Product Design—— Sustainable Furniture Design

Sustainable Furniture Design

Program Introduction


Our world faces an abundance of bad products. A designer should justify the reason for existence of every new product he puts on the market. Good products are answers to social needs of our society and offer added value and innovation through a keen eye for function, quality and durability. Developing a sensibility for the physical appearance of these objects in order to make them also aesthetically sustainable is the ultimate challenge of a designer. Our four-year Undergraduate Program focuses on three key values: Innovation, Sustainability and Cultural Heritage.


Training Goals


We believe designers are more than stylists giving a shape to a product. A designer is an all-rounder and has much more restrictions to respect than an artist. He can be considered a researcher, an anthropologist, a psychologist, an engineer, even a marketer. Our Undergraduate Program explores all these different aspects of what it takes to be a designer, on a theoretical and practical level.


Curriculum Description

 

Personal guidance by Master Dirk Wynants offers the students a unique tailored Master-Apprentice Relationship. Our Undergraduate Program focuses on practical implementation of the acquired skills; most of the course time is devoted to student projects in collaboration with real companies, including research, 3D studies and representations in the form of visual models, functional prototypes and conceptual simulations of user scenarios.

 

Career Prospective

 

After completing our degree, students will be able to: find and create added value through innovative and sustainable solutions for companies and institutions; become a competent and business-savvy partner for furniture and industrial design Industries, achieve a successful professional career as employed or with an own business.

 

Selection of students


The entrance examination is mainly based on the following skills: Creative Thinking, Communication Skills, Sketching Skills, Modelling Techniques and Personal Motivation.

Master Introduction
Dirk Wynants
Founder of Extremis, laureate of IF and IDEA


Prof. Dirk Wynants is a leading expert in durable furniture and equipment design. Dirk studied interior architecture and furniture design at the Architecture Institute Sint-Lucas in Ghent, Belgium. After completing his studies, Dirk established Extremis for the realization of his own designs in 1994. To date, he is still the full owner and president of the board of directors, but gives priority to design and art direction. In 2013, Dirk accepted the offer of Detao Group to share his design experience in China. He is now the leading master of Siva-Detao Master Academy – Sustainable Furniture Design.


Innovation, superior quality, a keen eye for functionality, but above all social relevance and ecology are part of Dirk Wynants’ credo. Thanks to this attitude, Dirk’s designs already won many awards internationally, like Red Dot Award Best of the Best, IDEA Award, Interior Innovation Award to name a few. Dirk just received 2018 iF Glod Award with the Virus Picnic table he designed.



Master Studio