Jeff Weber spotted a design rarity: The market opportunity is massive, and the products out there are terrible.
When Jeff Weber suffered an injury to his left foot five years ago, he was given a set of standard crutches from the hospital. But the crutches were uncomfortable and seemed to only add ergonomic insult to the original injury: Weber's hands chaffed and his wrists ached because of poorly designed, badly placed grips. “All in all, it was a pretty awful experience,” he recalls.
Weber is a seating designer by trade, and apprenticed to Bill Stumpf, a legendary pioneer of ergonomic design and co-creator of the famed Aeron chair for Herman Miller; later, the two created the Aeron's heir, the Embody. It's no surprise that Weber set his sights on crutches, which account for $320 million annual sales on 10 million units in the U.S. alone.
He started working out sketches and...
When Jeff Weber suffered an injury to his left foot five years ago, he was given a set of standard crutches from the hospital. But the crutches were uncomfortable and seemed to only add ergonomic insult to the original injury: Weber's hands chaffed and his wrists ached because of poorly designed, badly placed grips. “All in all, it was a pretty awful experience,” he recalls.
Weber is a seating designer by trade, and apprenticed to Bill Stumpf, a legendary pioneer of ergonomic design and co-creator of the famed Aeron chair for Herman Miller; later, the two created the Aeron's heir, the Embody. It's no surprise that Weber set his sights on crutches, which account for $320 million annual sales on 10 million units in the U.S. alone.
He started working out sketches and...
- 6/3/2010
- by Kaomi Goetz
- Fast Company
Jeff Weber spotted a design rarity: The market opportunity is massive, and the products out there are terrible.
When Jeff Weber suffered an injury to his left foot five years ago, he was given a set of standard crutches from the hospital. But the crutches were uncomfortable and seemed to only add ergonomic insult to the original injury: Weber's hands chaffed and his wrists ached because of poorly designed, badly placed grips. “All in all, it was a pretty awful experience,” he recalls.
Weber is a seating designer by trade, and apprenticed to Bill Stumpf, a legendary pioneer of ergonomic design. Weber helped Stumpf design the famed Aeron chair for Herman Miller; later, they created the Embody. It's no surprise that Weber set his sights on crutches, which account for $320 million annual sales on 10 million units in the U.S. alone.
He started working out sketches and eventually took them...
When Jeff Weber suffered an injury to his left foot five years ago, he was given a set of standard crutches from the hospital. But the crutches were uncomfortable and seemed to only add ergonomic insult to the original injury: Weber's hands chaffed and his wrists ached because of poorly designed, badly placed grips. “All in all, it was a pretty awful experience,” he recalls.
Weber is a seating designer by trade, and apprenticed to Bill Stumpf, a legendary pioneer of ergonomic design. Weber helped Stumpf design the famed Aeron chair for Herman Miller; later, they created the Embody. It's no surprise that Weber set his sights on crutches, which account for $320 million annual sales on 10 million units in the U.S. alone.
He started working out sketches and eventually took them...
- 6/2/2010
- by Kaomi Goetz
- Fast Company
Is one of these high-tech wonders your next office chair? You should be so lucky. We test the latest technicolor desk thrones.
Blame the Aeron. Ever since Herman Miller's mesh-backed superseat became a design icon -- and a sales smash -- in the late '90s, office-furniture companies have been vying to create the next "it" chair. In June, both Knoll and Humanscale will debut next-generation chairs to compete with Herman Miller's latest, Embody, which debuted last fall.
Everyone is fighting for a bigger share of the $2.2 bil-lion office-seat market. But the stakes are even higher in this economic climate. A chair now must be comfortable, functional, value-driven, and, oh, can you make it "green," too?
We asked three armchair quarterbacks -- an ergonomics fanatic, a design freak, and a Web guy who likes to code in a prone position -- to test-drive each chair. No posturing allowed.
Blame the Aeron. Ever since Herman Miller's mesh-backed superseat became a design icon -- and a sales smash -- in the late '90s, office-furniture companies have been vying to create the next "it" chair. In June, both Knoll and Humanscale will debut next-generation chairs to compete with Herman Miller's latest, Embody, which debuted last fall.
Everyone is fighting for a bigger share of the $2.2 bil-lion office-seat market. But the stakes are even higher in this economic climate. A chair now must be comfortable, functional, value-driven, and, oh, can you make it "green," too?
We asked three armchair quarterbacks -- an ergonomics fanatic, a design freak, and a Web guy who likes to code in a prone position -- to test-drive each chair. No posturing allowed.
- 6/9/2009
- by Linda Tischler
- Fast Company
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