Designing is a very frivolous activity for those, like me, whom are relatively new to this wide world classified as industrial design.

The thing is, sometimes it is required for designers to be spontaneously creative and that (at least for me) is a very hard thing to do. Luring the creativity to come out from whatever hole it hides in can be surprisingly challenging at times, yet incredibly satisfying when achieved.

That is more less what happened in this project.

Incoming:

In order to be considered a successful deliverable, this project was stablished with some ground conditions that had to be met in the deadline.

     1- The project must be a toy or furniture designed for kids between 2 to 8 y/o.

     2- At least 80% of it's structure must be Pine Plywood.

     3- The main manufacturing process must be CNC Router Cut.

     4- It must be used at least half a Plywood board, a whole at most.

     5- The thickness of the board may be 1/2" or 5/8".

From what you are about to see, you may say that at first my ideas were all over the place, and well, they kinda were.

The project first ran through my mind as a drawing station/ tent. Then I wanted to make boats and submarines for the bath time. As I grew more desperate I considered making a marshmallow crossbow, but it all felt so unsatisfaying.

In my short experience, when a project feels that way usually you are moving in the wrong direction, so I went a couple steps back, and reconsidered doing a bookshelf.

And from there on, it all ran smoothly.

Using Rhinoceros as my modelling engine and inspired by the Googie Architecture, I began to digitally develope the project.

The main manufacturing process to create this object is cutting with CNC Router, but to achieve the final form secondary processes must be taken. To assemble the drawers the pieces must be sanded to the correct angle, then glued together, and the remaining sharp corner of this union must be sanded down to a round corner.

A scale cardboard prototype was assembled in order to validate certain angles of the unions and was also used as a scale reference for some changes in the dimensions.

ATOMIC GOOGIE uses basic half-lap unions among wood boards, but for some of the decorations it was needed the use of dog bones, this are small circular grooves at the corners of the  the assembly lines and they ensure an easy yet strong union that does not require extra mechanical unions such as glue or metal fittings.