Christmas Tree 2021

Christmas is our studio’s favourite holiday season. When the studio was first established, we challenged ourselves to craft a different Christmas tree every year. The crafted Christmas tree should follow the studio’s principles of being functional, sustainable, and delightful. We had put down this annual tradition for a few years but decided to pick it up again to bring back some much needed positive vibes.

Plywood snap-together model kits have been available on the market for a long time, but this is actually the first time we tried to craft one from scratch to make this year’s Christmas tree. After designing the business-card-sized kit, we went through a few iterations of prototyping to make sure the parts fit snuggly, tight enough to hold up a phone but not too tight that makes it difficult to assemble. The end result was a functional (mobile phone stand, paper clip) and sustainable (flat-pack, on-demand production) mini Christmas tree that’s topped with a delightful 3D-printed star. We made about 20 of the mini smiley Christmas trees and most of them were mailed out to friends to hopefully bring a little joy in the holiday season.

It’s always satisfying to design objects and bring them to life from initial concept sketches. We shall bring back this joyful annual tradition again next year!