BIC lighter by hi-pe.at / martin foessleitner

FH-Joanneum / CMS 2021 ID ProWork 1|AD

The BIC lighter - designed in 1971 by Louis Lucien Lepoix - was introduced in 1973. Typically the cheapest on the market, the BIC disposable lighter is still today extremely popular with selling 4,4 million units a day. See here a summary of outstanding analogue as well digital interactive investigations and experiments for profound insights into a daily good. Five stories, how analogue research and experiments trigger creativity for unexpected new perspectives.

Martin Foessleitner FH-Joanneum 2021 foessleitner@mac.com

Sofiyan Biadsi, Bettina Pötscher & Nils Tornow: Charge Your Phone

Anna Mitterhauser Laura Varhegyi Magdalena Samonigg Max Müller Mira Kropatsch Victoria Reichinger

ProWork1IAD | CMS21

At the beginning of the project, we experimented with the lighter, with the goal to find as much information about that small thing as possible. For that, we took a look at the topic in different lights.

Importance of the fire for the human evolution In the Stone Age, the discovery of fire allowed us to cook our food for the first time. This ability led to the rise of our species: On one hand, cooked food supplies much more energy, therefore we had to eat less frequently. That gave us more time to sit around the fire and develop our social skills. On the other hand, cooking food also detoxifies potentially harmful bacteria, so we had a greater variety of food supplies. As a result, our brains got bigger and bigger and prompted our evolution.

Anatomization of the lighter To have a better insight into the BIC lighter, we decided to anatomize it. We took the lighter apart and melted down the fork, which looked like a heart. Isn’t that interesting. Fire and a beating heart.

Some fellow prehistoric humans experiencing the delight of instantaneous fire power.

1. Body 2. Fork & Jet 3. Valve 4. Spark Wheel 5. Hood 6. Flint 7. Base

2 6 5

4 7

3 1

Examine it

LIGHt IT UP

Mechanisms If you push down the fork, it opens the valve, which releases fuel. In the lighter, it’s an Isobutane gas. The valve itself regulates the fuel flow to have a constant flame with always the same height. To create a spark, you rotate the metallic wheel, which rubs against the flint. The spark is produced just above the valve, which then simply gets ignited by the plume of gas.

View into the chamber of the lighter, where the gas is held.

Disabeling the child protection of the lighter can be done trough some easy manipulation with a pointy object; like a screwdriver for exmaple.

Experiments We had the burning question of how long a BIC lighter lasts until it runs out of fuel. The answer: 1 hour and 14 minutes. If it burns 1 hour and 14 minutes, which is equal to 4440 seconds; we could estimate 888 candles could be lit with a single lighter. With an average of 5 seconds per lighting a single candle.

CONSUMING FLAME The lighter was fixed in an anvil while a piece of wire secured a constant stream of fuel.

Even more weird math: If we had an unlimited supply of tea lights (or at least 888 candles): » 210 minutes 3h 30 min is the average life span of a burning tea light » 888 times we could ignite a candle with one lighter » 186480 minutes we could have a light source in total » 3108 hours in total we could use this light » 129.5 days we would have a small light source burning » 35.4% of a whole year we could illuminate with a single BIC lighter.

The hood popped off due to the expanison caused by the heat of the ongoing flame.

Visual Arts

The fine paralell lines were caused by the loops of the spring.

DISCOVERING the PAINt We used the lighter as a stamp to create different shapes, telling a story with this abstract art form.

Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s painting “Fire” is part of a series of the “Four Elements” he created in 1566. In the other paintings, he used animals to represent the element and at that time it was believed that certain animals like the salamander have been bred from fire. But Arcimboldo chose to use a variety of objects that create the element to show man‘s dominion over the fire.

Performance of Rhythm 5

Other artists and their involvement with fire Marina Abramović, a performance artist, explores her mental and physical limits. In her performance “Rhythm 5” in 1975, she constructed a star out of wood and wood chips soaked in petrol. She set fire to the star and lay down in the middle of it. She failed to notice that the flames used up all the oxygen and lost consciousness. Nobody noticed until the flames touched her leg, and she didn’t show any reaction. Two viewers carried her out.

highly FlAmeable

Sharing is caring There is a social phenomenon in our culture. We share fire and pass it on, with strangers late at night, in the church and the Olympic fire is also passed on. We have a beautiful relationship with fire, around campfires, at birthdays and at the fireplace, that’s where we connect with people.

We want to create connections. That’s why we are here. We take the BIC lighter that is already a conversation starter. You might have already been asked by a stranger if you have a lighter. You might end up in a conversation with that person. Well, we use the BIC lighter as a flirting tool. We like the different contradictions the lighter has. It brings people together, but you can burn yourself, if you’re not careful. You can’t touch it, but it creates connections.

We think fire is romantic, if you burn for someone, you might feel the heat. Why else would Tinder pick a flame as a logo and if two people swipe right, they match. You can also light up matches, by the way. Same word, different meaning. Love is a hot topic, that’s why the BIC lighter is the perfect messenger, it replaces your wingman.

YOU GOT A light on ya?

Our idea If you fancy someone but are too shy to hit on a complete stranger and get rejected immediately, you might want to give hints in a more subtle way. It’s easier to give someone a note they see only later.

BIC-UP LINEs Our concept is to convert the outer casing into an interface. The narrow side is used as a stamp for your telephone number. You also get a sticker pack and can choose a sticker with your favorite BICUp Line and stick it on the lighter.

When you meet a person you like very much, give them your special BIC Up Lighter. Your telephone number will stick on the palm of their hand and the sticker will signal that you are into them.

For every flame. BIC-UP LINES: OUR flirting tool. 16

We gotchu covered.

Anna Mitterhauser Laura Varhegyi Magdalena Samonigg Max Müller Mira Kropatsch Victoria Reichinger

to bic or not to bic?

Sofiyan Biadsi, Bettina Pötscher & Nils Tornow: Charge Your Phone

A S P E C TAC U L A R STORY ABOUT THE

BIC

(and the creative humans behind it) Špela Bricman Olena Davletshyn Raphaëlle Garnier Andrea Paricio Henares Alicia Martinez Lopez

L I G H T E R

TA B L E O F

CONTENTS

01 02 03 04 05

WHAT IS THE PLAN AND WHO ARE THE MASTERMINDS BEHIND IT The Kick-Off / The Concept

BUT WHAT DOES A LIGHTER DO?! The User Research

WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE IS MORE TO IT?! The Experiments

THE BIG STORY OF THE BIC LIGHTER The Story / More Experiments

AND WHAT DID WE LEARN? The Insights

The Concept

W H AT I S T H E P L A N

AND WHO ARE THE THE MASTERMINDS BEHIND IT When we first got the lighter into our hands, all kinds of stuff went through our heads. We must make a confession... These thoughts were mainly concerns because we kinda knew that we cannot just burn and destroy the lighter and make something completely new out of it.

After an initial panic attack, our creative minds finally took over. After a quick session of just staring at our lighters and doing all kinds of weird things with it, we got an idea that we wanted to explore and pursue!

Figure 1a: Our first brainstorming session. 3

Figure 1b: Our first brainstorming session.

different designs in different periods of time. Beside that she explored the UX of the BIC lighter and how to use them.

We were determined that we want to explore not just existing but also non-existing uses of the BIC lighter. What was our first step? Getting to know the BIC lighter! We made sure to equally split the work on this one!

Raphaëlle, our fourth mastermind, dived into preparation of some interesting questions for the phase two of our plan, which we will reveal a bit later.

Our mastermind Špela made sure to get as much insight into the BIC physics as possible. From measuring the width, height and even the weight of the lighters!

Finally, our last mastermind, Andrea, got all creative with doing some research on how are lighters being used in art. I mean... We had no idea that you can use the lighter to set a fricking fire to the bank of France! We bet you did not know this one as well!

The second mastermind, Alicia, did a pretty good job with learning everything that there is to know about the technical stuff, like the lighter components and safety measures.

We made sure to compile all this useful and insightful data into a fun educational form to enlighten and educate the others: the KAHOOT game!

Our third mastermind, Olena, worked on the design history of the BIC lighters. She made sure to give us an insight into 4

The User Research

B U T W H AT D O E S

A LIGHTER DO?! Beside these questions, we also kindly asked our users to show us how they are using the lighter.

The phase two covered a very important topic for our idea: the user research! Of course, we could have brainstorm on what we use the lighter for inside our team but could we then really call ourselves the interaction designers? We think not and that is why we made sure to involve a broader and more objective range of users!

A lot of our users connected the lighter to words like fire, hotness, smokers, cigarettes and candles. Believe it or not, many of our participants use the lighter to light the candles. Among of other interesting findings, we learned that a lot of people actually lose the lighters or borrow them to other people before they can finish them.

Each one of our masterminds conducted 4–5 (very) short user interviews. (BTW, one of our masterminds, Raphaëlle, prepared some really interesting questions for our participants, which are):

On the next page, you can take a look at our beautiful illustrations, which represent the things, our users mentioned that they are using the lighter for. They were thoughtfully prepared by our mastermind Raphaëlle.

1. What does the BIC lighter evoque to you? 2. What would you use it for? 3. Did you ever buy a lighter? 4. Did you ever finish one? 5

The Experiments

W H AT D O YO U M E A N

THERE IS MORE TO IT?!

Our masterminds came up with some pretty cool, creative and funny ideas. That is why we decided to compile them into a short video, which we named “life hacks” because let’s be honest, they are exactly that!

After doing so much research it was about time to do some experiments. So, until this point, we had a pretty good clue about what the lighters are being used for but we needed more... We really wanted to know what else we can use the lighters for (beside the other obvious things you use the lighters for).

It is worth mentioning that our teammate, Andrea, took care of putting this short video together for you!

Our team again made sure to equally split the work here as well. Each one of us had to think of a few other (more creative) uses of the BIC lighter. We for sure had to think out of the box on this one! Beside just thinking and writing down our ideas, we all filmed them as well.

Raphaëlle again prepared some very lovely illustrations which show our creative, out of the box lighter uses. We also linked the video there for you, so make sure you do not skip the next two pages!

The Story / More Experiments

THE BIG STORY

OF THE BIC LIGHTER

FOREWORD

about the lighter itself. What is the story of the BIC lighter? What kind of feelings is it going through? Does it even have feelings?

Until this point, we kinda already called ourselves the BIC lighter professionals. I mean, you must agree that we showed you some interesting and creative things in our previous chapters.

That is why we came up with an interesting and emotional story of our BIC lighter which we put together into a short movie. But that is not all, we went even a step further. Since we are all interaction designers, why not make the movie... Yes, you guessed it: INTERACTIVE!

So, we informed you what lighters are usually used for and we also presented to you our own ideas, how the lighters can also be used for. However, we were still missing our core story. That is why we started thinking even deeper.

Are you wondering how we split the work here as well? Don’t worry. We got you!

We realised that hitherto we only looked at this challenge from our own (user) perspective and we completely forgot 10

Figure 2: Sneak peek into our storyboard.

really captivating background music and various sound effects. She even added different facial expressions to our main character!

Our masterminds, Alicia and Andrea, worked on creating this amazing script for our interactive movie. Raphaëlle put to work (again) her illustration skills on our storyboard, so that our teammate Olena could easily film the video. We must not forget about Alicia again, since she played a major role in the movie itself!

And who managed to finally create the interactive video? Well, that was Alicia as well! And what did Špela do, you wonder? Well, she is the one writing and creating this book for you and making sure that nothing is omitted!

One of our friends, Phil, was kind enough to borrow us and record his voice for the main character: the BIC lighter.

With all that being said, we think it is time for you to read our story and participate in it! Now, sit tight and prepare yourself to dive into the big story of the BIC lighter: How I met your owner?

Moreover, Olena worked really hard on making the movie more interesting. She managed that by adding some 11

HOW I MET YOUR OWNER? us quite fast because of our safety and quality at a good price. I was almost always used to light the kitchen fire. It was a great feeling because I was always left near the fire and felt the warmth and smell of the family’s delicious dishes.”

It is 2021 and Bic the lighter is about to tell his life story to two small lighters. “Well kids, come closer!” he says. “I think today is a good day to tell you a story of how I met your owner.” He goes on: “As you know, I am already pretty old. I’ve been in a lot of places and I’ve had a lot of different owners... Everything started in the year 1978, when a young man decided to buy me in a little shop in Paris, France. Those were good times” he adds. “BIC lighters had just come onto the market but people were beginning to trust

Bic proudly continues his story by telling the kids about his past adventures: “They were always using me, and when they didn’t, I was always left near the window and I could see the Eiffel Tower in the background and many Parisians walking in the streets.”

Bic was often used for lighting candles, heating the water and for lighting the fire of a fire place as well. He really loved being a part of these uses!

You decide how the story will go on! You now how the power to steer the story! You can choose between two possibilities that relate to the type of the new owner:

Bic, however, soons starts to show some signs of sadness and worry. “But those were the best times for me as a lighter. We were young and new, everyone wanted to have us at home... It was from the year 2000 onwards that everything started to change. My magnificent owner decided to give me as a present to one of his nephews...”

1. Nephew that smokes weed / go to page 14 2. Nephew that doesn’t use him at all / go to page 15

Nephew that smokes weed Bic now with sadness in his eyes remembers all the bad times with the new owner. Bic was forced to wear all kinds of weird tattoos and was often feeling high from lighting too many joints... He did not like this at all...

unhappiness of living almost breathless in a broken pocket.” Bic carries on with his story about these dark times with the new owner: “Occasionally I could feel the warmth of a campfire. My owner was a delinquent, and it is true that lighting containers in the street was not the nicest thing to do, but at that moment I could feel for a few minutes the air of the street and the warmth of the fire again.”

“I was only used to light cigarettes or joints” he says. “The smell of these elements made me dizzy all the time, and sometimes I saw blurred and abstract images of my former owner. It was only at that moment that a small ray of happiness would appear. But after a few minutes, everything returned to darkness and the

You can now continue to page 16.

Owner that doesn’t use him at all Bic recalls the lonely times with this new owner, where he spent most of the time in a really dark drawer full of spoons, knives and forks.

Bic continues: “Sometimes I could see the light for a few seconds when my owner picked me up and then put me back in a dark place... his backpack, and I never understood why he carried me in his backpack, because he never used me. At some point I heard him say it was a strategy for flirting with girls who smoke, but this never happened. “

“Those were dark years, literally” he utters. “I spent almost 20 years in a drawer. Nobody used me” says Bic with a really sad voice. “The kitchens had the new induction system, so they didn’t need me anymore for cooking... My new owner was healthy and didn’t smoke, so I couldn’t feel the street air either.”

You can now continue to page 16.

arrived to her house, I could see a small, clean and cozy apartment with a lot of light and plants...”

“But don’t worry kids, the story gets better” says Bic with a twinkle in his eye. “After those dark years, my owner lost me in a trash bin, and I ended in the middle of nowhere between trash. The smell wasn’t quite good, but at least I could feel the air for a moment” he adds.

Bic continues telling the story: ”I couldn’t recognise the view but at some point, my new owner said that we were in Graz, Austria. That same night, I could see her talking with her screen. She was saying something like: “I found a pretty cool one in the middle of the street”. To my surprise, the screen responded with different voices. Everyone sounded so happy.”

“One day, I think it was around 2021, a really nice young woman picked me up with curiosity and brought me to her house. I have to admit that I was quite scared at the beginning, but when we

All of this was quite new to our old fellow Bic, however he was quite intrigued. “I heard something about a new project they had to do for university, where they needed to analyse a lighter. I was really scared, because they started talking about opening me. I was old, but I didn’t want to die” he discloses.

our adventure started“ says Bic happily. “After all those days of being alone and sad, I could finally be used again!” Bic lighter was finally feeling useful and happy again. He was being used in some really creative ways. He was for example being used for opening bottles, stiring coffee, playing with animals and even for painting! He also loved being used as a shoe horn – he did not mind the smell at all!

Soon after, the girl brought home two more lighters but smaller ones. “Days passed by, and one day, you came. And

“Well kids, you know the rest of the story. I know I am not the most fancy and the prettiest lighter, but I still have a very long and used life. And don’t worry, even if you’re smaller it doesn’t matter. I am sure we are going to be used as long as we work!”

SCAN ME!

Psst! You can also take a look at our story in a form of an interactive video.

Girl slowly approaches the lighters with a smile on her face. “Oh! Be careful!” whispers Bic. “She is coming, pretend you’re not alive!”

The Insights

A N D W H AT D I D

WE LEARN?

We did our best to make sure to work on this project from two different perspectives: our own (the user) perspective and the lighter perspective.

We will never look at lighters the same way as we did before, that is for sure! I mean, who knew, that there are so many different and unusual things that one can do with a lighter.

Finally, while working on this project we definitely learned one important but simple lesson: looks and size don’t really matter here. The only important thing is that it works!

Through the whole project, from the initial research, the user research, fun experiments and then to the final, big story, we realised that when it comes to lighters, anything is possible. There is literally no limit when creativity and lighters join forces! We hope that we proved this to you with our book as well. 19

NOT EVERYTHING

IS ABOUT

SIZE

& L O O K S

as long as it works!

The story of ﬁre Lucía Pérez Diego Antoine Dessaint Fridtjof Agnalt Ole Petter Klæstad

Contents Experiments Concepts (Making of) Story

Experimentation "You are a lighter, I'm not a smoker. How is this relationship going to work?"

From creating a new BIC Frankenstein to turning it into a musical instrument and conceiving a new game where the lighter was the main protagonist, we got to discover the magic behind this object of our everyday lives

To better understand what we had on our hands and its hidden possibilities, we got down to work and "de-design" our BIC lighter, finding a thousand new functions to it.

PLaying board games

Recreating the original bic pen

Making jewelery Opening our beer

Cooking

Making Legos Playing the cello

We observed how the Bic lighter was as versatile as duct tape, if not more. We decided to use this super strenght to its full power. By not using all it’s abilities seperately, but rather combined, we figured it would result in a super show

Concepts (making of) How we listened to the Bic and told its story.

The sound of Bic

A sparkeling burst of heat converting air into flames. Disapering back into it’s hard plastic shell to later reappear. Sure sounds quite harmonic doesn’t it?

Atleast that’s what we thought. “Better get recording straigth away” said Lucia. With her expertise in music she started sampling all the noises of a bic lighter imaginable.

The result, a fiery album consisting of eight unique soundtracks. More iconic and catchy than the Titanic pieces. hope you were there to hear it..

The sound of fire sparked another idea of ours. What if we try to catch a digital representation of the soundtrack itself.

Antoine immediately opened up his Max8 Software. By catching the soundwaves of the soundtracks he managed to somehow interpret their movements on a screen in realtime.

The result was a flame-alike representation of the sound. We had somehow interpreted the flame in a digital format where it once again danced in front of us.

Visuals

The visuals of fire dancing on a screen was intizing. Our story wouldn’t be complete without a lighter-powered slideshow. Ole Petter cut holes in paper where the shadows of the Bic flame appeared. He shut the door to his toilet and watched how the pictures revealed themselves.

The history of ﬁre With this material at hand we were sure we had to tell the story of the flame. Setting fire to our evolution it sure is an important story to tell. Fridtjof grabbed his typewriter and locked the door..

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The Story The evolution of fire

The spark No one is quite sure how humans first came into contact with fire. However there are theories that fire is what made us human in the first place. Cooked food gave us access to cheaper calories, allowing our brains, what sets us apart from the animals, to grow. In this way the story of humans and fire are deeply entagled. From the Inuits of Greenland to the Pirahas of

“Fire is the first school ever. Storytelling took place around the campfires, and it was a tool for survival not just entertainment.

Other than cooking, fire also allowed us to increasingly shape the world around us. Starting with scorching wood to make it easier to shape, to ceramics and finally early metals. Fire unlocked new ways to shape the world around us.

Ignition The tools fire unlocked made it possible to transition from nomadic life to farming. Over time this led to small cities and villages being built. Civilization had begun, but fire was still an integral part of everyday life.

Through the societies of civilization the world became increasingly more complex, fire also took on symbolic significance. From the Greek Prometheus, bringer of fire and preserver of humanity to Christianitys fiery depths of hell.

As time went on fire’s destructive power became more and more apparent. The invention of gunpowder changed the rules of war as fire made an explosive debut on the battlefield.

Fire From civilizations' humble beginnings it was becoming more and more clear that fire was foe as well as friend. Nowhere could this be seen more clearly than in the Great fire of London in 1666. After starting in a bakery the fire raged for four days, making 70 out of the 80 thousand inhabitants homeless.

However the world went on and with the industrial revolution fire would change the world once more. Great steam engines powered trains and big machines pushing the boundaries of humanity and changing society forever.

Following the industrial revolution our lives became more and more intertwined with that of machines. The electrification of society became inevitable and soon we could enjoy warmth and light without the smoke and flame. However, in large parts of the world, the fire raged on in the powerplants.

Collapse Great changes in society and more destructive technology than ever was the perfect storm. The last century was plagued by the biggest wars this world has ever witnessed. Fire propelling every single bullet.

The war ended with fire taking on its most destructive form yet. Two giant fireballs created by slamming together rare metals uncovered deep in the earth. How far we had strayed from the warmth of the campfire.

As much damage as it had done, fire remained ambiguous. Powering the engines of the machines that rebuilt society.

Today we produce fire by the flick of a switch. It remains vital to us. Warming our homes and for many producing the electricity we now take for granted. It powers our cars and provides comfort. Fire has been tamed and perhaps with it, humanity.

Watch it come together https://youtu.be/D4im5UtTQn4

PROJECT WORK 1 · CMS21

The BIC Lighter – A story about mankind Marlene Dirnberger Hannah Nopp Alexandra Samandarova Marton Szabo-Kass

Introduction Inspired by the book „Apple: Learning to Design, Designing to Learn“ by the japanese author Ken Miki, we were given the task to take a deep dive into analyzing, exploring and de-designing a simple everyday product – the disposable BIC® lighter. So – for the sake of science – we started with a comprehensive background research of the product and the BIC® company itself. Based on our findings we experimented with the BIC® lighter in as many ways as possible: In order to discover it‘s hidden qualities and capacities we took the lighter apart and put it back together, burned it, froze it, buried it, painted it and much more (Sidenote: As playing with fire can get dangerous very quickly, we made sure that our experiments were done safely). In the end, we created a whole new story around the BIC® lighter, in which it plays an important role for the future of mankind. Sounds interesting? Well, it is! But before we come to the storytelling part, we need to start at the beginning.

Research We started our BIC® lighter de-design project by doing a comprehensive research in the following areas: Technology & functionality, Production, Safety & quality assurance, Sustainability, The brand BIC®, Look & feel and Fire in history, culture & religion. We collected a lot of interesting stuff about and around our product, of which we will only show a very tiny part on the next few pages.

Technology & functionality Spark wheel

Guard Hood Fork

Flint

Fork Spring

Jet Valve

Flint Spring

Body

Base Ball

A classic BIC® lighter consists of twelve components and works like this: When the safety guard is pushed down and the spark wheel is rotated by the thumb, sparks are created due to the friction between the spark wheel and the flint. After turning the wheel, the fork needs to be pushed down to bring the valve upwards to release a tiny amount of butane, which is stored in the body under pressure in its liquid form and turns into gas when released. The butane is then ignited by the sparks and a ﬂame is produced.

Production Five million BIC® lighters are produced per day. Lighters distributed in Europe are produced in Spain and France.

Safety & quality assurance Every BIC® lighter produced in Europe undergoes 50+ quality and safety controls. They also meet or even exceed the ISO 9994 international safety standard, which defines safety specifications of a lighter such as maximum flame height, resistance to elevated temperatures etc. Lighters distributed in Europe are also child-resistant, due to a small safety guard over the spark wheel.

Sustainability BIC® lighters are disposable and can not be refilled. That makes them not really sustainable at first glance. But what distinguishes BIC®‘s lighters from other cheap disposable products is their high quality and long durability, which can also be seen as an aspect of sustainability. For example a BIC® Maxi lighter can be lighted up to 3000 times. BIC® also has set sustainability goals regarding energy-, water-, packaging-usage etc and is a partner of TerraCycle, a pioneer in collecting and re-using non-recyclable waste.

The Brand BIC® The company was founded in 1945 in France by Marcel Bich (which explains the name „BIC“). The logo shows the letters B I C and a school boy who‘s head is replaced by the ball of a pen. The CI colors are black and orange (Pantone 1235C). BIC® is mainly known for their ballpens, razors and lighters.

Look & feel of a BIC® lighter BIC® lighters come in many shapes and colors: The pocket lighter range includes Classic, Mini, Maxi and Electronic. Then there is also the EZ Reach and the Multi purpose.

Fire in history, culture & religion The discovery of fire by the homo erectus is often considered as the beginning of human society. The usage of fire also sets humans apart from other living beings. Fire was also worshipped in ancient greece/greek mythodology (i.e. four elements or the story of Prometheus) and egypt (god „Ra“ of sun and fire). From a symbolic point of view fire has beneficial (i.e. passion, freedom, etc.) and harmful (i.e. destruction, death, etc.) powers. It‘s also seen as a spiritual element in many religions (i.e. fire in hell, presence of god, etc.). In linguistics, fire is often used in metaphors and phrases like „burning for something“ or „she has fire in her eyes“. But fire and lighters play also an important role in daily life – thinking of campfires, asking someone for a lighter, holding one up at a concert or opening a beer with it.

The lighter‘s secret So far so good, research done. We sat down together to discuss our findings and recognized one special thing about a lighter: It combines all four elements. Fire is self explaining, but air, earth and water do not seem obvious at first. Let us explain: To produce a flame (FIRE), there must be oxygen and burning gas (AIR), which is stored in the lighter‘s body (EARTH) in its liquid form (WATER). According to the „theory of the four elements“ all beings on earth are made out of these elements mixed in a specific ratio. As this is true for the BIC® lighter, we decided to build our story on that. Four elements, four group members, each with their zodiac sign in a different element – Destiny?

Experiments Based on our enlightenment about the four elements, we took a deep dive into experimenting with the lighter in as many ways as possible – As unconventional, radical and creative as we could get.

SHADOW GAMES

01—Air

THE BALLOON

DROWNING SEQUENCE

LIGHTER AESTHETIC

02—Water

T H E B OAT

U N D E R WAT E R

FROZEN

03—Earth

„ E A R T H “ ( TA K E A C LO S E LO O K )

ERDBEERMANTEL*

LOST IN THE JUNGLE

* These wordgames only work in german (sorry english speaking folks!), because the german word for „Earth“ is „Erde“.

BURIED ALIVE

ERDNUSSMANTEL*

„DAS GLÜCK DER ERDE LIEGT AUF DEM RÜCKEN DER PFERDE“*

„ U M M A N T E LT “ – A S E R I E S *

F I R E F I LT E R

M E LT E D

04—Fire

FIRE IN ALCHEMY M E LT I N G I T

A story about mankind

[dramatic music]

„At the beginning of time, the world was in balance. Everything consisted of four elements.“

„Air,…“

„The elements took care of new „But humans have moved away from the balance that once life ever since. And so they existed.“ created human beings and gave them free will.“

„So the elements became furious and sent signs to the mankind.“

„But humans did not listen nor learn from their mistakes.“

„…looks…“

„It…“

As a next step we made the four elements the main characters of a whole new story about mankind and created a video:

„…Water,…“

„…Earth,…“

„…and Fire.“

„Is this really the faith of the human species?“

„The elements are willing to make their last attempt to remind humans of a seemingly forgotten concept.“

[footage speaks for itself]

„…hopeless.“

BIC – Believe In Circularity So the four elements made their way to planet earth to make their last attempt to bring humans back on the right path. They met with a group of chosen ones – the Interaction Design students of CMS21 – in order to remind them of a seemingly forgotten concept: Circular economy.

What is a circular economy? In our current linear economy, we take materials from the earth, make products from them, and throw them away as waste. In a circular economy (also known as „circularity“ or „CE“), we stop waste being produced in the first place. A CE employs reuse, sharing, repair, refurbishment, remanufacturing and recycling to create a closed-loop system, minimising the use of resource inputs and the creation of waste, pollution and carbon emissions. It follows three principles, driven by design: eliminate waste and pollution, keep products and materials in use and regenerate natural systems.

Circular economy Linear economy

End-of-(ﬁrst) life

Circularity begins with everyday products… like a lighter Starting with deconstructing the ligther we asked ourselves „Which materials can be reused or obtained from another already existing product?“ We came up with two exemplary cycles how a BIC® lighter can become circular. The metal The metal used for the hood or guard could be obtained from burnt-out tea lights, as the part to which the candle wick is attached, is made of high quality metal. The plastic From the plastic of a lighter‘s body filament for 3D printing could be made. As 3D printing becomes more advanced, old lighter bodies could become art pieces, machine parts or even organs.

Logo redesigns We adapted the BIC® logo to fit our concept, so that each element is represented with a single logo. But since the four elements need to be in balance, we see the original logo as a superordinate symbol for those four together.

Air

Water

Earth

Fire

From now on, whenever you see a BIC® lighter, think about keeping our world circular. Your destiny is in your hands. Literally.

Who are we blallalalalalala

Colin Kavanagh

Nikolaos Goutzeris

For this project, we had to discover and rediscover a BIC lighter

Kerstin Slany

Ebba Bergström

Our main character

to this project was the Bic lighte

Who is BIC? Fire Rage Flirt Bon5re Small Power

Olympic 5re Communication Control Death Burn Warmth Fire songs Electricity Social Safty Disinfection Art tool Structure Heat up Opener Valuable Fear

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Conversl

When you can carry a lighter with you, you can smoke where ever you are, until its empties. Previously with re, people gathered around the on re not only to keep yourself warm ut to also gather around other people. Fire can start a converstion, and the rst step is to have the re around you.

“Do you have a lighter?” is a classic line that someone would say if they want to start a conversation with someone and they take a guess that they either are a smoker or carries a lighter. For this group, we do not support smoking, ut there is something pleasing when looking into someone is smoking and the smoke.

Blowing out smoke from a cigettret creates a pattern that is organic and looks different everytime. It has an aestetich feeling to it that makes us calm.

THE FIRE ENEMY

B B B B B B

BURN IT DOWN BURN IT DOWN BURN IT DOW BURN IT DOWN BURN IT DOWN BURN IT DOWN For this experiment we wanted to see how the BIC lighter reacted to burn around materials that was covered with something that resists fre.. Hand cream was one enemy that would resist fre and we had control over the fre movement.

Since we wanted to continue with the fre is a “communication starter” another communitative tool is typhography.

Patterns

Control and prepared

THE MESS

Why tyaogoaahy? As aoeviously mentioned, foe has aeen seen as eitheo a way to keea you waom oo a way to gatheo aeoale aoound you. So what does the BIC lighteo and tyaogoaahy have in common? he BIC lighteo is a way to staot a conveosation to someone with sound and tyaogoaahy is a way to staot a conveosation ay woods. Comaining these two and you can coeate youo own tyaogoaahy.

By using a foe oesitance mateoial and the BIC lighteo, we wheoe aale to contool the foe and coeate aatteons on aieces of aaaeo. o have some soot of stouctoe, we wanted to use the same font design as the BIC ligtheo seems to have, which is Lato.

Fire in music

Music in conversation Sgttgag

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Ring of fir

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Hravrn’s on fir

Fiir on fir Wr WiWn’t stait ttr fir

Giil on fir

BxRv It

Fiir irs Buining

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Sound Production

To txptesmtnt what ksnd of sound a BIC lsghtte could do and cetatt a convtesatson staette mussc. Tht BIC lsghtte may cetatt a tsny sound but st’s not to small to not gtt notscts. To peovt thats wt addtd sn sounds wavts to show that tht BIC can staet a convtesatson wsth othte mattesals. Wt testd out wsth othte BIC lsghttess tht fet etsssttess boxts and lsghtsng up.

Daniel Schwarz, Pavlo Vytkalov, Katharina Diem & Johanna Lielacher Zuckerl as a Unit