In this blog I will look into two design philosophies from two very different companies. What are the benefits of these strategies, and what are the challenges?
Northern Playground, “Our job is to make it easier and more fun to own less.”
Two main principles:
- Duration (physical and non-physical)
- Multi functionality (for all occasions and adventures)
Looks and functionality:
Northern Playground mainly uses one design strategy. This is designing with simple designs, multi functionality and keep-worthiness. Their design process is slow and never puts looks over functionality. Northern Playground never launch something new unless they belive it fills a hole in their collection and that it will stay a classic “forever.”
Quality:
The clothes from Northern Playground should have long lifetime and high quality through repairability, less chemicals, needing less washing and designing the garment first and then setting an appropriate price. The clothes should also be possible to recycle.
Supply chains:
Employees in their supply chain should have more than a living wage. They should have good lives and good working conditions. In addition there is full transparency in who Northern Playground partner with.
Read more:
Read more about Northern Playgrounds design strategy here: https://www.northernplayground.no/en/content/design-philosophy, and more about their buisness models, processes etc. here: https://www.northernplayground.no/en/environment
H&M Group, “…guide to designing more circular products.”
Three pillars, designing products to be:
- used more
- made to be made again
- made from safe and recycled or renewable inputs
Looks and functionality:
According to H&M Group’s “Circulator Guide” they try to place each product in a “Frequency and Lifespan” diagram before they decide on materials etc. The default before they as themselves a few questions is wear monthly and lasting for 3 years. This is not particualary ambitious.
If we wear 6 garments (pants, undershirt, shirt, sweater, jacket + underwear/socks etc.) every day, one new outfit every day in the month, for 12 months a year that would mean you would have to buy and toss 2160 garments in 3 years. This is excluding pyjamas, home wear, workout clothes etc. If most of these clothes are then placed in H&M Group’s “Mid” category they are not that designed well for recyclability, and most will end up outside of that system anyways as recycling clothes is a very overwhelmed industry.
Quality
H&M Group has a different approach than Northern Playground when it comes to the quality of their clothes. They argue that clothes which are designed for being in the “Extensive” product category should have physical and some non-physical (eg. lovability) durability. However, products in the “Mid” and “Light” category should NOT be designed for durability, but rather recyclability. They at best put medium pressure on repairability and avoiding waste.
Supply chains:
Ad H&M Group is a giant in fashion is hard to get the overview of all the suppliers and working conditions. They are part of the Transparency Pledge.
Read more:
Design strategy of H&M Group: https://hmgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Circulator_Guide_v1.0.pdf
What to take from this?
- Northern Playground is designing for “timelessness,” but will probably struggle to target people who want to express themselves through fashion with their muted colors and simple silhouettes.
- Northern Playground designs every piece in the same spirit. This leads to transparency and trust for the customer
- H&M Group design with different strategies for how to reduce the overall environmental impact. For as long as we produce clothes ment to only last a short while this is probably a good thing as it reduces emissions. ““Focusing on developing all products to be more durable could potentially lead to us using more resources than a garment requires.” However, this makes it more unclear for the customer what type of garment they are buying. It also drives prices down which lead to overconsumption.
