Amey Sogodekar.
Source : Upliance.ai
Accessories Design for Smart Home Appliances
Role
Industrial Design Intern
In collaboration with
Type
Individual (Professional Work)
Duration
February 2021 - May 2021
Brief
Upliance.ai is a smart home appliances startup based in Bangalore. Its maiden product DelishUp, is a smart cooking appliance designed for newbies who wish to cook independently.
My main responsibility at Up was to design accessories that would enhance the experience of users with the product.
Scrapper Design
DelishUp is an intelligent cooking appliance that makes cooking more accessible for its users. In its cooking jar, it can do numerous activities, such as sauteing, kneading, steaming, chopping, heating, etc., to make innumerable recipes. We observed that when the users cooked semi-solid curries using DelishUp, removing curry from the cooking jar became too tedious for them.
User Journey - User taking out curry from DelishUp
Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
Step 4
Description
Users cook a delicious
curry using DelishUp.
Users remove all of the curry except the one stuck beneath blades of cooking jar.
Users try removing the curry stuck beneath blades using Spatula.
Users face difficulty while taking out curry from cooking jar using Spatula.
Experience
Users are very happy as they cook something on their own.
Users are eager to eat the curry made by them and want to take it out quickly.
Users are eager to eat the curry made by them and want to take it out quickly.
Users are frustrated as the process takes too long, and their curry cools down.
Emotions
Solution Implemented
Scrapper was designed to make the process of removing curry from the jar easier for the users. The user first needs to rest the scrapper on the center of the blades. After positioning the scrapper, the user needs to rotate it so that it collects food stuck beneath the blades.
User rotates the Scrapper
which pushes the blades
Handle
Edge to push the blades
Draft to allow food to be collected in Scrapper
Smooth edges to prevent food from getting stuck
Scrapper Mechanism
Scrapper Design
Prototyping and testing
1
Scoop
interfering
with jar
blades
2
Increased
clearances
with jar
blades and
tested the
prototype.
3
Failure when
attempting
to remove
hot, semi-
solid curry
from the
container.
4
Increased
height of
handle.
Tapered profile
to ease usage.
Reinforced at
point of
failure.
Masala Palette Design
DelishUp is an intelligent cooking appliance that makes cooking more accessible for its users. The product is mainly designed for users who can't cook but want to eat homemade food. While beta-testing our product, we observed that adding spices to the cooking jar while cooking numerous recipes was too tiring for the users. This almost ruined the users' experience with DelishUp.
User Journey - Users adding spices in DelishUp’s cooking jar
Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
Step 4
Description
​Users are excited to cook using the DelishUp.
Users are preparing a curry for which they need to add spices and read the below instruction.
Users are provided with measuring spoons which contain different measurements.
Users enter spices in cooking jar using measuring spoons.
Enter 1/2 tsp turmeric
Experience
Users are happy as they finally can cook something on their own!
Users become anxious as they do not understand how much 1 /2 tsp actually is.
Users are relaxed now as they don’t have to think about the measurements now.
Using the same spoon for multiple spices and washing it before returning it to Masala Boxes is tiring and dampens user excitement with DelishUp.
Emotions
User Research
Masala Box in Indian Kitchen
Spoon Sizes used in Masala Box
To solve the problem, a study was done to understand how spices are added to the food.
In Indian households, spices are usually kept in Masala Boxes. Using the spoons kept in it, the spices are added to the food.
Masala Boxes generally have two spoons in them. One is used for adding turmeric and one for adding other spices. This is to make sure that turmeric does not mix with other spices.
Ideation
Ideas for first iteration
It was decided to design an accessory like a palette which would make the process of entering spices into the DelishUp easier for the users.
The palette would consist of slots with standard volumes. Filling it would mean that the user has added the required quantity of spices.
To start with the design, various products available in the market were analyzed, which could help ideate the product.
The common shapes present in these products were later tested to finalize the shape of slots.
Finalizing Slot Shape
0.25 tsp
0.5 tsp
1 tsp
Prototype Palette containing slots with different measurements of spices.
Slot Volumes (tsp = teaspoon)
Based on various products available in the market a prototype was made containing numerous slots with different shapes and volumes.
Users were asked to fill the slots using the spoons in the Masala Box. Based on the feedback, the shape of the slots was finalized.
Slots of measurements 1 tsp, 0.5 tsp, and 0.25 tsp were made in the palette.
Final Design
User enters spices from here using spoon.
Masala Palette contained measurements of only 0.5 and 0.25 tsp. For higher measurements multiple slots of Masala palette could be filled.
Separator shifted up to mix all the spices.
Process of mixing spices explained on screen to avoid confusion among the users.