Interview with artel design

artel design was founded by Kristine Wassung and Peter Tippl. The style of “informative minimalism” is the philosophy and basis of their design work. artel design created a sewing and embroidery machine for Pfaff that sets new standards with its minimalist and innovative design, and through its use of new functions and technologies. The design experts of this year’s red dot jury declared the “Pfaff creative vision” as one of the best products
in the competition and awarded it the “red dot: best of the best”.

The heart of the “creative vision” is its high-definition touch screen. What possibilities does it offer the user?
artel design: Apart from displaying simple sewing processes, the large high-definition touch screen offers users realistic 3D representations of embroidery in its true colours, supplemented by an ergonomically designed graphic interface – simple, clear, well-structured and easy to understand. Due to outstanding colour differentiation and the high quality of resolution it can display both whole representations of larger motifs and detailed macro zooms of single stitches. Users can therefore design and visualise their ideas down to the smallest detail. The LCD touch screen is the basis for what the brand name promises, namely to realistically render the creative vision of the user. The development of the user interface followed the basic principle of giving all the support necessary in the creative process in a simple and logical manner, but also of offering the necessary creative leeway to present the desired results at the best quality.

How did you overcome the challenge of combining innovative technologies and new functions with user-friendliness?
artel design: Innovative technologies and functions are partly born out of the idea to optimise user-friendliness. It is these factors and requirements that interact with one another; and the synergetic effect resulting from this facilitates the development of a product that is of the latest technological standard, meets the highest ergonomic demands of users, and also expresses this through its very design. This was also the case with the “creative vision”. The requirements for user-friendliness called for the use of innovative technologies that offer the user a myriad of additional features that have never been seen in such perfection before, ranging from the ergonomic work area and its illumination to the touch screen with its ergonomic user interface. Users had to be able to realise ideas instantly, intuitively and straight away, without having to study the user manual first. Furthermore, attention went into ensuring that basic sewing functions can be accessed directly and easily. This has been achieved by integrating a horizontal keyboard that is separate from the touch screen and place in direct view of the user.

What factors play a particularly important role for you when designing a new product?
artel design: There are three key factors in our design process. These are the idea of the product, the users of the product and the manufacturer of the product. Our aim is to develop forward-looking and outstanding ideas that open up new possibilities and added value for users and offer manufacturers a unique market profile and the highest product quality in global competition.