The NJIT Chapter of Industrial Design Society of America held a project launch event on Sept. 11 for the Montclair Design Week 2021. NJIT partnered up with DesignShed to unite four major design schools in New Jersey to introduce the project. The competition’s primary goal is to unite students from different schools to exchange ideas and tackle various design challenges, from finding creative new solutions to concerns such as climate change to addressing various social issues such as public health and personhood.
Students from all four schools- NJIT, Montclair University, Kean University and William Paterson University- work together to create innovative solutions for these different problems using their own design philosophies. While the specific challenges they wish to tackle depend on the team, the overall idea that all teams must follow is the same: the year is 2121, and the beings that roam the planet wish to send a time capsule 100 years into the past to assist the people in our current time period.
The competition will take place in multiple phases. During the first phase, students form teams and begin to discuss ideas regarding the situation presented to them. Upon forming their teams, the students move on to stage two, where they will begin the design challenge creating media as well as a prop that will be put into the hypothetical time capsule. Three physical items are required to be put into the time capsule along with a 30-second video for the people of their past.
In the final phase, the teams’ work will be showcased in the Montclair Design Week hub gallery. On Oct. 3, it will be open for the community to see. Many ideas have already been brought up during the very first phase such as creating robotic fish that go underwater and assist in eliminating pollution in our oceans by consuming waste. Two other concepts include tackling a possible food and water shortage in the near future and dealing with the concept of personal and national identity in a more globalized future.
The possibilities for creative solutions and designs are limitless, and the competition is an effective way for different minds in the field of design to collaborate and advance their ideas. The organizers of the launch event include DesignShed’s founder Petia Morozov, NJIT industrial design student Lemmuel Escalona, NJIT alumna Renee Collins and Matthew Mateo, club event coordinator of NJIT’s chapter.
The NJIT Industrial Design Society of America club hosts workshops, joins conferences and interacts in social affairs. Some of its events include drawing and wood workshops, and the club encourages anyone who has interest in making things and working with their hands to join! The meetings take place on Thursdays at 6 p.m. in the major fishbowl studio on Weston Hall’s seventh floor. Feel free to email [email protected] to get more information!
