Press Release
A' Design Award in Audio and Sound Equipment Design Goes to Birdy Speaker by Leijing Zhou and Xin An
Leijing Zhou and Xin An recognized for audio and sound equipment design by the international grand jury of the 2022 - 2023 A' Design Award & Competition
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 20, 2023 /DesignNewswire/ A' Design Award & Competition has announced that Birdy Speaker by Leijing Zhou and Xin An, designed for Zhejiang University, has been granted the A' Design Award in the Audio and Sound Equipment Design category. The recognition forms part of the 2022 - 2023 A' Design Award & Competition and was reached through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who assessed anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
The A' Design Award Explained
The Iron A' Design Award is awarded to good designs that meet the rigorous professional and industrial standards set by the A' Design Awards. This recognition is reserved for works that demonstrate a solid understanding of design principles and show creativity within their execution. Recipients of the Iron A' Design Award are acknowledged for their practical innovations and contributions to their respective fields, providing solutions that improve quality of life and foster positive change. These designs are a testament to the skill and dedication of their creators, showcasing their ability to address real-world challenges through thoughtful design.
More About Birdy Speaker
Birdy is a speaker with a bird-shaped control stick that allows music playback to be managed by hand. The lower part is a cone-shaped speaker with two 5W drivers and a dual-channel class D amplifier. A joystick sensor at the top of the cone detects movement of the bird figure on both axes. Swinging the bird figure forward or backward adjusts the volume, while swinging it left or right selects the previous or next song. Birdy also works as a smart home assistant that responds to bird calls. The design is intended to create a natural and emotional connection between people and technology.
About Leijing Zhou and Xin An
She has studied in the UK, the Netherlands and Singapore for many years. Her research direction is human-computer interaction and intelligent design. She has won more than 10 Red dot design awards, IF design awards etc. and published nearly 10 international journals and papers. She has participated in organizing the world industrial design conference, the world ecological design conference and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization ecological design leading class as the core personnel.
Award Record
Leijing Zhou and Xin An is a winner of 2 A' Design Awards, including this recognition. All of the awards belong to the 2022 - 2023 edition of the A' Design Award & Competition.
About the A' Audio and Sound Equipment Design Award
The A' Audio Products Design Award is an international product design competition recognizing best audio equipment by leading designers and brands worldwide. The competition is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to audio product designers, sound equipment designers, industrial designers and product engineers from all countries. Entries typically include headphones, microphones, speakers, amplifiers, soundbars and turntables. Awarded audio products designs are published at https://dezigners.org/design-category/audio-products
About A' Design Award & Competition
A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade organized annually since 2008. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The A' Design Award has a philanthropic mission to advance society through good design by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Entries are peer reviewed and anonymously evaluated by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. The A' Design Prize granted to eligible laureates includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, the upload of a work and the preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. Further information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://dezigners.org/149441
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/149441
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!149441
- Laureate Profile: https://dezigners.org/d/112694
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- Birdy Speaker
- Function
- Speaker
- Category
- Audio and Sound Equipment Design
- Discipline
- Industrial Design
- Industry
- Electronics & Appliances and Entertainment
- Colors
- Dark Slate Gray, Light Gray, Gainsboro, Tan and Dark Gray
- Images
- 5
- Client
- Zhejiang University
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Leijing Zhou and Xin An
- Country
- China
- Recognition
- A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2022 - 2023
- Design ID
- #149441
Credits
- Team
- Leijing Zhou and Xin An
- Image Credits
- Xin An
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- Birdy provides a more engaging way to control music playback. With its bird-shaped game stick, users can interact with their music in a unique and interesting way, making the experience feel more natural and intuitive. Designed to emulate the experience of touching and interacting with a live creature, Birdy provides a refreshing departure from traditional, lifeless speakers.
- Inspiration
- The design of Birdy is inspired by the way bird breeders often stroke and interact with their pets. The bird is located at the top and the bottom is a conical speaker. It is designed to foster emotional connections between users and the device, creating a more natural and seamless user experience.
- Research
- People communicate emotionally with their pets and we have studied various interactions between people and their pets and found that we were inspired by the interaction between humans and bird pets, where on the one hand birds have a natural connection to music and on the other hand their physical interaction between human and birds can be extracted as a way to control the music.
- Challenge
- The biggest challenge of the design is how to give an emotional connection to a technological artifact. We were inspired by the interaction between humans and birds, where birds have a natural connection to music. This led us to design Birdy, a speaker that offers a more natural and intuitive way to interact with technology, bridging the gap between the digital and physical worlds.
- Realization and Technology
- The speaker features two 5W drivers with a dual-channel class D amplifier. On the top of the cone is a joystick sensor that detects the movement of the bird above it in both XY axes, thus controlling the music playback.
- Operation and Interaction
- Users can control their music playback by swinging the bird-shaped game stick at the top, similar to a joystick. Swinging the bird backward or forward adjusts the volume, while swinging it left or right skips to the previous or next song. Additionally, Birdy is also a smart home assistant that responds to different bird calls.
- Project Duration and Location
- The project started in March 2021 in Qingdao and finished in September 2022 in Ningbo.
- Specifications
- The full height of the product is 316mm. The bottom cone speaker is 250mm high and the maximum diameter is 142mm.
- Keywords
- Speaker, Emotional design, Bird, Bionics, Natural
