Everyday Design-Driven Innovation: Exploring meaning change in IKEA hacking
Research Keywords
Design-driven Innovation in meaning;
Everyday Design;
IKEA Hacking;
Conceptual Blending Theory
Research Statement
Although much work exists to describe design-driven meaning innovation, there is little to date providing objective tools to identify and evaluate meaning innovation.
Within the context of everyday design activity,
the current work identifies and assesses design-driven innovation in meaning within cases of IKEA product hacking as examples of higher-level everyday design, and through the application of conceptual blending theory.
Conceptual blending theory is used as a scaffold for an expert content analysis of 100 IKEA hacking cases to identify and evaluate 60 cases of meaning change. These 60 cases are further assessed through objective meaning innovation scores derived from conceptual blending theory. A user evaluation study is then conducted through a pair-wise comparison of the 60 cases to derive user meaning innovation scores. These are then compared to expert scores.
Results indicate that although personal biases, idiosyncrasies, and life experiences inevitably influence the evaluation of innovation through the application of conceptual blending, the approach has potential as objective means to identify and evaluate design-driven meaning innovation in cases of everyday design. Boarder implications for assessing meaning innovation in everyday design are discussed.
Ga-eul Han, Yunwoo Jeong, Self A. James
Figure 1
IKEA Hacking design workshop process:
Group A participants are finding a similar form as a driver of product hacking, combining two different concepts.
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Figure 2
Hacking process of 'A dog accessory holder'
Figure 3
A dog accessory holder, it is made from 1 FLISAT book display, 1 set of SMASKA training beaker, and 5 BASTIS hooks.
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Figure 4
Blended Theory in meaning change
As shown in Figure 4 (left circle), the foundation of the meaning change is termed the BASE Concept. Input Space 2 is termed the CORE Concept.
These two conceptual spaces are interconnected, and these inputs selectively project to the BLENDED area through structural relationships (Comacchio & Warglien, 2010).
The dashed lines from the inputs into the blended space imply conceptual projections of structures, with the full lines between input elements, represent conceptual blends (Fauconnier & Turner, 2002).
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Figure 5
Discussion in 'Material Exploration & Analysis' step
Figure 6
A tea table, made from 1 FROSTA stool, 1 FRAKTA tarpaulin rope, and 1 BITTERGURKA plant pot hanger.
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made from 1 FROSTA stool, 4 BITTERGURKA plant pot hanger, and 1 TJUSIG hanger.
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Figure 8
Interesting IKEA hacking case1 from IKEA HACKERS: The IKEA Christmas Stocking
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Interesting IKEA hacking case2 from IKEA HACKERS: Emergency replacement for bird nest