We had the distinct pleasure to interview award winning designer Thijs Goossink about their original and creative Modular Wine Rack design work. Thijs Goossink is an award-winning industrial designer, that makes our world a better place with their original modular wine rack works.
Thijs Goossink ("TG") answered Design Interview ("DI") questions about their award-winning work Nucleus Modular Wine Rack. Interview questions prepared by Frank Scott.
TG : Interactivity by modularity. I needed a minimal design, expandable wine rack for my own wine collection, but I couldn't find a wine rack of my taste on the present market. So I designed one myself. Especially with the available colored elements you can make many combinations that actually look great without bottles too.
TG : I wanted to achieve a compact linkage mechanism between compact flat aluminum elements. The elements needed to be flat, not only as a nice feature, but also to be able to ship them easily all over the world. The elements' compactness makes this product highly flexible with regard to the assembly options and the variety of spaces it fits in. It also needed to be capable of holding champagne bottles, which are usually slightly bigger in diameter.
TG : To make it a well known and appreciated high-end product and to be able to invest in the realization of more creative ideas that our company has.
TG : 2 hours from idea to design drawing. 2 years to make the product perfect. I must add that 50% of the year I work at sea as marine engineer offshore. This created some delay in a sense.
TG : I needed a wine rack for my wine bottle collection in the living room. I couldn't find a modular, minimal and contemporary design anywhere else so I designed it myself.
TG : The extrusion and anodizing of the aluminum parts (or elements) is outsourced. Cutting them to size by CNC milling, QC checks and packaging is done by us. We like to keep control over as much of the process as possible to assure the highest quality standard. If sales would increase beyond our capacity, we will probably acquire more machinery to handle it. We love our product and - being an engineer by profession - I like to work with machines. These machines can then also be used to develop other new prototypes and products, or even to perform small production jobs for other companies.
TG : The personal need for a high quality modular wine rack with sleek lines, a playful mechanism and nice materials.
TG : No. Through market research I discovered what not to design. I think most other wine racks have too many unnecessary fringes, shapes and limitations.
TG : Our main target customer is someone who likes interior design, modern art, minimalism and contemporary furniture. But also likes good wines. Those two often form a good couple. Depending on the customers' creativity, the wine rack can very well just be a decorative and interactive piece of art too. On the other hand it can also be a subtle, less conspicuous wine rack that leaves the focus on its content: wine bottles.
TG : This design is the most minimal modular wine rack in the market and consists of the most compact elements with an interesting linkage system. Next to that, an arty setup with a mix of colored elements can be achieved and enjoyed even while empty of wine bottles. However, the structural shape of cells still resembles a traditional wine rack. Thanks to its subtle lines it's all about the wine bottle, the cells' core, the Nucleus.
TG : See answer to the previous question.
TG : Autocad, a CNC router and a brushing machine with a small conveyor belt.
TG : Having an interactive piece of art by modularity of compact elements. You can choose to let it be the main piece of art in your living room, or a subtle wine rack purely for storage of bottles.
TG : For the production process I collaborated with extrusion and anodising specialists. All other processes were a matter of using common sense and my own technical insights and interests.
TG : Quite big. For design and prototyping with small tolerances only CAD/CAM could do the job. And to finally achieve perfect shapes, cuts and finishes for the final product, we rely on machines that deliver a fine-tunable constant result with sufficient output.
TG : Initially there were a lot of positive reactions to this design. That's why we decided to bring it to market and we started this company to facilitate all processes. If this design would be credited with an award, it would get more publicity and enables Esthys Design Products to create more new designs in the future and eventually more people will be able to enjoy our designs. Basically it comes down to securing the means to express our creativity.
TG : I learned to be more patient and to give good and clear instructions.
