This project concerned the design process of a product for a specific user. A case owner with a special condition was assigned to the group, in this case it was a visual impairment. An introductory interview was conducted, to get to know the case owner and to learn more about the challenges they face. 

The outcome of this first meeting was that the case owner had a great passion for running. The challenges they faced were running alone, reading a treadmill display and finding objects around the house. However, after the first round of ideation, the case owner had a change of heart and wanted the focus to be on finding objects around the house and in particular in their massage parlour. After another round of ideation, they had another change of heart and wanted to focus on finding spices within their spice cabinet. In normal conditions, they distinguish spices by smelling them. This is a time consuming method, however, and in case their smell is diminished this method does not work. 

Many design directions were explored during yet another ideation phase, this finally resulted in two concepts, Topp¡e and ¡Spice. Topp¡e being an audio recorder button, that would be put on top of spice bottles and when pressed it would replay the message saved on it, generally the name of the spice. An addition to this concept was to connect the buttons to a mobile app, where a specific spice could be searched for, and when pressed it would play the sound on the button, to more easily be able to find the spice bottle. Then there is ¡Spice, a spice rack with an audio feedback system. Spices are placed in specific containers, which are shallow but wide, making it easy to grab spices out of it with fingers or a spoon. These containers are placed in slots within the spice rack, after placing a spice in a particular spot for the first time it can be saved to the rack using a button and saying the spice and the current slot, using a grid position. The next time a spice needs to be found, the user can press the button and say the name of the spice, after which iSpice reacts with the saved location of the spice.

After comparing the concepts to the requirements and discussing them with the case owner, the choice was made to continue with iSpice, it was rated slightly higher based on the requirements and the case owner felt like it would work better within his usual workflow. 

Following this, a low- to mid-fidelity prototype was made out of cardboard, to have a co-design session with the case owner and see how they interact with it. This session led to a few interesting findings, mainly concerning the way the containers would be placed within the slots, the position of the button and electronics and extra dividers on the space at the top. 

After getting this feedback, the final prototype was made. First a SolidWorks model and then it was laser cut out of wood and painted with white acrylic paint. In conclusion, the current prototype fulfils the requirements, however, if more time was available a few changes could be made.