When I first heard the American architect, Louis Sullivan's famous mantra, it was spoken by my dad (a pretty great designer, himself), who then added, "...Form should follow, but make sure it's always a great 'race' too!".....and I have always strived for JUST exactly that ideal in my work!
As a designer, I always try to assure that every element of all my designs is 100% necessary to the design in full. I never want for a critic of something I have built to judge some part of my finished work as 'superfluous' or 'self-serving'...But with sports gear, which is our favorite product group, FUNCTION is always king because to jocks, superfluous elements just equate to 'extra weight'. Here is a perfect opportunity to talk about one of our favorite Sport Equipment designs accomplished during our first 20 years in this gig: the Skulcrate, Sports Headgear.
Skulcrate was born of our own son
Jackson's bout with a serious sports concussion, suffered during a state tournament soccer match when he was 15 years old. After the collision that leveled him, I joined Jack on his team's sideline, where I could clearly see all the classic symptoms of the malady, I would soon begin to study in earnest...but on this day, knew next-to-nothing about. As the two of us sat together and the game and season came to its end, I had already begun to 'materialize, design and formulate' the Skulcrate Soccer Headgear in my mind. Skulcrate's design is simple and constructed of just three main mat-erials. We formulated the materials our injection-molded parts are made from by meticulously testing many densities of each, in search of those which would allow the final piece to best attenuate exterior impact which would otherwise be felt by the end user and could cause concussion. In the final analysis, product testing at the world's top sports impact study lab confirmed Skulcrate as displaying the greatest g-force attenuation of any sports headgear ever produced. The main materials in Skulcrate were actually quite similar to those I had used a year earlier to build a Wrestling Headgear product for our firm's client, Asics of America, Inc.
When Asics' President specifically chose me as his designer of a new wrestling headgear that would "entirely change the look and function' of wrestling headgear", I came up with this entirely original design.
The "conquest" immediately became the lightest-weight headgear ever introduced to the category...Its design is also decidedly 'lower-profiled' than any predecessor's offering...it uses molded, sweat channeling conduits to remove moisture that would otherwise threaten the proper positioning of the piece. Conquest became the world's top selling wrestling headgear immediately and has now sold to the market in the same form for over 10 years. Here is a football shoulder pad product designed and developed for the Bike Athletic label. Bike approached our firm, interested in developing a product specifically targeting the serious sternum injuries effecting young players, whose chest cartilage had yet to fully develop.
This design shows our Bike, junior level pad design with, "kick plates" and extended pads covering low enough to cover a young player's sternum entirely. After beginning with this one, design versions were added for each position type.
Sport Apparel, much like sport equipment and accessories, differs from all other apparel, in that it's focus is performance enhancement.
Here at left are examples of, 'compression base layer' pieces created specifically for fitness runners by the labels, Sugoi and Asics. In the case of the Sugoi stuff, use of inter-connected pattern panels that each note the 'direction of lycra stretch' over specific muscle groups, warms the wearer and creates compression that reduces muscle vibration during competition. The sock shown here is formulated specifically for fitness runners and uses different yarns for addressing blisters and ventilation problems.
The shorts shown here at left are a specific tool for benefitting long distance runners with a post workout, icing protocol. An athlete wears the compression shorts for the workout, then inserts the ice pods as shown. Studies show that following this simple protocol benefits athletes by dramatically reducing 'recovery time' before subsequent workouts.
Sport hydration is a serious issue that's understood by every sport equipment manufacturer...and we have worked with several to create and introduce means' by which athletes can achieve the standard allowing them to replace 1.5 liters of fluid lost, during each 30 minutes of strenuous activity.
Each of these functional designs include smart innovations allowing
the athlete to comfortably replace precious fluids, lost to savage workouts!
Here is a 50% universal product that's recognized around the world and went without ANY kind of functional design update for about 120 years! Bike Athletic Company claims to have introduced the, "Protective Cup" in the 1890s...and our firm contributed it's first substantive change in the early 2000s! When asked to design a new cup for Bike, all I could think about was the memory of the pain of putting that unforgiving piece of hard plastic down there every day of High School football practice and the ridiculous, painful bruise that then persisted there throughout the entire season! This product's story is important to our team, because, since its advent, EVERY cup manufacturer in the world has introduced a version of a hard cup, having soft, forgiving rubber sides. We're proud of that.
Sometimes you're asked to design product types for which you have NO personal frame of reference to rely upon for making general im-provements or innovations.
This is one of those. (But ONLY because motorcycles scare me.)
Western Power Sports is a cat-egory leader and their brand, "Fly Racing" is an industry jugger-naught. I was the first outside de- signer ever contracted to work with the WPS team and knew that my personal research into the industry and its specific products was going to make a difference in whether I'd be invited again to contribute designs to their wonderful lines of products. Shown in the photo here are the sample they gave me for material and quality reference AND my design the company chose for development, from the EIGHT designs I gave them to consider. (This one's so new that I haven't seen the developed sample quite yet.)
This is a group of compression molded backpacks, designed for active use.
Each one uses a molded EVA shell and molded 'hi-foam' straps...all designed with an objective of limiting all movements of the pack, which are NOT in concert with the movements of the athlete. Each of these are molded in a press of my own, which is keep in a Dongguan, China factory. I have used this press for many different types of comp- molded 'zip-cases' of all types and sizes. Look for a future edition of this blog detailing those zip-cases, which stand among my most favorite 3D designs to develop!
Sports Medicine supports, made from Neoprene (or, actually SBR)
may LOOK easy to design and build...but they're NOT! It's also true that this material is very difficult to sew and it's therefore also quite difficult to find a great manufacturer who can deliver without spending a huge chunk of your materials on defected offerings! But don't worry. I have a great, reliable facility with GREAT material connections ready to help with this OLD favorite product category that dates for me back to the earliest stages of my OEM product design and delivery days! Thanks for your interest in Tom Lukens' creative and design services. Please feel free to contact with any questions this may have raised in you...Then, let's make some Sports Equipment!!