From the Hindu
BANGALORE: Mobile handset major Nokia on Wednesday announced the launch of its first satellite design studio at Bangalore’s Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology.
The studio, the company’s first anywhere in the world, will explore a range of design trends and themes, including detailed research into colour and material trends in India.
Focus
The design centre will study the use of mobiles for the Internet in India and its implications for design. New features and uses for mobiles will be another focus area of the centre.
At the centre, Nokia designers work with students, established designers and alumni of the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology. Eventually, the centre aims at emerging as a key destination for Nokia’s global team to visit to share ideas and be inspired.
New ideas
The satellite studio will work on new design ideas for India and the global markets.
Here’s what Hannu Nieminen, Head of Insight and Innovation, Nokia Design, had to say about the centre at a media conference here: “For Nokia, design is not just about the look and feel of the handsets but equally important is what it can do for people and how it fits into their lives. Designers must be exposed to how people live and work in different places in the world. Our new satellite studio will draw on the experiences of this dynamic market to develop new design ideas and identify trends.”
In the words of Geetha Narayanan, founder and director, Srishti: “The studio gives the talent of tomorrow the opportunity to work with experienced Nokia designers from around the world.”
The Bangalore satellite studio is part of Nokia’s ongoing investment in design. This year, the company established a new design studio for its design team at its global headquarters in Espoo, Finland. The company has proposed to open a similar studio for its design team in London later this year. Nokia has more than 300 designers in its global team representing 34 nationalities.
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4 Comments
For Srishti, this marks the beginning of a new learning phase - learning to work with (if not within) big business. Srishti has always remained at the periphery of mainstream (industrial) design, and worked at the leading-edge (experimental) and trailing-edge (grassroots) aspects of design. What is encouraging is Nokia’s openness to Srishti’s open-source ideology of innovation. It might also be interesting to recall that Srishti’s first industry collaboration was with HP Labs’ Indian centre. Watch this space.
How can design be grassroots? Skeptically wondering, but open to changing my mind . . .
If by design we mean “creating solutions that work” than I think most of the best design is in fact grass roots. If instead, design is “shiny sleek things that disappear” than grass roots doesn’t have a chance.
Some people who do grass roots design that I find interesting are
Anil K. Gupta, Sristi and the Honey Bee Network
And of course there are the hacks that happen in the market streets of Bangalore everyday. Everything from Mantra boxes to 1 ruppe movie posters.
Is culture jamming grassroots? Is that like anti-design?
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