Hello!
 
I am currently in the Integrated Product Design program at UPenn in Philadelphia. I enjoy well made products that feel like they were made with purpose and built for the long term, however, if discarded won’t last forever. I’m tired of all the cheap products sold from discount stores, which never work well, rapidly deteriorate and are quickly thrown away. It’s become a cultural habit in America to buy cheap products frequently instead of investing in something worthwhile that will actually pay for itself in the long run. The worst however are one-time use products such as plastic grocery bags, Colgate Wisps, Swiffers, and anything disposable but not recyclable. Although my future is hazy, I’d like to work for a product design firm to begin to help shape a better future. I also think that Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things is a great book that all designers and engineers should read.

In my free time I read about the methods behind good designs and have come to realize that it really just comes down to who’s making the decisions and what do they care about. I’m also interested in usability since my parents are constantly having trouble with their computers (mac’s).

This has helped me learn how to better explain functions and concepts, as well as taught me that the end user could be anyone with any level of experience.

I had dreams to start a non-for-profit drupal powered website titled Innovate For Tomorrow that I hoped would some day become useful for engineering, architecture and design students. The idea was to create an online community that could propose problems to important issues, and then vote on these issues, allowing the problems most worth solving to ‘float’ to the top. The most important problems could then be used to create competitions. The winning ideas would then be built using the sites advertising/donated funds and installed in the location for which it was designed. Unfortunately I didn’t have the time or knowledge to fully develop the site and get the word out.

My current project is to start a small business focusing on simple clean design. I’m starting with leather cases that will soon be available through my online store.

Here is my resume and email jon@jonrwilson.com