The project work took place at the Kunsthochschule Berlin Weissensee with my colleague of 12 years Professor Hartmut Ginnow-Merkert. Students worked in interdisciplinary design teams with German and exchange students from other countries to develop a Philips sponsored design project.
The two week cultural part of the tour included visits to Fachhochschule Mainz, and Weimar University. Visits to Braun GmbH design studios and the Braun Museum and Archive, Darmstadt (the seat for a lot of German history and a source for design philosophy), the 300 hundred year old Meissen porcelain Factory and a variety of historical sites, churches, castles, museums, towns and villages.
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Above: The student group |
Above: Justin working on his concepts |
The differences between the former German west and the new east was highlighted by four day stays in Naumburg and Meissen and visits to Weimar, Dresden, Leipzig and Dessau.
Transport was mainly the DB or German Railways and included S and U Bahn, EC and ICE’s travelling often at 240 km/h. Students also got used to walking - a useful when combined with public transport. Accommodation was in hotels and the ‘Let-em-Sleep’ Berlin youth hostel.
Lotars Ginters
Faculty of Design
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Student Experiences
Andrew Wheatland, Product Design Engineering
My German experience was not just about collecting digital photos, but also how to frame them. During my time at KHB in Berlin, I worked with Zheng-Bin. As a team we worked on formulating a design Philips could use for a digital photo display. We also formed a friendship, despite our culture differences.
The class we worked with was very culturally diverse, so I was able to gain an understanding of many different approaches to industrial design as well as workload management.
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Top Left: Andrew Wheatland (left) and his partner Zheng-Bin (right) |
Other images: Andrew and Zheng-Bin's concept work |
Much of my time was spent on a cultural tour of Germany. Many culinary delights passed my taste buds; some tastes were expected but some were totally new. The amount of meat Germans consume is astounding! “Don’t forget, sometimes you just need a salad” is the single most useful piece of advice that was given to me before I left for my great adventure.
Drinking beer with 16 year olds and paying to use the bathroom weren’t the only cultural differences between Australia and Germany; they were just the most annoying ones. In Australia, people use public transport, but in Germany people believe in it. When a train says it departs at 11.30, arriving at 11.29 will do just fine. After all, “30 seconds is plenty of time to catch a train”.
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Darren King, Product Design Engineering
Germany has borne many innovations in the area of design and engineering and has been home to many inspirational designers. Since beginning Product Design Engineering at Swinburne, it has been my goal to expose myself to education abroad, particularly in Germany , a country noted above all other European countries for its contributions in the field of design and engineering. Germany provides a good practical balance between design, design culture and engineering, something very important to me when relating theory to practice. Two examples of this, both personal highlights of the trip, were our visits to Braun Design in Kronberg and the Porsche factory in Leipzig .
The study tour to Germany allowed me to view the “big picture” from design and engineering to professional work opportunities from an overseas perspective. Additionally, the study tour gave me a chance to learn first hand about innovative and sustainable design methodologies in a country which is considered to be progressive in the field of sustainable design. A feature of this hands-on learning was the group project work. The project was commissioned by Philips and involved re-designing a digital picture display for the electronics market. The project was undertaken by teams made up of students from Swinburne and those from Kunsthochschule Berlin (KHB). Working cooperatively, the teams combined experiences from across the globe to come up with designs which were as unique as they were innovative.
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Linda Tran, Product Design Engineering
To measure the magnitude of knowledge and experiences gained from our journey through Germany is near impossible; we saw and encountered just so much!
Language barriers were always minor – nothing hand signals, broken German and pointing couldn’t overcome. Museums and design exhibitions filled our schedule, my favourite being the Museum of Modern Art having both awesome architecture and unique displays. We discovered the marvels of porcelain in Meissen , played tourist in historic Darmstadt , and had exhausting overexposure to the Bauhaus. Other highlights included Euromold, luxurious ICE trains and the little red men at Porsche.
Our project for Philips was to design a digital picture frame. Based purely on aesthetics, no consideration was given to manufacturing techniques, design feasibility or sustainability - a notable difference to our applied design methodologies.
At times the substantial meat consumption was of concern but it’s all a part of the cultural sampling… schweinshaxen (massive crispy pork leg), doner kebap and bratwurst (meaty sausage goodness) – there were even metre long bratwursts! Also experienced was beer, readily available in vending machines at uni and in every milkbar.
They say that nothing ventured is nothing gained… going to Germany , I gained friendships and experiences that will be with me for many years to come.
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