Harvesting water through air – Design Concepts for Urban Nature in the future

Harvesting water through air?  Aero was one of the great projects that came out from a Design Students assignment in Sweden “Creating and Taking Care of Urban Nature 2030”, on the initiative of Husqvarna Group. 

“Design is much more than styling, it goes way deeper in creating holistic relevance for the user, here and now as well as visualizing the future which can be a challenge in our quite conservative industry. That’s why we wanted to get a biased view from young, creative students on how and why we would interact or use nature in our future living and public spaces. The assignment was also to explain how you as a designer interpret the future designs in connection to insight research and user needs ,”says Towe Ressman, Vice President of Global Design at Husqvarna Group.

It was 11 international students at Advanced Product Design at Umeå University, in Sweden, that was  given the assignment “Creating and Taking Care of Urban Nature 2030”. In particular three of the presentations, Aero, The Future Arborist and Lush  inspired and challenged the Husqvarna Group Global Design´s team thoughts for the future.

  • Aero – is a project about the need of water in the future. The students created a solution of harvesting water through air. Active absorptions and low energy requirements in order to give gardeners and communities access to up to 200 liters of water per day. Aero isinnovative and relevant as by 2030, 4 billion people are estimated to live in high stress water areas and the world to be 40% short of water. Made by Janis Beinerts and Susanne Duswald.
  • The Future Arborist – is about making the job as an arborist easier and safer in the parks. A harness that assist for effortless tree ascending and powers a versatile electric lightweight chainsaw. The complementary drone helps the arborist to find the perfect spot to anchor the rope when ascending to an optimal position for pruning. As well as monitoring the surrounding to be able to alarm when a park visitor is too close to the arborists works area. Made by Jens Renhammar and Joe Richardson.
  • Lush –  is about decreasing the waste of food and to produce and tweak flavor of food in your home/urban garden. The student used the insight that one would be more engaged in eating what we grow and thereby decrease the waste. 

Made by Karl-Otto Saarman and Darja Wendel.

“We selected Umeå University because they have a very good reputation in the design community and attract students from all over the world. Highly engaged students participated, conducting several presentations with  a very high and professional level of the end result. The ambition is to continue our collaboration with students and universities. We will do similar projects again and naturally as we are a global company, next time with a University in another country,” says Towe Ressman.

Harvesting Water Through Air