Connor Laurilla

Industrial Design

Hi, I’m Connor, an industrial designer focused on creating meaningful connections between people and products through thoughtful, user-centered design. Throughout my design journey, I’ve been particularly interested in exploring the emotional impact of objects and how materials, textures, and colour can enhance user experience. I aim to combine my technical knowledge with my appreciation for clean, minimal aesthetics to create my own unique design style in products, always exploring the balance between form and function.

Solace

Solace is a light alarm clock that mimics sunlight and uses thoughtful user interactions to create a relaxing space in your home. This project aims to bring the benefits of natural light to those who do not get enough sunlight in their home, and help those who struggle with insomnia to improve overall sleep quality and mood. Solace uses magnets and sensors to control the light intensity and direction, offering a unique user experience.

Moss

Designed for industry partner, About Space Lighting. Moss is a pendant light for both residential and commercial settings, incorporating nature into spaces while offering noise dampening properties. Moss uses felt sheets to reduce echo and reverb and can be customised in colour and size to fit any space.

Gemini

Designed for industry partner, Country Road Home. Gemini is an elevated dog feeder that fits into any modern home. Made from casted ceramics, Gemini uses common parts which makes manufacturing more efficient. Gemini can be customised to the user's preference, offering different coloured ceramics as well as anodised stainless steel bowls.

Torii

Inspired by Japanese Torii Gates, Torii is an elevated dog platform that takes away the strain of dog grooming while being an aesthetic piece for any household. The elevated platform allows the dog to stand taller which help the user groom the dog without needing to bend over. Torii, much like Japanese wood joinery, does not need any screws to assemble, instead the plywood sheets are slotted into each other which locks it into place.

Design Hackathon | E-Bike Prototyping

In collaboration with Hongik University in Seoul, South Korea, and designers from Hyundai KIA Motors, Genesis, and LG, we undertook a 2-week intensive prototyping project. Groups of students were provided an E-Bike and tasked with building a body on top of the existing frame. Being apart of the build team, I worked on foundation of the body as well as the surfacing.

Acknowledgement of Country

The School of Design and Architecture respectfully acknowledges the Wurundjeri peoples of the Kulin Nation as the Traditional Owners and knowledge-keepers of the lands, waters and sky that surround us, where we work, learn, create, communicate and make place. We recognise that sovereignty has never been ceded and this always was and will always be Wurundjeri Country. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who continue to make a better world through design.

We extend our acknowledgement to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff, students, alumni, real-life clients, and knowledge keepers, who have contributed to our own education diversity and growth. We will continue to ensure that staff and students respectfully honour ancestral connection to Country and Place in everything that they do.

We are dedicated to the notion of design to make a better world and we acknowledge that making tools, shaping place, sharing stories, making meaning, wayfinding and collaborating have long been and continue to be both central and integral to First Peoples' cultures. We recognize that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ cultural contributions have continued relevance to design practice and commit to: reconciling ancestries of design and contemporary practice as well as pursuing culturally and professionally appropriate ways to engage with a diverse population of colleagues, industries and clients. In a time of treaty-making and voice we understand that there are overlaps between caring for Country and the sustainable production of goods, services, experiences, products and buildings.

Guided by the principles of respect, reconciliation, and reciprocity we undertake to indigenising and decolonising design practice by dismantling colonial structures and challenging biases that have marginalised Indigenous voices and design.

As students of SoDA you will be given opportunities to both engage with and educate yourself in Indigenous creative practices and cultural protocols through a lens of inclusivity, diversity, respect, mutual understanding, inter-cultural dialogue in all aspects of design practice. Indigenous people have been telling stories, making tools, and connecting to Country through visual media, placemaking and place marking for more than 60,000 years and these practices are part of an ongoing, evolving and live tradition.