PRESS RELEASE
14 June 2007
A design for adding folding handlebars to bikes is one of the winners of the BSI Sustainability Design Awards 2007.
Joe Wentworth, a student graduating with an MA in Design Products from the Royal College of Art (RCA), is one of this year’s winners of BSI’s Sustainability Design Awards 2007 for his retrofit folding handlebar design. His design aims to encourage cycling which is a sustainable and pollution free method of transport.
A keen cyclist and a lifelong Londoner, Joe is only too aware of the storage and crime issues faced by cyclists living in densely populated urban environments. He said, “You might start off keeping your bike in the hallway because it’s convenient and safe. But after a while it becomes an annoyance, always getting in the way, getting knocked over as the handlebars stick out. Then you move it to the shed and never use your bike again!”
Once fitted with Joe’s retrofit handlebars a bike will sit more comfortably in tight spaces such as a hallway and negates the need for purchasing a folding bike at considerable expense. Additionally, the cost to the environment in producing a new bike is much greater than a pair of folding handlebars.
When not in use the handlebars lock in the folded position creating a steering lock providing an additional theft deterrent.
The retrofit design has been prototyped and is undergoing initial testing. Joe’s design is equally suited for integration with new bikes at the manufacturing stage and he is looking for interest from manufacturers.
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Read about the folding handlebars on the BBC website
NOTES TO EDITORS
For further information please email Joe Wentworth.
• Joe Wentworth is from London and is a final year student at the Royal College of Art (RCA), London, studying Design Products.
• Other winners of the BSI Sustainability Design Awards 2007 are Andreas Zachariah for his “Carbon Hero™” personal carbon calculator, and Ben Storan who won first prize for his new design for an affordable personal wind turbine that is more suitable for the urban environment.
• To interview Joe Wentworth or other winners please contact Marc Edney, BSI Group Press Office on +44 (0)20 8996 6330 (24 hours).
• Press are invited to pre-view all winning designs on 14 June 2007, at the Great Exhibition 2007: The RCA Summer Show.
About the BSI Sustainability Design Awards
The BSI Sustainability Design Awards support design projects that promote awareness of sustainability issues or provide sustainable solutions. Now in their 13th year, the Awards are open to all students studying at the Royal College of Art.
The Awards help students find out more about their chosen subjects while learning about the relevance of sustainability issues to design. Prize money is used to help research and realise projects.
Past winners include: Peter Brewin for his high performance water-saving shower – The El Nino – which uses 70 per cent less water and 40 per cent less energy than a conventional shower; and Will Crawford and Peter Brewin for “The Concrete Canvas” – a rapidly deployable hardened shelter for use by aid agencies in disaster regions. This ‘building in a bag’ won the $100,000 first prize in the Saatchi & Saatchi 2005 Award for World Changing Ideas.
About The Royal College of Art
The Royal College of Art is the world’s only wholly postgraduate university of art and design, specialising in teaching and research and offering the degrees of MA, MPhil and PhD across the disciplines of fine art, applied art, design, communications and humanities. There are over 850 masters and doctoral students and more than a hundred professionals interacting with them – including scholars, leading art and design practitioners, along with specialists, advisors and distinguished visitors. Alumni include Tracey Emin, David Hockney, Peter Blake and James Dyson. Read more.
The Great Exhibition 2007: The RCA Summer Show
Friday 15 June – Thursday 28 June. Free Admission
To celebrate the 150th anniversary of the establishment of the Exhibition Road area, which was created following the Great Exhibition of 1851, the RCA will be holding an even more spectacular Summer Show than usual in a huge tent in Kensington Gardens, running simultaneously with an exhibition in the College galleries. Supported by generous sponsorship from The Conran Foundation and located near the site of the original Great Exhibition of 1851, the extra space will enable the RCA to show the work of the entire College’s graduates at the same time. The show will feature the work of over 400 students from the Schools of Fine & Applied Art, Architecture & Design, Communications, Fashion & Textiles and Humanities.
Opening Hours: 12 noon - 9pm daily except for Tuesday 26 June when the exhibition will close at 5pm. Read more.
Innovation Night, Tuesday 26 June 2007, at the Royal College of Art gives business and research partners the opportunity to meet the innovators of the future. On show will be the work of graduating RCA students from the Schools of Architecture and Design, Communications, Fashion and Textiles, and Humanities. In addition there are prestigious award events to attend, including the BSI Sustainability Design Awards 2007, and a review of InnovationRCA. At the heart of the evening is the Innovation Lecture which this year is being given by Bruce Nussbaum, Managing Editor of Business Week, speaking on global innovation trends. Read more.
About BSI
Having pioneered the environmental management system ISO 14001, BSI Group has increasingly developed a leading role in the environment and sustainability fields. BSI undertakes work in environmental data verification including Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG), waste and discharges as well as offering assessments of Social Accountability management systems which assure working conditions in the supply chain.
In May 2007 BSI announced it was working with Carbon Trust and Defra to develop a standard method for measuring the embodied GHG emissions in products and services which will enable companies to measure the GHG related impacts of their products and services and reduce them accordingly. The standard will ensure a consistent and comparable approach to supply chain measurement of embodied GHGs across markets. Read more.
In 2006 BSI published the standard BS 8900 Guidance for managing sustainable development which will assist organisations in developing an enduring balanced approach to economic activity, environmental responsibility and social progress. The standard will enable organisations to develop an approach to sustainable development that will continue to evolve and adapt to meet new challenges and demands. Read more.
BSI Group is a global independent business services organisation that inspires confidence and delivers assurance to customers with standards-based solutions. Originating as the world’s first national standards body, the Group has over 2,250 staff operating in over 100 countries through more than 50 global offices. The Group’s key offerings are:
• The development and sale of private, national and international standards and supporting information
• Second and third-party management systems assessment and certification
• Product testing and certification of services and products
• Performance management software solutions
• Training services in support of standards implementation and business best practice.
