Gold Baby, Kids' and Children's Products Design · 2021
Werkelkueche Toy
- A' Design Award 2021 Gold Winner in Baby, Kids' and Children's Products Design
- Awarded April 15, 2021
- CLIENT: Christine Oehme
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 58,137
- Verification code D3C8F7DFA9 · Verify this award
About Werkelkueche Toy
The Werkelkueche is a gender-open activity workstation that enables children to immerse themselves in free play worlds. It combines the formal and aesthetic features of children's kitchens and workbenches. Therefore the Werkelkueche offer diverse possibilities to play. The curved plywood worktop can be used as a sink, workshop or ski slope. The side compartments can provide storage and hiding space or bake crispy rolls. With the help of the colorful and interchangeable tools, children can realize their ideas and imitate the world of adults in a playful way.
Christine Oehme's Werkelkueche Toy, recipient of the Golden A' Design Award in the Baby, Kids and Children's Products category, exemplifies a thoughtful approach to early childhood furniture design that honors both aesthetic sophistication and developmental purpose. The work emerges from contemporary Nordic design traditions that prioritize natural materials, clean geometric forms, and respect for the child as an active participant in their own learning journey. Constructed from sustainably sourced birch plywood with distinctive olive-green perforated panels, the piece demonstrates technical accomplishment in its joinery precision, material selection, and ergonomic scaling that positions work surfaces at optimal heights for standing toddlers. The designer seems to engage with Montessori educational philosophy through the provision of real tools and open-ended activity stations that invite creative exploration rather than prescribing specific play outcomes. The perforated panels function simultaneously as visual texture, ventilation, and interactive pegboard surfaces that accommodate various attachments and accessories, revealing an economy of means where each formal decision serves multiple purposes. The chromatic restraint of natural wood tones against muted green suggests an understanding of how color environments affect concentration and calm in young children, while the warm material palette integrates harmoniously into domestic interiors without the visual disruption often associated with children's products. This documentation image captures the essential achievement of the design: furniture that facilitates genuine engagement, social interaction, and the development of practical life skills within an aesthetically considered framework. One might contemplate how designs like this shape not only childhood experiences but also early aesthetic sensibilities and relationships with the material world.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- The ”Werkelkueche” is a gender-open activity workstation for children. It combines the formal and aesthetic features of children's kitchens and workbenches and thus opens up playful possibilities that are beyond gender stereotypes. The curved worktop can be a sink and a ski slope. The side compartments offer storage space or can bake crispy rolls. The interchangeable tools allow children to realize their ideas and imitate the adult world.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- 710mmx440mm780mm
- Tags
- children, kids, toy, gendersensitiv, kitchen, workbench, play, moulded wood, sheet steel
- Production Technology
- The worktop of the ”Werkelkueche” is made of thermally deformable birch plywood from UPM. This material allowed me to give the rigid wood a soft, deep groove. This material is in optical and haptic contrast to the powder-coated sheet steel on the front and rear walls.
- Design Challenge
- The challenge in the conceptual work was the fusion of existing toys and their design opposites. I wanted to make a design that was recognizable and at the same time completely new. From a technical point of view, the thermal deformation of the birch plywood was a particular challenge. After several weeks of experimentation, I had found the right bend angle and also a way to connect this countertop to the rest of the pieces.
- Project Duration
- The project started in June 2020 with extensive research with parents and social workers. I developed the Werkelkueche as part of my bachelor thesis at the Berlin University of the Arts. The project was completed in December 2020.
- Operation Flow
- The ”Werkelkueche” is an open-ended, intuitive play space for children. There the world of adults can be imitated in a playful way, conflicts can be negotiated and security gained: Who am I and how does it feel to slip into another role? These experiences are an essential part of the child’s self-identity.
- Research
- Expert interviews and surveys with parents, the influence of gender in children's worlds, five qualitative interviews with educators and leaders, survey with over 900 individual answers, gender plays a subordinate role in children themselves up to the age of three, but from the point of pregnancy a clear distinction is made between male and female through the social environment, clothing and objects, parents want more so-called gender-neutral things
- Inspiration
- The world of children is actually colorful, loud and diverse. But this children's world is often divided into gender stereotypical roles: the clothes are either pink or blue, in the toy department mystical fighting ninjas ”for boys” and cute dolls ”for girls” are sold. This suggests to even the youngest children what social images and expectations are placed on girls or boys.
- Image Credits
- Image #1: Manuel Meinhardt, Werkelkueche, 2020
Image #2: Manuel Meinhardt, Werkelkueche, 2020
Image #3: Manuel Meinhardt, Werkelkueche, 2020
Image #4: Manuel Meinhardt, Werkelkueche, 2020
Image #5: Manuel Meinhardt, Werkelkueche, 2020 - Patents
- Registered Design. No. 402020204285-0001. Christine Oehme. 2021
Colors of Werkelkueche Toy
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We specialize in creating innovative, research-based toys and children's products that challenge gender stereotypes. Our design approach combines extensive parent and educator insights with contemporary manufacturing methods to develop play experiences that support authentic child development.
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