Digital Pot
red dot
red dot award: design concept 2008
While pets and their owners communicate with
each other through non-verbal communication
(such as patting, smiling and tail wagging), a plant has no way to express itself directly.
Digital Pot helps plants communicate with their
owners and express their needs.
Digital Pot is a twenty-first century plant pot
composed of three parts. The inside of the pot
is filled with soil and sensors to measure soil
conditions, temperature, humidity and water
level. These sensors determine whether or not the plant’s basic needs are being met. The outside of the pot uses speakers and pictograms on an LCD screen to relay the
conditions measured by the sensors. This way, the plant can communicate how it feels or what it needs – whether the conditions are normal or bad, hot or cold; whether the plant is dissatisfied or thirsty.
The lower part of the pot contains a water-
holding vessel. If you’ve over-watered the plant, the excess water will drain into this
vessel.
Digital Pot plants thrive in stimulating
communities. Multiple Digital Pots placed in close proximity can communicate with each other via Bluetooth. They also respond
favourably to the sound of music; some studies
have concluded, after all, that a musical
environment benefits the health of plants. All
this high tech goodness does mean the pot needs power. However, efficiencies are gained
through the use of a simple USB interface that does double duty by both charging and
transmitting the information the pot has
collected to and from computer software. This
means the pot does not need to store large
amounts of data.
If you have plants for the Digital Pot, simply
connect to your computer and download the pertinent information (for roses, tulips or herbs for example). Then just follow the pot’s instructions: feed the plant when it is hungry
and give it water when it is thirsty. That is it. |
