The Tools for Everyday Life project is a practice based exploration of how the connection the skilled maker has with their tools can inspire the creation of products that meaningfully connect users to everyday tasks.

The Tools for Everyday Life designers are drawn from the community of practice that surrounds the BA(HONS) 3D Design Programme and post-graduate Designers in Residence scheme at Northumbria University.

This project is informed by the craftsperson’s sensitivity to materials and processes and the value ascribed to the workmanship of risk. When much contemporary product design practice is concerned with the development of products activated by an effortless gesture, glance or digitally accumulated data, the research project explores what might be gained by designing and making everyday products that promote the active rather than passive involvement of the user to the task at hand. 

Since 2011 the project has generated products that encourage users to viscerally engage in commonplace activities.

With overt reference to the tools and equipment used by by both craft and industrial makers, artefacts are proposed that acknowledge everyday life consists of innumerable skilled actions to be celebrated.

The results have been showcased throughout the world at trade fairs, galleries and design festivals.