The Japanese studio Nendo has achieved master-status in turning everyday objects into something extraordinary! Their constant reinventions have always left us wanting more. This time ‘a simple white bowl’ was their starting point, leading to the creation of the Kakao Friends Homekit, a collection of contemporary smart home appliances with a companion app. It’s a mobile app, making it easy to access your products anywhere, at any time! Inspired by Kakao Friends, the original characters of Korea’s largest messenger app “Kakao Talk”, these simple yet totally adorable objects include seven products: a body scale, a humidifier, a thermometer, an alarm, a sensor, and an air purifier. All the objects share a continuous aesthetic theme, even though they each possess a unique silicon ‘icon’ which symbolizes their different functions. Another element that groups them together as a family is their soft feel factor, the absence of any hard edges and the overall soothing texture they possess. Let’s dive a little deeper into them!
Designers: Nendo x Kakao Friends
The cloud-inspired Smart Scale records and tracks users’ weight changes. The scale’s icon a ‘cloud’ symbolizes the desire to be lightweight. Puffy and cotton candy-like, the body scale will literally give you the sensation of “walking on clouds”, while you enjoy managing your weight with a series of super friendly feedback animations.
The collection also includes an adorable little humidifier! The humidifier’s icon is ‘vapor’. With a simple white bowl as it’s base, Nendo chose a muted lilac for the ‘vapor’, enhancing the soft feel of the item. Humidifies a room, and looks cute? We’re all in for this product!
Not an early bird? Well, your mornings are going to be a little less gloomy with Nendo’s Kakao Friends alarm clock. Waking up on time won’t seem such a task with this little bird chirping out your daily alarm! The color accents on each piece, including the butter yellow on the alarm, are inspired by the characters of Kakao Friends.
Falling sick is the last thing any of us want to deal with in our busy lives! However, Nendo’s quirky little thermometer does manage to put a smile on our faces. Modeled after the ‘perspiration’ that is produced on catching a fever, the droplet-shaped thermometer is truly one of a kind.
Continuing to weave a playful story around each product, Nendo decided to shape their sensor after a periscope. Though it may look little, that does not affect its functionality nor its ability to look out for us!
Here, Nendo has diverted from their bowl on the bottom design, and instead placed the bowl on top for the Kakao Friends lamp. The lamp has a ‘ray of light’ extending from the bowl, illuminating any room it could be placed in.
For the baby pink air cleaner, a ‘flower’ that flutters in the wind was selected as the icon. The visual of a flower fluttering in the air instills the image of a fresh clean breeze in our heads, adding on to the lithe aura of the air cleaner.
Minimalistic, soft and highly functional, Nendo’s Kakao Friends Homekit is exactly the collection of accessories we need to add a touch of pastel color and mellow aesthetics to our homes!
