Angel: Water Purifier Family (A4Pro, A6Pro, A8) – IF Award 2018

The A6Pro designed by Envary  throughout 2016/2017 received the IF design award 2018 for product design excellence.

After designing wall and desk water dispensers, Angel asked us to tackle the design of their bestseller: the Ax-family of water purifiers. Either a 3-stage or a 4-stage water filter, most Chinese households would connect these below their sink baisin to their kitchen water faucet. Providing a safe source of drinking water when preparing foods or making tea, the A-filter-family consists of 4 differently positioned products. The A1, A4, A6, A8 each have different sediment and chemical based filter cartridges, suitable to clean polluted water to a safe degree. Although Angel aimed at a full redesign of their most successful product we were asked to keep its form architecture similar to the previous A6 ensuring that customers can easily recognise the bestseller. Additionally to the Ax family our team had to create a color-coded label system for the 8 different cartridge types and a standalone kitchen faucet.

What we did: The look of the Ax purifiers had to unite aesthetic factors of the product design language as well as individual design characteristics imposed by the filters’ unique structural architecture, while somewhat resembling the form factor of Angel’s old A6 product. In order to achieve the desired light-bodied appearance we merged the vertically layered look of Angel’s product design language with the newly developed curved middle surface, thus avoiding an oddly massive enclosure at the top and emphasising Angel’s “Scientifically clean water”-feel. Assessing the usually packed spatial conditions of the sink cabinet in different households provided us great insights to significantly decrease the Ax’ spatial footprint. Ensuring all-around accessibility of the UI when placed sideways or alongside the cabinet walls we rethought the UI completely, placing detailed status indicators onto the front’s back-lit branding line, while buttons and an additional multi-purpose status light were integrated onto the enclosure’s right hand side.

The project is a collaboration between Envary and the Angel Design Center, Shenzhen China.