Capstone / Thesis
EPOD Capstone Studio
A capstone should reveal what a student has learned and what they are ready to care about next.
Environmental Product Design Capstone gave students sustained time to develop work grounded in their own interests, emerging professional goals, and responsibility to others. Projects began with a problem arena rather than a predetermined object, moving through research, systems thinking, ideation, prototyping, critique, refinement, fabrication, and documentation toward a resolved public outcome.
The course balanced individual agency with collective support. Each student held primary responsibility for the direction and progress of their project while working within a studio culture of peer critique, shared technical knowledge, one-to-one desk reviews, professional mentorship, and clear milestones. Independence did not mean isolation.
The documented course model supported three paths: self-directed projects developed with an outside professional mentor, client-led work responding to a real partner's need, and values-led projects beginning from a personal cause and refined through design sprints. All three paths shared the same expectation: service to real people, professional readiness, and work resolved enough to stand on its own, across furniture, products, graphic design, packaging, publications, and communication systems.
Studio Framing
Freedom Within a Framework
Capstone is one of the rare moments in a student's education when the question can become genuinely personal. After years of responding to briefs, they are asked to decide what deserves sustained attention and what kind of designer they want to become. My role was to help students turn personal ambition into a project with clear stakes, disciplined progress, and a standard of completion they could defend.
We spent real time learning to love the problem before committing to a solution: researching beyond the surface, speaking with people who understood the issue through experience, and writing a problem statement that could guide difficult decisions later. Once a direction was established, milestones, desk critiques, peer reviews, mentor conversations, and repeated prototypes made progress visible, while full-scale prototypes exposed the questions that drawings could postpone: comfort, balance, tolerances, weight, assembly, and the reality of another person's body.
The range of work in this collection is one of the things I value most: furniture, gardening systems, safety equipment, play, publications, packaging, wearable objects, and tools for creative work. None of it shares a visual style, and it shouldn't. What I'm proudest of is watching students take themselves seriously as designers before graduation, finding a real opportunity, seeking expertise, making repeatedly, and presenting the result with confidence.
01 | Group
Products
Physical products addressing accessibility, protection, mobility, and daily use, developed through iterative full-scale prototyping.
Vegi
A modular indoor garden designed to make growing edible plants more accessible in apartments and other spaces without adequate daylight. A self-watering planter supports approximately ten days of autonomy, while an integrated timed grow light allows the unit to operate away from a window.
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Indoor garden
Physical prototype
Annotated section
Prototype development
Gobe
A line of moisture-controlled bags designed to protect electronics in humid environments where climate-controlled storage is uncommon. Rechargeable silica packs absorb moisture, change color when saturated, and can be restored through accessible heat sources, prioritizing affordability and durability for users whose access to education or the internet depends on a working laptop.
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Product line
Heated-pack design
Identity and material system
STUDIIO Backpack
Watch project film A mobile work system for artists, designers, and craftspeople. The backpack organizes tools and materials so that a creative practice can move between home, school, studio, and field conditions, paired with a campaign that presents the bag as a portable studio rather than a conventional laptop bag.
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Project film
In use
Material detail
Campaign composition
Mobile workspace campaign
Jumble
A modular indoor planting system built from truncated-octahedron pods connected through an alternating magnetic pattern. Users assemble the units intuitively into playful, expandable arrangements, developed through failed structures, greenhouse testing, and growing-medium experiments.
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Modular planters
Assembled planter
Modular connection
Planted configuration
BEAT BOX
Watch project film BEAT BOX addresses the difficulty of storing and transporting a complete drum kit, combining the footprint of a full set, the protection of a road case, and the compactness of a travel kit. The resulting prototype fits in a car trunk while retaining the sound, spacing, and playability of a conventional drum set.
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Project film
Finished build
Side view
Deployed configuration
Hardware detail
Phoenix Filter
Watch project film A compact in-tent air filtration system for wildland firefighters and other frontline workers exposed to smoke, designed to improve rest and reduce long-term exposure during deployments. Its exploded assembly integrates a filter, high-output fan, rechargeable battery, aluminum shell, hanging hook, and simple controls into a portable unit.
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Project film
Assembly
Attachment
Activation
Wildfire context
Moments | Adult Fidget Jewelry
Watch project film A line of sterling-silver fidget jewelry created for adults with ADHD, dyslexia, and related attention needs. Rings, necklaces, bracelets, and earrings provide discreet tactile movement while remaining appropriate for professional and social settings, reframing an assistive behavior as something elegant and personally meaningful.
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Project film
Ring in use
Earrings in use
Pendant in use
Jewelry collection
Rescue Light
A lightweight, collapsible winter rescue sled designed for faster response and easier transport across advanced and backcountry terrain. An inflatable sled supports patient comfort and packs into a wearable backpack when not deployed, reducing the need for two-person handling and accepting a standard stretcher insert for transfer between emergency-care settings.
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Deployed sled
Folded configuration
Inflation system
Field deployment
02 | Group
Furniture
Furniture systems exploring modularity, material honesty, and the social and cultural meaning of everyday objects.
Frank Furniture
Frank Furniture responds to the waste generated by short-term living and frequently discarded furniture. Two CNC-cut modular components join without external fasteners or tools to form shelves, desks, chairs, tables, benches, and larger assemblies that can be disassembled, reconfigured, transported, or shared.
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Modular furniture
Room system
Interlocking module
Shelving configuration
Dragonfly Table
The Dragonfly dining set translates a family adoption story into contemporary furniture. Dragonfly inlays reference a moment associated with good fortune, happiness, and love, while the table and chairs combine precedents from Ming-dynasty furniture with a contemporary Chinese-American identity, built in solid cherry with traditional joinery.
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Dining set
Table joinery
Chair detail
Table and chairs
IOREK Seat
Watch project film A modular seating system designed for young adults who move frequently and may rely on small vehicles. The system disassembles in minutes, nests into a compact box, and can be transported by one person, with interlocking panels, removable cushions, and customizable colors and layouts adapting the system to a new home.
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Project film
Modular seating system
Compact transport configuration
Seating configurations
Built prototype
The Entendre Chair
Watch project film The Entendre Chair uses multifunctional furniture to open a conversation about intimacy, privacy, and sex-positive domestic life. Its mid-century-inspired form operates as a comfortable lounge chair while supporting more intimate uses, treating playfulness and sexual expression as legitimate subjects of home design.
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Project film
In context
Woven leather detail
In use
Co-instructor: Melissa Felderman
A configurable stool system that pairs a simple circular seat with interchangeable leg components and brightly colored connection details. The family of variants demonstrates how a consistent kit of parts can support personalization without changing the underlying construction logic.
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Project film
Stool family
Modular assembly
Color family
Exploded assembly
03 | Group
Graphic Design and Packaging
Editorial, identity, and packaging systems that treat communication as integral to the design rather than documentation added afterward.
Security through Insecurity
A publication and digital platform examining how advertising and visual culture profit from personal insecurity. Anonymous interviews and documentary portraits became a book centered on transparency, healing, self-acceptance, and more ethical forms of communication, connecting photography, editorial design, storytelling, and public advocacy.
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Cover
Reader interaction
Open spread
Publication detail
Hidden Gem Tea
Hidden Gem Tea reimagines tea packaging as an unfolding experience of discovery. Color, geometry, nested components, and a small metallic tea container turn opening the package into a sequence intended to lift mood and create surprise, developed through repeated physical prototypes, material studies, laser-cut revisions, opening tests, and identity development.
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Packaging
Packaging family
Open blue package
Folded infuser
Student Experience