BLOG
Products
Talking to Odosdesign about Dorik

Products | Inspiration

Talking to Odosdesign about Dorik

APRIL 2024 | 4 minutes

"To talk about design only in terms of the formal part is to remain at a very superficial level, and design is much more than that. In many cases, it is an attitude that permeates the culture of the company and can become a multiplying tool".

We talked to Ana Segovia and Luis Calabuig about their more than two decades working from their studio, Odosdesign, creativity, research and design to help companies identify, articulate and communicate their differential value. Her portfolio includes collaborations with brands such as Actiu, for whom she has created Art Direction campaigns since 2014, and with whom she now presents the Dorikcollection of tables inspired by Greek Doric columns.

How were your beginnings, training and first years before founding Odosdesign? Your participation in 2005 in nude marked a before and after... what was that turning point? What was that turning point?

We met at the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV) in 1998, studying Industrial Design Engineering. After four years working together on class projects, in 2002 we entered the nude in what was its first competition; and that same year Odosdesign was born. At that time we were moonlighting, as we had the odd sporadic project, which we combined with other jobs, and it wasn't until 2005 that we started to make a living from the studio. That year we designed the Ensombra parasol and presented it in nude, and we won the Valencia Crea competition and the National Injuve award for young designers, which made us try to make a living from Odosdesign.

You are specialised in product design and communication, two disciplines a priori different but intimately related and that you work together, how do you understand this relationship and what does it bring to your clients?

Although having studied product design probably makes this discipline the soul of the studio, over time we have realised that knowing how products are communicated, the necessary commercial tools and, in general, having a better knowledge of the market and the business, helps us to give a more efficient response to the projects.

Limited until recently to its most aesthetic facet, design has shown that it is also functionality, communication, wellbeing... What is your experience of design as a tool for 'building' company and community, and achieving greater well-being and productivity among workers?

Design seeks to solve people's needs, so we understand that it must maintain a careful balance between form and function. To talk about design only in terms of form is to remain at a very superficial level, and design is much more than that. In many cases, it is an attitude that permeates the culture of the company and can become a multiplying tool.

This is not the first time you have worked for Actiu, with whom you have developed several graphic campaigns, such as 'Always on the move' (2014) and 'Cool working', winner of the Red Dot Award in Design and Communication Design 2017 in the category of 'Cool working'.o de Comunicación 2017 in the category of Corporate Publication; and for whom in 2019 you created a video about the Trim chair, finalist in the category 'Digital and interactive graphics' of the ADCV Awards. What changes have you noticed and how has the way of communicating evolved over the last 10 years?

We have been working with Actiu since 2014, mainly on Art Direction projects, such as the 2017 RED Dot award-winning project. For the Cool Working campaign proposed by Actiu, we imagined how to represent the brand's products in different contexts and try to connect with typical users, so that they went from needing a product in general to needing an Actiu product. This Art Direction work evolved, in some cases, to participate in imagining the real spaces, in the image of the photographic spaces we made. Since then, and although more and more companies pay attention to how they communicate their products, we also see more repetition in the way they communicate.

Although you have designed a multitude of products for other companies, the Dorik table collection is your first work in this category for Actiu, what are its main pillars and inspiration?

Dorik responds to a commercial need, it is a product typology clearly identified in the market, and we have worked on the conceptual part of it to try to make it unique.

A design that in this case is inspired by the Doric columns of ancient Greece, as supporting elements of timeless architecture, and where every detail has been thought through.

Tell us a little about the design and manufacturing process of Dorik, materials, shapes, what spaces and uses it has been designed for, what it brings to users?

The design process is a conversation, words, concepts that are translated into strokes and, with increasing haste, are passed on to the digital world, 3D modelling and the 3D printing machine. An inevitable path, which we combine with manual work with models, the essence of which we try not to lose.

At Dorik, we separate the leg, manufactured by rotomoulding, from a top available in different materials, such as porcelain, melamine, etc., thus achieving a very versatile piece that can be adapted to the user's needs, depending on its material and finish, which can be used in meeting rooms, restaurants, terraces...

How was the process of working with Actiu? How has the project evolved since its beginnings? What do you take away from this collaboration?

We have been collaborating with Actiu for many years and, although we know perfectly well the inner workings of the brand, the development of a new project is a long road with many stages, from the design to the economic validation or the management of the necessary investments... But, if we have to highlight something, we would highlight the moment when they confirmed to us that the project was going ahead.

THE HARMONY OF GREEK ARCHITECTURE

MORE INFO