Wash away your worries!

NID student Karthikeyan Gopinathan has added what is considered a ‘boring chore’ to the list of interesting community activities – laundry! His entry at an international competition  emerged as the winning concept

One of the problems that has plagued Karthikeyan Gopinathan, currently a student at Ahmedabad’s National Institute of Design, was that of doing laundry, ever since he as being staying in hostels. And that problem led him to design the Laundromat 2.0, to simplify the problem in a community-based location like a college campus, to submit as an entry for an innovative home design competition organised by UK’s Loughborough University. Run by PhD student Jak Spencer from the Sustainable Design Research Group at Loughborough’s Design School, the aim of the competition was to propose a new, sustainable laundry process.

Karthikeyan, who competed with 17 other national and international entrants, feels that the simplicity and the transparency of his design is what clinched it for him. The Laundromat 2.0 aims to encourage a sustainable way of washing clothes in a large communal environment such as a university or large work campuses. This machine lets one do laundry alongside other social activities. “I say sustainable, because the transparent cover lets the user understand the process, and the usage of water. Also, the basket of clothes (the grill like design in the picture) belongs to the student, and it goes straight into the machine, leaving the student free to do what he or she wants,” says the final year production design student who holds an interest in sustainable design.

 Talking about sustainability, Karthikeyan says that there should not be special attention given to the thought of ‘sustainable’. “According to me sustainable is sensible. There is no need to make a big deal about it. It should be a part of each process. When one has an empathetic though towards the user and the environment, sustainable designs will automatically be created,” he says.

Coming back to the design that he submitted for the competition, Karthikeyan says that his concept will turn out to be cost effective since he has thought about connecting the motors of the machine which will reduce power consumption. His design joins three machines together, so it can be replicated for a large space in multiples of three. Having studied engineering at the undergraduate level, Karthikeyan has an idea of the feasibility of the machines. Besides, he adhered to the guidelines provided by the Sustainable Design Research Group at Loughborough University regarding input and output. He also integrated the information in an app, via which a student can book a slot and be informed of available slots, the end of the process and other such items.

As part of the prize, Karthikeyan won a Nexus tablet, but he was more thrilled at the opportunity to present his work to Spencer and the innovation team from Forum for the Future – a non-profit organisation that works towards developing a sustainable world, that supported the competition. “Jak Spencer as well as the Forum for the Future team offered a lot of critical feedback towards the design, which will enable me to fine tune it,” he says, hoping that he can take this design further.

All we can say is all the best!