Designing Air Sensor

A few years ago, there was a huge hype in Home Automation in the Chinese market. I provided design work for a Chinese client, who also wanted to enter this market, which didn't grow as much as everyone had anticipated. The concept doesn't seem like anything special today but the idea was to automate almost everything including lighting, audio, TV, room temperature, and all the home devices here and there. As part of the home automation product line, I was asked to design this air sensor device, which was essential for Chinese homes in the big cities, where the air quality was one of the top concerns.

It’s fairly a simple product with a few sensors, a battery, and Bluetooth/WiFi antennas. What I first thought of was a clean and “friendly” design. There were already many products like this in China and the design had to be unique. One important requirement was a dust sensor hole. The brainstorming stage is always a struggle. This time, okay, where do I locate that hole? After a dozen of sketches and testing, what was most natural to me was the center of the circle. Circular design is always friendly and inviting. One drawback is that the circle typically does not work well with the inner PCB assembly, which are all made in square shapes. But it wasn't an issue for a simple product like this.

I made the LED indication light to have more bold gesture than a standard design, because this is the only interface on the hardware, aside from the mobile app, that alarms you when the air quality is bad. It shouldn’t be a little dot you see in many of the consumer electronics. There are 3 LED lights (combined green and red) along the ring with a light guide or film to diffuse the light evenly. The hole patterns are made to disappear when the device is off. This is achieved by a laser engraving method on the painted surface.

I have been working as an industrial designer for almost 8 years now. It’s amazing to think that I started from not knowing anything but design to being able think through engineering challenges. I used to be the least techy person in the family and now I know quite well about a PCB assembly, component layout, and mechanical work. In recent years, I have done much more complicated products like wearable, an AR device, and 4G LTE products. Now I look back and I can appreciate designing a simple wireless product like this.

For more information about the design, you can visit my portfolio site at Air Sensor.

Greetings in Japanese

数年前に、ホームオートメーションに関わるプロジェクトを引き受け、そのプロダクトの一環としてこのエアーセンサーをデザインさせてもらいました。クリーンでフレンドリーなデザインを第一に考えながらたどり着いたのがこの円形のデザイン。そして中心にある穴はダストセンサー用で空気を探知するためにあります。LEDライトは空気が良いか悪いかを伝えるためのものですが、デザインが統一されて見えるように円形に沿った形になっています。

インダストリアルデザインを始めてもう８年くらいになりますが、デザインすることしかできなかった当初と比べ、今ではエンジニアリングの知識も随分と増え、機能をしっかりと考えたデザインができるようになりました。このエアーセンサーは、今まで関わったプロジェクトの中ではシンプルなほうで楽しくデザインさせてもらいました。詳しくは本文で。