Bakgrund: I konkurrens om morgondagens konsument kommer sannolikt materiella värden inte räcka till. Företag måste också kunna erbjuda immateriella värden genom upplevelser. Ett sätt att göra detta är via produktens design. Den företagsekonomiska relevansen understyrks ytterligare av det faktum att lite forskning finns kring immateriellt värdeskapande och design. Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att bidra med förståelse för hur design kan tillföra immateriella värden till en produkt. Genomförande: Initialt konstruerades en begreppsapparat, ur teori från vitt skilda discipliner, som sedan genom tolkning av en rad intervjuer med relevanta aktörer utvecklades. Resultat: De immateriella värden som tillförs en möbel genom design kan förstås med hjälp av två huvudkategorier: estetiskt och socialt värde. Dessa värdens tillblivelse kan i huvudsak förstås som en social konstruktion uppburen av en rad aktörer i en värdekonfiguration. En historia konstrueras och ger möbeln ett värde. Kunskap har central betydelse för konsumentens/nyttjarens värdeupplevelse. Resultatet torde ha stor generalitet i form av dess språkbildande karaktär. / Background: In the competition for the consumer of tomorrow it is not likely going to be enough to deliver material value. Companies will have to offer immaterial values through experiences. One way of doing this is by the design of the product. The relevance is emphasised further as there is little research available regarding immaterial value creation and design. Purpose: The purpose of the thesis is to contribute with understanding for how design can add immaterial value to a product. Research method: Initially a number of concepts were constructed out of theories originating in widely different theoretical fields. These concept were then evolved by interpretation of a number of interviews with relevant actors. Result: The immaterial values that are added to a piece of furniture by design can be understood with the help of main categories: aesthetic and social value. The creationof these values can to a large extent be understood in the terms of a social construction carried by a number of actors in a value configuration. A story is constructed which give the piece of furniture value. Knowledge is of great importance for the value appreciation of the consumer/user. The result should have great generality as it is of a concept creation quality.

The project consisted of developing an office workstation specially designed to compete at the Spanish market. The assignment was received from the Daifuku Designs, a design company in Barcelona, Spain. Daifuku Designs are well experienced in various kinds of product and interior design, but has not designed office furniture earlier. The project’s purpose was to introduce the company to the branch of office furniture. The research phase consisted in three different parts, a survey concerning office work that was handed out to Swedish and Spanish office workers and cleaning staff, studies of the world leading companies in the branch of office furniture and educational visits at different showrooms and offices. The project resulted in a desk that is offering a flexible space dividing system and a unique cord solution. The space dividers can be put anywhere along the desktop and are easily moved by hand. All the cords and cables are hidden in the desk and computers, phones, e.g. can be installed anywhere on the desk. The desk can be used both separately and in big office landscape. Flexibility is a common sales argument and the demand of this kind of flexibility is constantly growing. The trends to hire personnel and to work in temporary project groups are two reasons to the growing demand. The office furniture needs to be able to be used in different ways when the constellation of the project group is changing. It is a big advantage if the same desks can be used for different occasions. / Projektet bestod av att utveckla ett kontorsskrivbord, designat för att marknadsföras på den spanska marknaden. Uppdragsgivare var Daifuku Designs, ett designföretag i Barcelona, Spanien. Daifuku Designs har stor erfarenhet i olika sorters produkt- och inredningsdesign men har ej designat kontorsmöbler tidigare. Projektets syfte var att introducera företaget på kontorsmöbelmarknaden. Researchfasen bestod av tre olika delar, en enkät om kontorsarbete som gavs ut till svenska och spanska kontorsarbetare samt städpersonal, studier av världsledande företag inom kontorsmöbelindustrin samt studiebesök på olika showrooms och kontor. Projektet resulterade i ett skrivbord som erbjuder ett flexibelt avskärmningssystem samt en unik sladdlösning. Avskärmningarna kan sättas vart som helst längs skrivbordet samt kan lätt flyttas för hand. Alla sladdar och kabeldosor är gömda i skrivbordet och datorer, telefoner, etc. kan installeras vartsomhelst på skrivbordet. Skrivbordet kan användas separat så väl som i ett större kontorslandskap. Flexibilitet är ett vanligt säljargument, behovet av denna typ av flexibilitet växer hela tiden. Trenden att hyra in personal samt att jobba i projektgrupper är två anledningar till det växande behovet. Kontorsmöbeln måste kunna användas i många olika grupperingar när konstellationen i projektgruppen förändras. Det är en stor fördel om skrivbordet kan användas för många olika tillfällen.

In a world that only spins faster and where information is available in abundance, the need to multi task has grown bigger than ever before. The need to eat or work from the sofa is growing, while the trends say that the coffee table should be low. This conflict of interest forces people to make a choice, following the trends or being able to easily multi task from the sofa. Or do they have to? The thesis work described in this report may provide a solution to the problem. The work consists of 10 credits and is carried out by two students as a final stage of the bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design Engineering at Luleå University of Technology. The work is carried out in collaboration with the furniture manufacturer Tenzo AB. Tenzo is a, privately owned, Swedish furniture manufacturer with a business idea aimed at trendy furniture in the international market, according to Tenzo (2018), 95% is exported to Europe and major retailers in France, Germany and Switzerland. The goal has been to develop a conceptual lift top coffee table. With a user-centered design process, the user was involved continuously throughout the work, during a workshop and in interviews with the goal of exploring the question ”What is important in a coffee table?”, in evaluative interviews and in Virtual Reality (VR) to test the concepts and ideas. The final concept embraces a more classical table shape than the lift top tables available on the market today, but is also developed with future trends in mind. The trends identified are colors with more hue than the bright pastels we see today, rounder and softer shapes than the boxynes observed among today’s lift top coffee tables, and that the light wood is replaced by darker woods. The color options presented give the table both the ability to melt into an environment or stick out and demand presence in the room.

This report is an investigation into how I, as a furniture designer, can absorb the task of furniture design, with the intention of honoring a brand, by holding it in the highest of esteem, so that it may be revered.  During my three years as a student at Malmstens Bachelor’s Program in furniture design, I have been taught and trained, to be able to to create and design distinguished furniture for the industry, that is worthy of respect.  The report describes how a lounge chair has emerged through a design process in collaboration with Gemla Fabrikers AB. I have been focusing on the history of Gemla as the only furniture manufacturer in Sweden that can tame wood and the challenges that Gemla stands in front of.  The investigation is built on my  onw studies, interviews and a survey.The lounge chair, which is a physical result of this investigation, is partially made of bent wood and is a tribute to the queen in the Swedish furniture bransch. Gemla. / Den här rapporten är en undersökning i hur jag som möbeldesigner kan ta mig an uppgiften att designa en möbel i avsikt att vårda ett varumärke. Under tre års studier på på Malmstens möbeldesignprogram har jag tränats för att kunna designa möbler för möbelindustrin. Rapporten beskriver hur en fåtölj vuxit fram ur en designprocess i samarbete med Gemla Fabrikers AB. Syftet var att skapa en produkt som vårdar Gemlas varumärke. Fokus har lagts på Gemlas historia som är det enda företag i Sverige som kan böja trä och de vägval Gemla står inför. Undersökningen bygger på egna studier, intervjuer och en enkät. Fåtöljen som är det fysiska resultatet av denna undersökning är delvis tillverkad i böjträ och är en hyllning till drottningen i den svenska möbelindustrin. Gemla.

Visually simple collection of interior equipment, consisting of the design table, light and chair made from wood. Specifically from oak. Designed with the modern aesthetic and technological principles.Collection is designed for a particular company and this design respects their technological facilities and requirements.

In 2020, the meatpacking district of Stockholm (Slakthusområdet) is at the beginning of a period of change. A lot of its buildings are being demolished, or at least gutted, to transform a historical area of industry into a more urban district of housing, offices, trade, and services along with new parks and squares (Stockholms Stad, 2020). This thesis project is specifically about the first building that was torn down as part of the development of the area, Sandhagen 2. We should consider our condemned buildings a precious resource and extract from them rather than from the earth. In every house there is invested energy which is lost the day it is demolished but there is also something else that is lost other than precious resources. The research aims to highlight the importance of reuse not from the more obvious sustainability point of view, but as something that can be aesthetically motivated. The method involves a dissection of Sandhagen 2, extracting interior architectural elements without excessive alterations, and making an organized taxonomy. The taxonomy is then rearranged into a new spatial composition. How can a space be created from a taxonomy defined by an interior architect? How does a material’s earlier life add or take away potential in its future life?  The proposal is a strange space where the tension created by reuse is completely between the elements themselves, a result of having to become the conventional parts of architecture that complete a space; steps, something to sit on, floor, partitions.

I detta examensarbete ville jag undersöka asymmetri och använda det ordet för att formge möbler och objekt. Jag ville undersöka hur asymmetrin skulle kunna te sig och jag lade en stor grund vid litteratur och omvärldsanalys. Med researchen tog jag mig vidare in i en skiss- och modellprocess som därefter ledde fram till två utvalda former som jag skulle tillverka i full skala. Arbetet är förhållet till ett tio veckor långt tidsspann och jag betraktar arbetet i helhet som en skiss och en grund för fortsatta studier på master- och forskarnivå. Jag kom fram till att asymmetri kan te sig på olika sätt i formgivningen – en materiell asymmetri, en asymmetri i formers relationer till varandra och att det krävs en viss symmetri för att kunna urskilja asymmetrin, det avvikande. Resultatet är två möbler som visar hur långt eller hur kort man kan dra asymmetrin och de båda objekten innefattar symmetriska beståndsdelar placerade i en asymmetrisk relation till varandra. / In this thesis I wanted to investigate asymmetry and use that word to design furniture and objects. I wanted to investigate how the asymmetry could manifest itself and I laid a great foundation in literature. With the research I proceeded into a sketch and model process which then led to two selected forms that I would produce in full scale. The work is related to a ten-week long span of time and I regard the work as a whole as a sketch and a basis for further studies at master’s and doctoral level. I found that asymmetry can manifest itself in different ways in design – a material asymmetry, an asymmetry in the relations of shapes to each other and that a certain symmetry is required to be able to discern the asymmetry, the deviating. The result is two pieces of furniture that show how far or how short one can take the word investigated. The two objects comprise symmetrical elements placed in an asymmetric relationship to each other.

Trenden är tydlig, vi arbetar flexiblare nu för tiden och det verkar vara början på en strukturomvandling av arbetsmarknaden, det har blivit extra tydligt under Covid-19 pandemin. De absolut flesta som arbetar på distans arbetar hemifrån och våra hem måste anpassas till dessa flexibla arbetsformer. Den vanligaste lösningen på problemet är att ta med kontoret hem. Arbetsgivare erbjuder ofta de anställda att ta med stolen eller skrivbordet hem men storleken och estetiken på kontorsmöbler passar inte in i hemmiljön. Vi vill inte ha ett kontor som ser ut som ett hem, inte heller ett hem som ser ut som ett kontor. I det här arbetet undersöker jag estetiken och hur förutsättningarna för distansarbete hemifrån kan förbättras. Ett tidigare projekt kallat Home, som behandlade distansarbete ligger till bakgrund för mitt examensarbete och är en anledning till att jag valt att djupare syna ämnet. Jag har lärt känna problematiken och behoven genom en litteraturstudie där jag granskat olika rapporter och vetenskapliga artiklar för att förstå distansarbete och dess för- och nackdelar. Användarstudier har också genomförts för att lära känna användarna och förstå deras behov, samt samtalat med experter för att fånga in detaljkunskap inom området. Det har lagt grunden för den kreativa fasen bestående av idégenerering och prototyparbete. Det resulterade i ett designförslag som heter Pop, ett flexibelt och kompakt skrivbord för deltidsdistansarbete med platsbrist i hemmet. / There is a distinct trend that we work more flexible nowadays and it seems to be the beginning of a structural transformation of the labour market. This has become clear during the Covid-19 pandemic. The majority of remote workers are stationed in their homes. Therefor our homes must adapt to the change in favor for these flexible working conditions. The quick solution is often to bring the office home, but the size and the aesthetics of office furniture does not fit in the environment of the home. We do not want to have an office that looks like home, or a home that looks like an office. In this essay I investigate the aesthetics and how the conditions for remote work from home can be improved.  An earlier concept called Home, a project about remote work has laid the foundation for my bachelor’s degree essay and is one of the reasons I wanted to explore the subject further.  By studying reports and scientific research I have deeply got to know the conditions for remote work, user’s needs, and the associated problems.  I have also interviewed users as well as professionals, to gather expertise. This has laid the base for my creative work – generating ideas and prototyping. This resulted in a design proposal called Pop, a flexible and compact desk for part-time remote workers who has a lack of space.

How can we use more of the materials and products that have already been produced? At the second hand shopping mall ReTuna in Eskilstuna, where circular flows are a reality, there are still many products going to waste. This master thesis project explores the possibilities of upcycle and repurpose driven design, and by that adding new value to existing products. The process of doing that is the basis of this report.  ReTuna Återbruksgalleria is a place where people can leave products they do not want or need anymore.Everyday hundreds of products are left for reuse at ReTuna, which is connected to the overconsumptionthat results in copious amounts of second hand products. Much more than can be taken care of in today’s system. The resources put into every product needs to be valued accordingly to what they truly cost and emit.  This master’s thesis project explores how to design within the planetary boundaries by taking care and responsibility for what already is produced. The first phase of the project consists of observations and interviews to get an understanding of how ReTuna works. The framing of the project was decided after the research phase, which resulted in focus on one specific product, dining chairs. The next part of the project involves upcycling workshops, building of prototypes and an exhibition, all with a focus on increasing the value for second hand chairsand giving the material new areas of use. The last part of the project presents a design result, with an approach for involving more repurpose driven design and upcycling within design and product development.

Master thesis carried out in collaboration with PS Retail, a retail design company from Jönköping, during the spring semester of 2022 as a part of the Industrial Design Master at Jönköping University. This project describes the process of design, development and construction of a module focused on the bread and bakery department in grocery stores for EveryDay Sweden, a partner of PS Retail. It consists of the development of a new versatile and contemporary assortment of displays that fit the interior of grocery stores, more specifically, for the bread and bakery department. Some of their approaches are to anticipate how supermarkets will evolve over time and design accordingly. In addition, they want the space to be comfortable for everyone, so some ergonomic factors are taken into account. Finally, their goal is to expand to other European markets, so both aesthetics and function must be considered. The final result is a module for bread storage and some proposals on how to fit in different environments. It works similar to a drawer, except that when the customer pulls it, the glass is lifted and the bread is exposed. In addition, the proposals represent how this module would look in different shapes and environments, depending on the capacity of the store.