Organizing Your Workspace

Rail mounting design balances art and work, technology and humanity

A universal rail mounting system that allows users to customize their work areas was part of a recent exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York City. MOMA's Workspheres exhibit focused on the work environment and the role of design in creating a balance between technology and humans. It featured fully constructed models of new tools and environments produced by design teams from around the world.

Automotive design meets the desktop
in Haworth Jump Stuff work tools.

On display was "Haworth Jump Stuff"--a line of work tools developed by industrial design studio and BMW subsidiary Designworks/USA, Newbury Park, CA. Haworth Inc., Holland, MI, tapped the studio to help bring space and performance efficiencies of automobile design to the desktop.

Designworks analyzed user studies that showed how people worked at their desk, shuffled papers and organized files. It appeared that the way people dealt with, worked with, and organized paper on their desks served as "reminders" to act on those documents. Thus different "to do" piles became visible icons of one's workload.

They concluded that an interchangeable rail system would allow people to customize their work area to suit their individual needs. As a first step, Designworks provided their client with sketches, then foam mock-ups, followed by alias renderings. The fourth step involved rapid prototyping models, which were then rebuilt by engineering. Engineering created alias data and tooling packages. Finally came tooling and production.

The result was the aluminum support rail--designed with a collection of simple, fluid and multi-purposed accessories--that allows users to remove clutter from their desktops. The collection includes translucent resin 3-layer trays, 2-way shelves, paper sorters, pile dividers, hold-everything boxes, goose-necked stick-on and grip clips, memory joggers, mini-tack and marker boards, wire bins and an adjustable keyboard pad.

The rail allows different people to use the tools in different ways. For example, when mounted horizontally, the paper tray is ideal for chunking project-related information. Turn the tray around and it sits at an attention-getting 60-degree angle, perfect for display purposes. Tools can be used in both planes on the same rail. The rail lifts work off the work surface, taking advantage of the unused vertical area and reclaiming valuable desktop space.

--KC

For more information: Circle 530 - Designworks/USA or connect directly to their website via the Online Reader Service Program at http://www.OneRS.net/105df-530

Circle 531 - Haworth or connect directly to http://www.OneRS.net/105df-531