as a vintage suitcase, the total weight—when combined with the weight of the tools themselves—may be too heavy and inconvenient to carry for the elderly, who need to hold onto handrails while going up or down stairs. (1-2) The Economic Fabric Bag The Economic Fabric Bag seems to be the most suitable option. It is easy to carry, keeps tools from falling out, and enables convenient tool access. Nevertheless, there are two aspects that can be optimized: first, the fabric is not waterproof; second, it lacks auxiliary carrying designs. (1-3) The Washable Caddy The Washable Caddy can also meet the needs of carrying and accessing tools. However, I am concerned that an imbalance in the weight of the tools inside may cause it to be heavier on one side, which could affect the elderly when they go up or down stairs. (2-1) The Belt Supported with Suspenders The belt supported with suspenders frees up the hands and allows for extremely convenient tool access! Wearing it on the body makes carrying easy and labor-saving. However, it has obvious shortcomings: its capacity is relatively small, and there is no protection for the tools—they are likely to fall out when the user bends over. Additionally, a single shoulder strap may cause pressure on the shoulders. It is recommended that the belt be designed with an adjustable length to better fit the elderly of different body types. Can improvements be made to address these issues? (2-2) The Plastic Carrying Bag The plastic carrying bag has an interesting and innovative appearance, and your design is undoubtedly creative.…

We held an online meeting with Team 10 on Zoom at 6:00 p.m. Beijing Time (1:00 p.m. Turkish Time) on November 8th. What preparations did we make for this meeting? Burcu connected with members of our group on WeChat using the contact information provided in our briefing document. She also thoughtfully created a dedicated WeChat group to streamline communication between both parties. Additionally, she inquired about our availability for an online meeting—intended to review the briefing document and enable a brief introductory check-in. As we had classes scheduled on Thursday and Friday, we coordinated via email, WeChat, and Instagram to finalize the meeting details, confirming an online session for Saturday afternoon. During the meeting, we greeted each other warmly, raised questions regarding both parties' briefing documents, and the most interesting part was that Burcu and Nisa showed us Lahmacun—a traditional Turkish delicacy. Since I didn’t get a screenshot of it, I found a picture of Lahmacun online instead. Does it look a bit like pizza? I thought so at first too, but it isn’t. Filiz explained that Lahmacun has a distinct flavor from pizza. Unlike pizza, which is topped with a variety of ingredients such as mushrooms, olives, and sausages, Lahmacun consists of minced meat mixed with chili peppers, tomato sauce, and onions, all spread over a thin piece of bread. It is then wrapped with fresh tomatoes, onions, and parsley and eaten as a roll—and it sounds absolutely delicious Regarding the questions about our design project, due to our limited English proficiency, we had a brief discussion about the missing information that each party needs in our respective briefing documents, and decided to supplement this information on the blog. We were truly delighted to connect with Team 10 through this opportunity—their warmth and enthusiasm were tangible, even across the screen. It was also a wonderful surprise to learn about Turkish cuisine, which added such a lovely touch to our conversation. Though we hail from different corners of the world, there’s something truly special about building connections in this way; it feels like a small but precious bridge between our cultures.That said, we do feel a gentle regret that our limited English kept us from diving deeper into more conversations—there was so much we wanted to share and ask. Even so, we’re eager to keep nurturing this connection through our design projects moving forward. Meeting all of you has been such a joy, and we hope every day brings you the same brightness and energy you brought to our video call. Wishing you lots of happiness in your days ahead, and we’re already looking forward to our next chance to connect. The above content is provided by Team 1.

Thank you for Filiz's question. Regarding usage scenarios, we would like to add some supplementary details. In China, some elderly people often convert the yards of old-style houses into small vegetable gardens. For elderly residents living in new residential communities, due to the restriction that they cannot use the community spaces arbitrarily, they choose to grow plants on their balconies. Additionally, there is a group of elderly people living in old residential communities who not only grow plants on their balconies but also make use of the unused spaces or flower beds downstairs in the community for planting. Our target audience is exactly this last group of elderly people, and the problem we need to solve is how to transport tools when they need to take care of plants both upstairs (on the balcony) and downstairs (in the community spaces). The tools they commonly use for caring for both indoor and outdoor plants are all the tools in picture (5-1) except the dipper and the iron shovel. This is because all the other tools are needed for both indoor and outdoor planting.The key question is how to better store these tools after using them for balcony planting and then carry them downstairs for outdoor planting. Elderly people may have unsteady steps when going downstairs, and the old residential communities where they live often lack elevators, so they need to hold onto handrails to go down. On one hand, this tool storage bag should be easy to carry—for example, it could be a single-shoulder bag that can be slung over the shoulder while going downstairs. On the other hand, this hand-carried bag needs to secure the gardening tools properly, preventing sharp tools from falling due to the elderly’s unsteady steps and causing harm to them. For watering tools and large iron shovels, we don’t think you need to consider them as items for storage. Indoors, watering is usually done with water ladles or plastic bottles, while outdoors, water guns and iron shovels are used. Whether indoors or outdoors, these tools are not only different from each other but also difficult to store with lightweight storage tools. Wish you all the best.

We have added some additional content and adjusted the image sizes to help you understand more clearly, We have also included our contact information—feel free to reach out to us anytime! Thank you for your time!