e-Garden
An IoT connected gardening system for local community centers.
Tools & Methods
Figma, Arduino, SolidWorks.
Duration
4 months
My Role
Lead Designer, Team of 6
Project Overview
e-Garden is an automated gardening system with a special app to be able to buy and exchange fresh produce with a web app companion.
In an era of rising social isolation and economic stress, many people in the low-socioeconomic background are withdrawing from public life.
I designed a phygital gardening system that uses a simple, sensor-backed activity connected with a web-app to re-engage these groups with their local community.
The "WHY"
The core issue wasn’t just a lack of connection, but a lack of active participation in society. Many citizens are currently immobilized due to the energy crisis. Gardening is not just a leisure activity; it is a productive one where it can begin on a windowsill or in a small apartment.
The garden produce can serve as a “social currency” to facilitate interaction, through digital “swapping” in the web app or physical participation in Saturday markets for example.
Design Challenge
How might we design a connected gardening system that helps urban users grow community and care for plants with minimal knowledge and effort?
Design Process
Research and exploring various issues in Eindhoven.
Narrowed down to gardening as a way to build community and increase participation among minorities.
Developed ideas into concrete features for the e-Garden system.
Worked across disciplines to prototype the pot and app.
Presented and tested the concept with the municipality, who saw potential for it to not only increase greenery in the city but also scale into small business opportunities for users.
Final Deliverable
The final MVP successfully integrated an IoT hardware kit with a Flask-based web application.
The product was presented to the Eindhoven municipality with a scalable framework to boost local trade and community participation, even for the tenants from the Saturday Market stalls.
Reflection
Prioritizing clarity over feature. Because many users felt overwhelmed by plant care, so reducing complexity became a crucial factor in the design process
The challenge of designing for behavior change, not just functionality because people are already used to the manual way of gardening
Testing is important to do throughout to get early insights
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Side Projects
Some other projects that is also worth to show.