Toyota has set up a design challenge to students of the Royal College of Art. The brief was to create a household item that represents intelligent urban living.
After a brisk three months of hard work the winners of the iQ competition were announced in a celebration of young designers' work at the Royal College of Art.
The judges include Ron Arad, Lynda Relph Knight - the editor of Design Week, Sebastian Bergner, and Lance Scott - Chief Engineer at Toyota.
Yusuf Muhammad, was the winner of Living Room category and joint overall winner. His Yu Type design sits on the computer keyboard and allows 'hunt and peck' two fingered typists the opportunity to increase their speed and confidence. He is now thinking about developing the idea and hopes to include features like spellchecking and predictive text to increase its appeal. Judges praised the way he addressed a social issue of an ageing population within the urban context.
Dominic Hargreaves, was winner of the Garage category and a joint overall winner. His concept for a bike lock which sits at first storey level on the front of a building is designed to hoist bikes out of the reach of potential thieves. Along with Yusuf Muhammad, judges felt that Dominic's design would benefit the most from money to develop the idea further.
Graeme Davies took the first prize in the Kitchen category. His Quicksnap icetray design solves the problem of dropping two ice cubes on the floor for every one you manage to get in the glass by creating an undercut to release individual ice cubes. Judge Lance Scott called it "An innovative solution to a very simple but annoying problem". Graeme, who has a patent on the design, is looking to have it on sale by the summer.
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