Learn, Make, Learn
Learn, Make, Learn is two product geeks sharing qualitative & quantitative perspectives to help you make, better. Hosted by Ernest Kim and Joachim Groeger.
Learn, Make, Learn
Can Restomod Culture Go Mainstream?
This week, we talk restomods. It’s a concept born of the automotive world—extending the life of a classic car by modernizing it—but we discuss the potential to apply this idea to categories beyond cars. With sustainability now a must-have in product creation, we believe the restomod concept is ripe for mainstream adoption.
FOLLOW-UPS – 01:24
Behind Apple’s Doomed Car Project
RIP Apple Car. This Is Why It Died.
CAN RESTOMOD CULTURE GO MAINSTREAM? – 08:28
Restomod Culture is Just Getting Started
Charge Cars
Fineeleven
Singer Vehicle Design
Electrogenic Mini Conversion Kit
Totem Automobili
How I Designed the MINI COOPER
RESTOMODS—BEYOND AUTOMOTIVE – 21:39
Desire Path
Twitter features invented by its users
EOE Works
Flop Rock
Pixar Headquarters
APPLICATIONS FOR MAKERS – 35:28
A proven strategy to keep old tractors safely running
Are In-House Watch Movements Overrated?
Vibram: Repair If You Care
Bedrock Re-Soul Program
ThredUp Resale Report
Sashiko
Kintsugi
Recycling Is Beyond Fixing
Rolex’s CPO Program
Dieter Rams: 10 Principles of Good Design
WEEKLY RECS – 57:41
Rhinoshield CrashGuard
Peak Design Mobile Slim Wallet
Brudertoys
CLOSING & PREVIEW – 01:06:26
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Rant, rave or otherwise via email at LearnMakeLearn@gmail.com or on Threads @LearnMakeLearnShow.
CREDITS
Theme: Vendla / Today Is a Good Day / courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com
Drum hit: PREL / Musical Element 85 / courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com
Hello and welcome to Learn Make Learn where we share qualitative and quantitative perspectives on products to help you make better. My name is Ernest Kim, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host, Joachim Groeger. Hey Joachim, how's it going?
Joachim:Pretty good. It snowed. I'm still like, what's going on? Um, it's cold up here in Seattle. I mean, you know, not as cold as other places, obviously. But when you're out and about and all of a sudden it starts snowing, it's, it's kind of unusual. So, yeah, we're just trying to keep warm over here. How about you guys?
Ernest:No, it's the same. It actually snowed, these past couple of days at our house as well, is pretty unusual for this time of year. We have it easier than a lot of other places, but I am, I agree, really ready for this, cold to go away. Ready. pretty, it just feels like it's lasted a bit longer this year.
Joachim:It is March already, and it's still not sure about, nature is not ready for spring yet, so yeah.
Ernest:All right. Well, this is episode 10 and today topic is can restomod culture go mainstream? We'll dive into this in greater detail in just a minute, including an explanation of what a restomod is for anyone who isn't familiar with the concept. But let's start with a follow up to our previous episode, CarPlay or the Highway. And here, I just wanted to note that, I think just a couple of days after we recorded broke that Apple had canceled their internal car project. It was known as, project Titan. and we thought this was worth sharing, um,, just because it has potential implications to that topic of, uh,, in car infotainment systems. And we'll share a link to, there was a lot of reporting around this. I'll share a link in the show notes to, an article from the New York Times because it, it included some details that I didn't see included in a lot of the other coverage. Uh,, this was a piece titled Behind Apple's Doomed Car Project, false Starts and Wrong Turns. For the benefit of any of anyone who hasn't had a chance to, you know, read up on this. I'll read some snippets from the article and then, we can dive into this a little bit as well. So the article noted that, for the last decade, many Apple employees working on the company's secretive car project internally, code named Titan a less flattering name for it, the Titanic disaster they knew the project was likely to fail. And by the time of its death, which was, uh,, Tuesday, February 27th, when executives announced internally that the project was being killed and that many members of the team were being reassigned to work on artificial intelligence, apple had burned more than$10 billion on the project according to this reporting. the story goes on. At the start of this year, Apple's leadership decided that it was a better use of the company's time to work on generative AI rather than the car. the company told employees. In that internal meeting, company said some members of Project Titan would be reassigned to work on artificial intelligence. interviews on Wednesday with the New York Times, people who worked on the project praised the decision to shutter it, saying The technology behind generative AI could be invaluable to the future of the company's all important iPhone business. So that was the Times article and it, I thought it was interesting because this positive sentiment was echoed by Kay Venkatesh Prasad, the Vice President, or, I'm sorry, senior Vice President and Chief Innovation Officer at the Center for Automotive Research. He was quoted in a wired article about this whole going on of Apple ending and its EV program. So that article in Wired, and we'll provide a link to that one as well. That article ended with Prasad saying clearly for Apple, this is not the end. This is just the beginning of the game. is a very exciting reset in so many ways. Unquote. And the suggestion of the piece was that Apple, you know, with its car program now shelved, would focus much more of its efforts on CarPlay, which we discussed in last week's episode. And with Apple no longer developing their own car and no longer being a competitor, perhaps other automakers also be more open to partnering with Apple on their in-car systems. So, definitely an interesting development that has relevance to, the topic that we talked about last week. But I was just curious if you had any thoughts on this, Joachim, if you had been tracking this at all.
Joachim:I mean it had always been humming in the background that Apple was working on this. and I treated it the same way I was, I heard when, when I heard that Sony was working on an electric car as well, I said, that sounds cool maybe for the shareholders, but, what does the reality of this actually look like and how does this, how does this make sense? So I treated it as a, a curiosity similar to when Uber would say they're gonna make flying cars or something like that. It, it just didn't seem like a meaningful thing, but given that they've spent$10 billion, clearly they thought they were, this was a serious thing to do. The piece that I find interesting is that they were treating this very physical thing. That has to navigate the physical world for real and interacts with the physical world in a very real and dangerous way that they were treating it like a software product. You know, there's, they can grab people from the team and just move them over to generative ai. I'm not saying that software engineering is not a generic skill and transferable, right. It totally is. But there's something about the, a question of what was the philosophy going into this project that they were bringing? And, and last episode I was talking about the idea that electric cars are treated as batteries with software or batteries with wheels and software that doesn't feel right. And I don't think it's, it's a good way to think about what an electric car is. I think it's completely naive. I found that tidbit quite interesting, that they were able to just grab those resources and just point them in a new direction I don't know if it's a real loss to be honest.
Ernest:right.
Joachim:I don't know. Cars are very big and very physical, and they do give you an emotional response. This sounds very wishy-washy, but it's true. They're, they're very physical products that make you feel things. There is a reason why Formula One is such a huge sport, and people assume that bringing apple's design language to bear on a car would be something very desirable. And I feel like that what would happen is that the car would just look like a really fancy steam iron or something. I see lucid driving around, which are incredibly expensive cars and they're very, very impressively engineered. But to me they just look like a really well-designed coffee machine. They,, they don't have the same evocative power of cars of the past. Maybe I'm just showing my age, but there's a piece of me that just thinks something that's smooth and sleek and cuts through the air is very cool for aerodynamics. But, you know, formula One cars look kind of cool and they're also very aerodynamically efficient and so are Le Mans cars and so on. So, I don't know. Part of me is wondering, would that have been a match made in heaven having smooth surfaces on a vehicle? I don't know. Maybe it needs a little bit more humanity in it.
Ernest:Yeah, I agree. And I, I share your sentiment as well in that. The hope I have in this news is that it marks the end of this chapter, just as you said, this chapter where people were thinking of cars as just batteries on wheels with software and this sort of gold rush that was predicated on the assumption that self-driving was right around the corner and full autonomy was right, right around the corner. it, I, It feels like people are finally coming to grips with that not being the case and-recognizing that, there are aspects to this that are really complicated and than just the software. So I, my hope is that. Because of this recognition, we'll get to people in the car space, you know, doing what they do best people in the software, doing what they do best. And, we'll get, a richer evolution of the automobile than we, what we've been seeing in the past few years, which is exactly as you've said, just these sort of of soap. Shaped blobs rolling around that all just kind of look the same. Um, well, definitely interesting times in the automotive space and that actually does bring us to our main topic for today, which is can restomod culture go mainstream? And that's because restomods also have the roots in the car world. As we'll discuss in just a minute, we think that the. may have a potential to influence products beyond the automotive sector as well. Alright, so what is a restomod? I can't say I'm an expert on the topic. So I'm gonna lean on the expertise of someone who is a person named Tolu Akinshete. I hope I'm pronouncing his name correctly. he's a writer at supercars.net and in a piece titled restomod Culture is just getting started and finally going mainstream. He explains that. Quote, understand restomods, you need to understand that the fifties automotive scene spawn two primary forms of car enthusiasts. On the one hand, you had the collectors mainly after cars that could be shown off at car shows the so-called Garage Queens. people cared less about performance attributes as the vehicles did not get driven around much. So you could kind of call these folks the restorers. The second group were the hot rods adrenaline junkies who craved more from their cars in the form of engine power, improved brakes and other components that significantly elevated the driving experience. You could call, you could call them the modders. It didn't take long for a third group to emerge. Those interested in both the car styling and performance, their cars not only got to retain their original designs, but also received the latest brakes, engines and other mechanical parts for better performance and safety, unquote. So as Akinshete explains, the key point here is that a restomod retains the timeless design elements of the original classic car on which it's based around the modern framework that boasts improvements to safety, handling and comfort. So the mod in restomod speaks not only to modifications, but also to modernization. As Akinshete notes, restomod retain the visual impact missing from Many of today's automobiles, just to your point, while still allowing owners to drive a classic that's practical and reliable. Now, Akinshete does acknowledge that, quote, there are those within the car community that kick against this idea who believe that classic cars should be left in their original state, unquote. So, before we get into our broader conversation about restomods, I was just curious, Joachim, what camp do you fall into here? Are you a restoration purist, who believes classic cars should be preserved in their original state? Or are you a fan of restomods?
Joachim:If you'd asked the younger version of me, I probably would've been a purist and said, this is the way it was meant to be and it should stay that way. And as I got older. I'm starting to appreciate patina and the natural aging of these products. I think a critical moment for me was actually in Seattle. I was walking past an old 911T. And it was an absolutely atrocious shape. It's white, the door is red, it was replaced, the wheels don't match. And he drove it in that state and loved it in that state. And it's still in that state and it is uniquely beautiful to me. Now, there's something about it. It shows. That it has gone through things, it has experienced things. you get very romantic. It sounds really silly, doesn't it, to talk so romantically about a hunk of metal. But, there is something about it that, that it has just, it's seen stuff, you know? So that opened up my eyes to the possibility that something does not need to be in its pristine state to still be beautiful. Things can change and things should be allowed to change. And sometimes you can help that change along by actually stepping in and modifying them. So I feel a lot more motivated about restomods being the way to go for all cars, because you want them to be practical but still. Live, live longer, you know? And if this extends the life of these cars and allows people to see them on the road and be experienced on the road, albeit in slightly modified form, I think it's valuable. It doesn't have to be treated with such conservative esteem. it can be allowed to evolve. I think conservatism and nostalgia are very dangerous things to hold onto politically as well. I think always looking to the past to find inspiration for today is a dead end and innovation and design, and also the way we design our societies. So I, I have to be very clear, I have a strong bias against nostalgia. I like the idea that the car has aged. It is it, it's showing that it has been through things. It is not a brand new car. I think that patina and aging and restoration and modification should go hand in hand. I have a couple of companies that I like that are doing a really good job. And full disclosure, I am naming European companies in this. I think that's really important in this discussion because Europe still has very stringent rules around what cars are allowed to be on the road. Now, classic cars are a little bit of an exception to that, but I think they still do have to pass certain tests that in the states are not necessary. So in America, you can really modify your car, and it wouldn't be a problem In Germany, for example, a country that I know, or England, a country that I know very well, your car has to go through an annual car inspection for safety reasons and if you modify it, you put lights in spots where they shouldn't be. For example, if you try to put LEDs to light up a logo, I mean you will fail your vehicle inspection. So I believe with that high bar, having people being able to run a business successfully to restore and modify cars is a, that's, that shows you the total viability of this way of doing business. I think it's a really big deal. So there are two companies that I wanted to highlight. I think charge cars is one of them.'cause they're totally, I mean, there's no respect for the vehicle. They're turning classic cars, classic muscle cars into electric cars. And one of their big cars was a, sixties Mustang that they stripped down to bare metal and essentially nothing is left of that car other than its exterior and it's totally electrified. So a fantastic piece of work and allows this car to live a, a totally different life separately from where it was. So I find that very inspiring. And then a small German company called Fine 11 is one of my favorite partial restorers fine. 11 being a little play on nine 11. They also do pure restorations, but they also have their signature line, which is where they do restorations and modifications. And that's where you can say, I'd like to have ABS, I would like to have power steering, and they're able to get that car on the road and pass whatever vehicle inspection is necessary in Germany. I assume it's so stringent because Germans, I'm allowed to say this as half German. I understand the, the need to certify and test and all of those things. I get it. They like their paperwork, so I can imagine that they're doing this to a high standard. I, I raised that one as a great example of it is possible to run a business that can adhere to safety standards and get old cars running on the road so fine. 11 is my other submission for that. You put me on the spot on this. I'm gonna put you on the spot. Where do you fall on this? We, we, we set this topic up, but we didn't discuss with each other, where are we on the spectrum on this? So now I want to know where you are.
Ernest:Right. No, I first, I just love that sentiment you shared around your bias against nostalgia. I think fantastic. should make that a t-shirt, I had a, a similar journey here actually in that when I was younger, I would say that I was much more on the restoration side of things of saying we should keep these things pristine. but now I am very much in the restomod camp. And in my case, I think it's more just a, function of, as I've gotten older, I've become less dogmatic. and, and maybe it's partly I am in, get to a position where maybe I might actually, purchase one of these things, the practical considerations start to become more important than just whether it's Absolutely exactly, it was when it came off the line. so yeah, I'm definitely in the, the restomod camp and I'm also a big fan of the EV based restomods. the funny thing though is that I was introduced to the concept through, Porsche as well, specifically through Singer Vehicle Design. uh, well-known customizer, I think they're down in California, make beautiful, a singer reimagined kind of rethought versions of the nine 11. I, I actually know two people who have owned singer, nine elevens, funnily enough, they both said they were. They really, um,, didn't like them very much.
Joachim:Oh wow.
Ernest:constantly having to go back to the shop. So, it wasn't a great experience for them, but they, they look incredible. another one. That I've seen recently was, something created by a team a company outside out of the uk, where they offer a drop in ev conversion kit for the classic mini. And it's a company, oh gosh, I'm trying to remember the name of this company, but we'll certainly include a link to them in the show notes, but they have a history of making ev conversions for Land Rovers. so, they have experience in this and they've developed this, what they call a cassette that's, uh, the motor as well as the battery combined. And, and it just sits right into where the engine would sit in the classic mini, and it gives you a car that I think does about 80 miles on a charge, which, you know, for a city car is, is great.
Joachim:Yeah.
Ernest:so, man, what a hoot that would be to have a, an original or classic mini, um, with a electric motor in it. as I understand it, it's about, 15,000 pounds in, money or. I think translates now to about 19, 19,000 US dollars. but you do have to supply the car yourself and, whether you do the work or someone else does it, you have to the wrenching yourself as well. So, the accessible side of things. But still, when you factor in the need to supply the car, not necessarily the cheapest. The thing that I, if money were no object, what I absolutely love is something, created by this I think they're an Italian company called Totem Automobile, and they do a restomod of the, classic Alfa Romeo, Giulia, into a completely modernized, 500 plus horsepower ev and oh, it just looks so amazing. And, and, and in my case it's not. It's less about. Nostalgia in that, that wasn't a car I, you know, lusted after as a kid, but it's more to your earlier point of today, just look so blah, in so many cases. and, that is something that just captures emotion in physical form, like so few cars today do, I'm guessing there's many reasons for that. There's, you know, aerodynamic reasons, probably safety reasons as well. and it may be that these restomods get around some of those, at least the safety.
Joachim:Yeah, I assume
Ernest:Yeah. But oh my goodness, I think they capture something there that I would love to see, more car makers try to tap into, moving forward. And we'll provide links to all this stuff there too. Unfortunately, that one, Al Romeo GT Electric is I think around$500,000 us. So definitely not something I'll be anytime soon.
Joachim:I saw that one as well. There's something about that Giulia GT shape is just something very special about it. I would love to see car designers bring some of that to now you mentioned the mini, I think the mini is a great example of a car that was brought to the present day, quite skillfully by Frank Stevens, who has a great YouTube channel, which I, we should add the links. And he worked at BMW. He's responsible for the X5, and the mini. And he describes the thought process that went into the mini that I find is fascinating. He, he wanted it to have a little bulldog shape the face, which I love. I, I love these little, the personality of the car coming through like that. So that car is a little bit, you could argue it is nostalgic, but it is a. It is a re-imagining'cause when you put the two side by side, it really does not feel the same. We've been talking about Porsches nine elevens continue to be some version of a resto mod to a certain extent, right? They're always adapting to the new safety, the safety bars that are being set. But they are still an echo of the old cars over and over again. Yeah, that's very interesting.
Ernest:Well, so we're both fans of restomods when it comes to cars, but like we mentioned earlier, now we wanna dig into, you know, could this go beyond the automotive space? Joachim, I was just curious to hear what you think, like, do you see ways that this concept of restomods could be applied more broadly?
Joachim:Yeah. When I was thinking about restomods in general, my mind went to two places. One very, very. Broad philosophical space that I wanted to start off with, but then slightly unrelated, some very specific examples of where I've seen people take that philosophy and extend the life of a product. But the first couple of high level philosophical ideas that I had in mind relate to, desire paths. If you're in a park, you will notice that there is a path that someone has laid out and designed. but then you'll always notice somewhere in the grass, a a track where someone has just walked over and over again and there's just a dirt path that has formed because that's where people want to go, and that's the path that they want to take. And hence it's a desire path. It's a reflection of what the crowd. Thinks the path should be and nature is compliant enough and people can take that path. So what's interesting about the desire path is it's telling the designers, well done guys. You've put the park here, everyone wants to be here clearly. But some ideas here aren't quite right. And we have a way as human beings by trampling on these soft areas, we can say, actually the path should be over here. So there, there are two responses. One is cover that up again and force people back on the path that you intended for them. And the other one is to embrace that path and actually to make that an, an extension of the existing path So the reason I mentioned Desire paths is you could rotate the idea of a restomod you could say actually. A restomod is acknowledging that there is beauty in this original design, but it doesn't quite do it for me. There are some things I need to change either because time has moved on, safety has moved on, and our needs have moved on. And in most physical products, there's no way to plow a desire path. It's very difficult. Funnily enough, you can actually see it in technology. When you look at the early days of Twitter, if anyone remembers those days, you know, 16 years ago. The idea was just a microblogging platform, and then people developed this set of rules that you could follow to make it usable. The hashtag was one of them that emerged from the community saying, well, we need a way to identify topics here, so I'll put a hashtag on it. And then Twitter said, there's a desire path. Let's, let's integrate that into the system. So desire, paths and resting, I feel are kind of the same idea that someone is saying, this is a great thing, but here are the modifications I'd like to add to make this a workable thing. And then again, there are two responses. Ignore it. Or build it into your product itself. So take on the feedback from the community and then actually learn from the modern community what you want. So that's kind of my first philosophical statement, to get to something very concrete where I've seen resting happen in physical things. there are two specific examples that I kind of like. One is a very direct resto modeling thing, which is a company called EOE Works. And this was a college student trying to make ends meet and he was buying broken iPods on eBay for a couple of dollars. And opened them up. Thankfully you could still do that. And he was able to replace the hard drives with solid state drives and, replace some of the screens as well so they're better screens and clean them up and, and get them working in, in, in good working order. People are buying these things, and they're not obscenely priced, but they're also expensive given the fact that you already have a device that handles all this stuff. But for a lot of people having a focused product that is just a single function, is very, very valuable. So I found that a really, really interesting example. It's a pretty modernish technology that is locked down by Apple for so many years, and somehow someone with some dedication was able to pry it open, literally physically update things. And it's somewhat nostalgic, but also the interesting thing is the nostalgia here is fulfilling this. Need for focus. Someone wants to just enjoy music and they don't wanna be distracted by notifications and things like that. And they want to have a dedicated music playing device that they can carry with them, and that will work when they go in the subway and has no connectivity and so on. So that was one that I wanted to highlight. Then the other thing that I just wanted to say briefly is, this, these underground movements that I really appreciate and one of them is the floppy disc music scene that I just learned about a couple of days ago. there are people that are recording music that fits on, well, an old floppy disc that can hold what, like a, a 1.4 megabytes of information. So they put an MP three on there and most songs can only be a minute long. And I really love that that's an old technology being completely. Brought into our modern age, there's no need for it to exist. There's no need to do this yet. It is so compelling. There's something physical and real that people, wanna feel connected to, I think. It's the. Eighties, nineties version of vinyl I guess. Right? So, so I put those out there, Ernest, and see where the discussion goes. So the desire pass idea, these two things that I think quite interesting, as examples of where you can see this resto mod culture taking hold. and I've not seen someone look at that culture and try and pull it back into the product. I think that's where the opportunity is, how that happens. Maybe we'll figure it out in this conversation. I dunno.
Ernest:Those are both great. I, um, I love that desire path concept that, you know, someone who worked in user experience design that picture, would get shared around all the time. and I think it's a really powerful example. What I always struggle with is, a designer, what are the instances where you want to go against that? I think it'd be easy to say, oh yeah, universally should always Allow for that desire, path But one example was, when were designing the facility for Pixar, they were, building a new headquarters. They intentionally designed it to maximize physical interaction, which meant that it wasn't as efficient as it could have been. So you imagine if, if the interior of the building had a lot of grass on it, you would've seen a lot of these desire paths expressed because the built in ways to get around weren't, the most efficient, but were designed with the intention of, provoking these kind of physical collisions between people so that would get this sharing of ideas., and so that sort of goes against that idea of your natural desire path because you have this greater end that you're trying to enable. And something that I often struggle with when I was working in experience design. When are those instances where you want to deviate from that kind of natural desire path that's being expressed? but I was curious if you had any thoughts on that, if you've encountered that, and if there's instances where you think you'd want to go against that natural desire path.
Joachim:The concern is that you might be going towards the lowest common denominator, right? That there is some sort of inherent laziness that is being expressed here and in the park setting, that's exactly it. It's usually a shortcut to something that you want. if a desire path shows you something that you didn't realize your product was capable of doing, that is something that you need to take on board. I think somewhere in the hardware world there has to be some version of what a desire path looks like. so for example, I would like to have the case on my phone be off because I would like the case to get nicked and bashed around a bit to get some patina on it. But I'm so worried that I'm gonna smash the screen at the same time and I'm going to damage the camera Does that mean I should have a robust phone that I don't need a case for that ages well, it's not clear to me. If some desire path as a, a widening of interactivity, a widening of communication pathways. that's probably something to take on board. If it's just lowest common denominator and you're trying to find a shortcut to get to something that comes into the camp of friction, and I agree with you, an sometimes you do need to introduce friction to get something more powerful out of that interaction. Smooth sailing for everything doesn't lead to interesting outcomes all the time. And so maybe a desire path that is avoiding friction is one to be treated with some suspicion, a desire path that opens up higher fidelity, interactivity, more communication. Or connection for the person with a product, maybe that's something to hold onto. know. How do, how do those sit with you, Ernest? This, this is very freewheeling right now, but is there something in that that you can latch onto or, or
Ernest:no, absolutely because it feels, like if it's opening up additional opportunity that I think is naturally gonna be exciting. if you see a desire path that is more about creating opportunity space that seems like something that you can feel pretty confident is gonna be promising versus something that's actually more about reducing choice just purely about reducing friction, maybe look a little bit more closely at that. I think that makes a lot of sense. just trying to think how would that apply to that, classic example of the path in the park,'cause that is purely that reducing friction example. It's kind of the intent that you were talking about as well, the underlying intent. Why was the path designed that way in the first place? Was it just because, you know, just because we like grids and so someone designed the grid, and if that's the case, then I feel like, hey, yeah, we should allow people to move the way they want to. But if there is some larger purpose as in that Pixar example, then you know, I think you can start to weigh the costs and benefits to that and decide if it's worth it for you in, in the case of whatever it is you're trying to design.
Joachim:Actually interesting now that you mentioned that Pixar example, again, the building itself is not to blame and the architect's not to blame. The desire path is maybe telling you something that has nothing to do with the design of the building. It's telling you something about the design of the organization potentially. Because if the organization is so into the serendipitous moments, then there should be time to walk. Through the building inefficiently and everyone is inefficiently navigating the space and they're bumping into each other and projects get started. The fact, that's not happening, the desire path is I need to get to there now that is telling you something. that the intent of what the architects were trying to execute on is not the intent of the organization. So that's also interesting, right? The desire path could be telling you something that's totally, tangential to your task, so yeah, that's, it's a tricky one, a desire path is interesting because it isn't just a cheap opinion, it is actually an action that you're taking for yourself. So it, does need to be a signal that you take seriously. You know, as an economist, I'm always very wary of looking at surveys because cheap talk is everywhere. You can just say whatever you wanna say, the proof is in the behavior. And so I would take very seriously a behavioral signal you can't make the inference that you wanted to make off it. It might be uncomfortable, but potentially still valuable as as a signal.
Ernest:You know what's interesting too is I think this touches on some of the other topics we've talked about recently in that it's an example of encoding something in the physical environment so that it really becomes a requirement. You know, I think maybe there was a recognition that, if we wanted this outcome we have to encode it in the physical space or else I. You know, we can put all kinds of guidelines in place around, you know, set meetings to start five minutes after the hour, or, you know, end five minutes blah, blah, blah. And all those things are so easy to change, you know, as leadership changes, as cultures change. But if you were to encoded into the environment, you can't change that. And you've created this, attribute that's at going to just by default be at the core of your culture because of the space, the physical constraints you've created, which is, I think, you know, something you talked about earlier too is one of the great things about physical embodiments is that they do have this sort of forcing function. You know, they're, they're there. they have a rigidity, that I think can be really powerful. and it's something that I think people don't think about. You know, I think think less about now than we used to because we've all become so enamored of digital things. But, there is a to that, to that physicality and of, you know, literally setting something in stone, that can impact a whole company's culture, in a way that's more lasting than, you know, whatever process of the week. We can keep talking about this, but I thought maybe could segue into, know, we've given some more abstract examples, I guess, you know, like architecture and, the kind of desire path example. Do you see examples? You talked a little bit about this, about the kind of the person, repurposing old iPods, but do you see examples where this restomod concept could be brought to life for folks who are, say, you know, making products, on a day-to-day basis?
Joachim:Funnily enough, it does go back to what we were touching on last time, this notion of right to repair modular product design, resilient product design I feel like these are very tightly connected ideas. The thing to keep in mind, and the only reason I think Resto Moding really has any value is the fact that it can extend the life of a product It comes back to that iPod example. That iPod is a high quality, high resolution screen. Oh, oh, by the way, I didn't mention they replaced the batteries as well. So the batteries are better. The hard drives are solid state, so they don't scratch and they don't break, and the screens are better and it just works without any, any wifi. So they're resilient from the ground up. And I think as a product designer, I really wish we had more of that type of thinking where people ask the simple question, what happens when the cloud goes down on this thing that can't connect? Or what if we go out of business? But we would still like to have our product that we've invested time and effort and expensive resources into can exist without us as an entity still existing. What if we used our technology to actually create products that were intelligent, so for example, many voice control home pods from big tech companies are essentially. They are small computers that run software. They're a full computer in there, but they're hobbled because the way they're architected is so that they are only there to know one thing, which is either the wake up call to them, hey, Siri, or any other one that's out there, and then after that it just pings a server in the cloud. And the reason why that's important is because when that cloud goes down or your wifi goes down, that device has absolutely no function anymore. So I think about that in this conversation of ODing because if the device doesn't rely on wifi and the cloud, then it's. A device that sits locally with you, and that means it's potentially modifiable by you and fixable by you. You know, I think it's quite critical that we start thinking about the fact that our technology is incredibly powerful, but we've hobbled it because we keep relying on these cloud solutions What about you, Anis?
Ernest:I think it's definitely very, relevant what you're saying. I mean, I've had a experience recently where, I have a lot of, apple Home Kit devices, in my house and, you know, kind of, a few like smart home type things set up and so many interdependencies. That it can, when it works, it can be magical, but when it doesn't, it can be just completely infuriating because there's no way to effectively troubleshoot what's happening. like one example is the lights in my garage we're not turning on the motion sensor in the garage was, activated, and after like hours of troubleshooting, I finally figured out, I don't even remember how I figured this out, but that I had to reboot., one of the home pods in my bedroom because that was you serving as the home kit hub for the house. You know, and there's nowhere where it tells you that. There's no way that, there are these, cascade of dependencies. And so it can create this incredibly frustrating situation and, can potentially lead you to replace things when they don't even need to be replaced because you, you know, something appears that it's not working, but it's actually just because this dependency that's been created. so I absolutely share that sentiment that it would, I think, be very helpful for designers to think about these dependencies that they're creating. and how challenging it could make it to enjoy the products. kind of bringing it into the physical world. you've mentioned this, I think in the last episode too, this class of products that we really like being watches. I think one of the wonderful things about watches is that designed to last, you know, that's a big part of their appeal is that If you just apply a modicum of of maintenance to them, they'll last for decades, for generations, I think there's also, this is getting a little bit watch geeky, but in the watch world there's this notion of in-house or manufacture movements and it's kind of seen as a little bit of a point of pride that you as a manufacturer make your own movements in house. There's also a class of kind of off the shelf movements made by, historically company called ETA would've been one, although now they're not really making their movements available. But ETA or, Selita, they're these companies that make movements that are available to third parties. And I think that's a wonderful concept in the watch world, that you have a lot of watches out there that, that are based on these off the shelf movements. and so it makes it very easy to repair these watches even decades later. You know the point you made that what if the company goes outta business? Even if that, individual watchmaker goes out of business, if it has an ETA movement in it, it's gonna be so easy to get that repaired, decades from now. So I think there's a beauty in that. and it kind of gets to the point we started with, when we talked about CarPlay that it allows you as the watchmaker to focus on different things. You don't have to expend huge amounts of energy on making your own movement and then maintaining that as well over time can just take this great movement that already works, and then build all those other things around it that are gonna really matter to your customer. So I think the watch world is a really nice example of kind of a category of products that has this resiliency built into it and is being fundamentally built around this idea of longevity.
Joachim:I was gonna say that the watch example is even more useful to this conversation because you mentioned the fact that watches are repairable So when you open one of these things up, it's, it's a mechanical device. Not you or I could fix one of these things. It requires a specialist, someone who has trained in these things. and to a certain extent they have to be artisans. The device can be. Repairable, but it requires a specialty skill. And what we haven't had time to see or even encourage to a certain extent is the training of those artisans who would be able to restore and modify more complex devices the iPod is a great example. Someone has had the time to sit down and think about how could I restore and modify one of these devices? It's a desire path that I, I think, manufacturer themselves should be looking at. They should be asking themselves, who's out there in the modern community and should we be providing them with support and more tooling so they can do this job? It's continuing our legacy as a brand we don't need to do all of the work ourselves, but maybe we just build the infrastructure that allows people to find each other. Then it becomes much more, a community marketplace where people come together. I think there's an interesting model of something that could emerge, which is you don't need to necessarily have a global restomodding manufacturing base, but maybe you just need an engaged community of about a hundred people that you supply and that you support. They are authorized, they get a little stamp of approval, they have some training, they understand things. And you're now building with those people in mind that down the line, maybe a robot couldn't disassemble this device, but an artisan could, a specialist technician could do it. maybe that's more costly in terms of time, but there's a skill now and these people know how to repair these devices, da da da da. There's all these other benefits that come off that, that I think is quite interesting. So, maybe the watch world does have a little bit more to offer here in terms of a model of what, restoration and modification skillset could look like more
Ernest:Right. Right. I'm really glad you mentioned that.'cause something I wanted to as well, that opportunity. And, we've talked about a lot of products that are pretty high end cars and but what's heartened me is seeing the growing interest in shoes that can be resoled. You know, and they tend to be a little bit on the higher end, but not nearly as premium as say a, a fine watch or a, a, a car. and that's, I think another, a great example of kind of this two-sided opportunity. You're offering a product that's going to last longer, have a lower impact on the environment, but you're also then creating this opportunity for a class of people who are going to be able to develop that expertise to service that product over time. I. I think Vibram has been an incredible catalyst in this, in that they really make that market possible in that they offer households that, you know, basically any cobbler. maybe you might have to sign up to some program. But basically, you know, it's very easy to get access to these replacement outsoles and, you know, with some development of, skill, you can, you know, learn how to replace outsoles on any kind of boot that, it was designed around that. So. It's been great to see that's been around for a long time, but I think for quite a while it, of getting boots resold was kind of, fell off people's radar, it's been great to see, that it's becoming much more popular again. and I think Vibram deserves a lot of credit for enabling that because without someone making those outsoles, it would be very difficult for that, that market to exist. so the fact that they've continued to, to offer that as a service, is great to see. I, I was really amazed to see, I was just doing a little bit of research for this episode and to this group called Circular Online, I think this was dated from 20 20 20 21, reported that Nike sells 780 million pairs of shoes a year. I. To the best of my knowledge, none of those shoes are resolvable, which is, it's just incredible when you think about that. And then same with Aidas. It's Nike's not the only one doing this. really all of these leading shoe makers are making shoes that are designed to be disposable. So. To see a shift there, I think would be really powerful. And the great thing is that the knowhow exists. you know, lot of shoemakers are doing that. Vibram makes it possible. So that's something that, you know, I think is a great model at an accessible price point, you know, shows it doesn't have to be a luxury product. even down to, this little brand called Bedrock, they make sandals and, they have, what they call a resold program as an SOUL, but they'll resold your sandals. So even I think this, entry price for their sandals are about$115. And it goes up from there. But you, it's not a premium. Super premium product, you can get those resold and they're not doing it for free. You know, this is a, you know, has to be sustainable for them as well. So it's, I think, 50,$55 to get a pair resold, that's, you know, a lot less than a, a new pair and it's just a much lower impact on the environment. I think it, there's some good signals showing that you can do this at AC price points. And the other thing that has me excited is that. It seems like younger people are really pulling this as well now, you know, we, I think, lived through this period where we just saw products as being disposable and we're totally fine with that. there was a study done by a group called Thread Up just last year and they found that 64% of Gen Z look for an item secondhand before buying it new. and that's up four percentage points from the last time they did the study in 2021. So think partly for just reasons of need because of, inflation, but also because of uh,, concern around the environment. is this growing desire have products that are gonna last. And, you know, knowing that you might not be the only person who owns that product over its lifetime. Um, so I think there's a lot of opportunities there. And there's some. Historical context here too. I think, you know, particularly, think both of us have this appreciation for Japan and Japanese culture, and there's some practices there that are starting to, to gain popularity. Like, uh, I think it's sashiko you know, it's just basically mending of garments. Um, but in a way that kind of creates embellishment, so. You know, instead of trying to hide the men, really showing it and making it part of the story of that garment. so that, you know, you can show, like you were saying, the patina show, the patina of that garment as it's aged. Um, and, you know, as you've lived with it. I think that's such a beautiful concept that is starting to get, um, uh, traction beyond Japanese, uh, apparel makers, and then also Kintsugi, is this similar sort of idea, but in this case for more like, uh, pottery or lacquer wear. And again, the idea of not trying to hide the men's, but really celebrating them by using, in the case of zuki, either powdered gold or silver or platinum to highlight. The areas where you've mended the product and giving it that, you know, really beautiful patina that again, tells the story of that lifetime of that product. So I think there's some really interesting concepts that, um, you know, are out there that people are tapping into or gaining popularity. You know, one last thing I'd maybe mention here too, just in the context of sustainability is I think we've. You know, at the same time we've had this very disposable outlook on product. really focused on recyclability as and like, oh, we're using X number of recycled water bottles in this garment, or, know, blah, blah, blah. But I think we're seeing it's becoming clearer and clearer that that can't, certainly can't be the only answer. you know, for one, so much of what goes into recycling streams doesn't ever actually get recycled. But also there's just the huge energy use associated with that. So, you know, there are some, I think, pretty interesting things being done on the recyclable recyclability side of things, but, I personally think that there's so much more relevance thinking about longevity, um, and it's kind of celebrating it versus, um, running away from it, which I think we have for the past couple of decades.
Joachim:I think that's a really good point about recyclability. Recyclability is about basically making a new product from old stuff. and it's very rare that. A brand will say, actually, let's be very upfront about the fact that this product is imperfect and is made of recycled things. And that's, that's why it looks this way. I feel like Nike did that very well with, with some of the recycled shoes that were quite, divisive in their design, but very honest about where they were coming from. You could push that concept even further, which is why I was so happy that You mentioned Sigge because it's such an old fashioned technique, but as you said, it celebrates the repair. We'll link to some pictures of what Kintsugi looks like if, people haven't seen it, but you're doing it with gold and silver, so if there's a crack in your pottery, it's visible. You're not trying to match what was there. You're trying to very explicitly highlight that this thing has been broken and it has been repaired beautifully, by an artisan. Again, highlighting the skill that's necessary to be able to reassemble this. And it gets very philosophical because I think you have to tap into that more, emotional and emotive language to get people to be motivated about this stuff. As you said, the energy required to recycle is crazy. We're burning fossil fuels to move the stuff to get it recycled. Back to the idea of we haven't even started exploring what a network of repairers and artisans working on these things would look like. maybe we're showing our coastal elite nonsense status here, right? Because we're both in the Pacific Northwest. But there is something about being able to go down the road and say, could you please fix this, and I'm okay with it not being what it was before, because there is no way for it to be that. I, I, I think Japanese culture is really happy to embrace that notion that repairing is. Maybe it starts with that, willing to embrace imperfection like that. But I think it's gonna be imposed on us sooner or later. I don't think we're gonna have the luxury of doing sooner. And I suspect that we'll have to one way or another, extend the lifetime of all of these products, just by necessity. And we will be kicking ourselves when we realize that there's no way to just upgrade a memory board in that laptop one day. As a product person, have it in your mind that this is something that needs to happen, but maybe you have to empower the human being that's able to manipulate these objects in a way that right now automation is not lending itself to it is maybe a very. Manual process of cracking open and delicately pulling things apart and then repurposing them. And that's maybe the starting point. And we just have to be willing to embrace that quote unquote inefficiency. Siggy is totally inefficient, right? I mean, why would you do that? Why would you cobble this thing together again, makes no sense in, in a, in a pure efficiency lens. But I have a person here with skill that can fix this and bring back this thing maybe. And then it also, as with physical objects, is imbued with emotional memory. You want it back in some form. So I think maybe that is also part of it, that we have to be willing to say that this is one of those solutions that is not quote unquote, scalable. Maybe it, it just can't be. but it's still necessary. It's not something that we shouldn't be pursuing. And then maybe after decades of it, it'll be become scalable. Who knows?
Ernest:Well, kind of along along those lines, what I've heard often in terms of pushback on the business side this has been most frequently, well, if we make it last longer than gonna sell as many, because, you know, people hold onto their item X for longer. first, I think in my experience, that's not really true, and especially now with the existence of these very mainstream secondary markets for all kinds of products. People have the opportunity to sell their existing goods so that they can buy new versions of those things. So longevity isn't going to, at least from my direct experience that I've seen, isn't going to reduce your opportunity for sales. then on top of that, existence of these secondary markets means that you have an opportunity to participate in those markets as well. And you know, we see that happening, for Rolex entering the certified pre-owned space. So you know, they're actually selling pre-owned Rolexes. so you know, you can actually benefit from that, this kind of growing interest in secondary sales of, used products. and then there's also the other opportunities, like you talked about of, you know, maybe training or offering components for service. You know, there's a lot of ways that you can, I. your business, um, around, uh, these sort of restomod concepts. So I really think it's, um, not only shortsighted, but just wrong to think that building for longevity is going to limit your business opportunity. Um, I think there's a lot of examples showing that actually can, um, expand your opportunities, uh, as long as you, you think about it in that way. on, on my end, I guess my, I don't have a specific, you know, heuristic in terms of how to approach this, but I, I again, kind of come back to rom's kind of 10 principles of good design and, you know, it was just so, so thoughtful and so. Uh, it just makes so much sense. But, you know, amongst those 10, he says, you know, of course good design is aesthetic, also good design makes a product useful. design is long lasting and good design is environmentally friendly. Uh, and you know, he said that quite a, quite a while ago. So I think, you know, that's a really nice, simple checklist you can apply. Are we delivering on those things? And to your point, I think a lot of the products we're surrounded by days don't deliver on those, know, simple principles like, you know, Apple's products, which are often celebrated as, you know, beautiful design. they're not very long lasting in many ways not very environmentally friendly. and so I would love to see that, you know, they're starting to embrace some repairability. but., there's so much more I think they could do as leaders in this space to, to really shift the thinking. You've heard our perspectives on this topic, of restomods and whether they could be mainstream. Are you a fan of the restomod concept and do you think it has applications beyond the automotive space? We'd really love to hear what you think. So let us know at LearnMakeLearn@gmail.com. Now moving on to our recommendations. this is a bit of a build on what you said earlier, Joachim, about your desire to kind of take the case off your phone so that you can it develop some patina. Um, but I wanted to recommend actually a iPhone case, and I, a few reasons I wanted to recommend this one that I, I actually really like it, but also I, you know, I recommended, uh, last week a very expensive piece of audio equipment. So I thought, Hey, let's recommend something that's just a little bit more accessibly priced, uh, as maybe not so esoteric either. And it's the Rhinoshield. CrashGuard iPhone 15, pro Max case. In my case, it's the iPhone 15 Pro Max. They make it for every version of the iPhone. And this is, we'll share a link to, uh, the product page, but this is a bumper style case, which I think has really gone outta style in the past few years. Uh, back in the early days of antenna Antennagate, I think it was around the iPhone four. You know, apple gave my style cases, for whatever reason, they've fallen outta style. Um, but I got this iPhone 15 Pro Max, uh, last, late last year. And I, for last two phones, I've been on a four year cycle. So I went from the iPhone seven to the iPhone 11, from the iPhone 11 to the iPhone 15. So, um, I, I had to get a new case as well for this new phone. I. And this was the first time I had access to a phone that supported MagSafe you could attach things mag magnetically to the back of the case. and so, you know, I started to do all this digging into what kind of case should I get? And I originally was going to get, um, one of Apple's new cases for the Lon 15 line. there's an interesting case study there in that I think admirably decided to stop using leather products because at their scale leather, you know, is, has very huge sustainability challenges for company making products at their scale. that was admirable. And think it was also very interesting that they pushed themselves to not just make a fake leather case, you know, with just kind of pleather like material that we've all seen. Uh, instead they a new material that was actually a microfiber. It's made up of these you know, very microscopic, uh, loops of synthetic material. it results in a case that has a really unique hand to it. has a little bit of give, um, and, you know, it just, at least to me, felt much nicer in the hand than your typical synthetic leather. But the people have reported, like, I think just last week, there's some reporting from Joanna Stern from the Wall Street Journal in reporting that her iPhone 15 case just looked like a rotten. Banana, I think she called it'cause it had started get going brown
Joachim:how
Ernest:stains on it and stuff. it's been a, I think unfortunately a bit of a failed experiment. You know, I think they deserve credit for trying to do something, to get away but it seems like the solution hasn't worked out. But, um, so. That led me to this idea of, Hey, you know, this phone has this beautiful design. Why would I just cover it? You know, they just seemed so crazy to me. Uh, so I just said, you know, they used to be bumper cases. Someone must still make some. And after quite a bit of digging, I did finally land on this Rhino Shield crash card, uh, which just goes around the perimeter of the phone. One thing that's interesting, um, is that the rim stands quite, uh, proud of the back of the case, and that's because it has to protect the very prominent camera bump the back of the iPhone 15. Um, this wasn't an issue in the old days of the iPhones where the, there was no camera bump, but was a little worried about that. I thought that that might be issue and that, you know, it would make the phone feel quite a bit thicker. but I actually found that that was a really, I. Good benefit in that. I also use this peak design slim wallet, I think it's called. It's a mag safe wallet that you can stick on the back of your phone. um, I really like that because it means I don't have to have a separate wallet. But the great thing is that the. Crash guard acts as like a guardrail for the wallet. So when I put the phone in my pocket, uh, if, if I didn't, if I had a, a conventional case, the wallet would, you know, really often want to just slide right off. Um, and because the magnets are strong, but with the crash guard kind of acting as a guardrail, even if the wallet slides a little bit. It'll just pop right back into place. So found this combination to be a really good, um, my favorite combo that I've had,'cause I've had wallet style cases in the, in the past, uh, where the wallet piece is built into the case itself. Um, and, you know, that's nice, but it you know, a relatively thick total package. I found this to be a really nice combo. One last thing is that. Rhino Shield allows you to customize the color of the buttons, you know, so you have your button for the volume up and down and, um, the, uh, uh, power button as well as the, I forget what they call it now, but they added a button in the iPhone 15. I think it's the action button. Um, and so it's just really, really small thing, for 99 cents you could get a set of buttons in a different color and, you know, the opportunity to just add that little bit of customization to your case, um, in a very simple way. And I, I did that. I, I have the, what, essentially gray bumper and then I added an orange, action button. and it just makes it that, well, you know, it gives it that little bit of personality that it wouldn't have had otherwise. So, uh, the Rhinoshield CrashGuard iPhone 15, Pro Max case is my recommendation of the week.
Joachim:Thanks for that, Ernest. That's very cool. I've been sitting on my recommendation for a while actually. I, I remember when we decided to do this, I, I made a list of just one of the things that I think are cool, and today feels like the right time to mention this one. So it's, it is for little people. It's a toy company, Bruder, they're a German company. Bruder toys or Bruderr Toys will send the link in their show notes. They make these pretty detailed scale models of trucks and forklifts. They're great toys. A little bit on the pricey end, but the quality's pretty high. But the reason why they're worth mentioning, especially in this context, is they have a really great spare parts catalog and it's incredibly easy to repair these toys. So some of them have got a lot of intricate little details. For example, a forklift, you know, actually has a working forklift component, or a garbage truck has a working little flipper to put the garbage into the the bay. Those things break. I have small people of varying ages. Not all of them appreciate the, high fidelity reproduction of a real garbage truck. And so things break, obviously, and all these little plastic bits, wing mirrors fly off. It's been pretty cool to be able to just go online and get specific parts, not at a crazy price, and essentially refresh these toys so that they can live a little bit longer. So, this toy will be ready for the next little person to inherit from the older one and then pass it through the, the generations. And it just made me love this brand a little bit more. I think if you go into a store as a parent, you see that they're around, but they don't really advertise the fact that they're so repairable. and so I would like to advertise that because I think it's a pretty cool thing to, to be able to do so easily. And it's not crazy price to buy the spare parts. They're not gonna get you$20 for a car or look, there's appropriately priced for what it is, and you'll get a sense of pride that that toy can go a little bit longer in its lifetime. I would recommend them to people who are thinking about something that's a little bit more. High quality, and they want the detail of the real vehicles but then that added benefit of long lasting, so my rec for the
Ernest:That's a great one. Definitely super relevant to the topic as well well, alright, I think that does it for us. Thank you so much for joining us here at Learn Make Learn. As I mentioned, we want to hear from you, so please send any questions or feedback to LearnMakeLearn@gmail.com and tell your friends about us. For our next episode, we're going to discuss the lone genius versus a creative collective, is more conducive to innovation. Are there contexts or phases of product creation where one approach might offer advantages over the other? We'll share our own experiences and perspectives on this topic. On the next Learn, make, learn.
