As an industrial designer, Erik Björk typically is faced with a lot of limitations. He strives to produce non-conventional product designs that are not too experimental, They should be easy to mass produce, yet hard to copy. He aims to create an exclusive look with interesting, low-cost materials. Most days he finds that limitations are inspiring and challenging, but sometimes they can also be very frustrating.

Erik admits that “The Do It Yourself Wooden Bicycle” is the polar opposite of his trademark industrial designs. It is very easy to copy and reproduce. The components are available from the nearest hardware store, and anyone can build it with common hand-tools. The look is quit rough and unconventional, which Erik hopes will make the bike an unlikely target for bike thieves.

Erik considers his design as a first test version of a open source project. He encourages folks to build their own. If you’d like drawings of Erik’s bike to jump-start your own project, then contact him via email. More information on The Do It Yourself Wooden Bicycle is available at Erik’s website.

–Karl Rosengarth

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 28th, 2008 at 6:16 pm and is filed under Fresh Dirt. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.