WO2017021839A1

WO2017021839A1 - Design system and method for the realisation and composition of interior furnishings

Info

Publication number: WO2017021839A1
Application number: PCT/IB2016/054545
Authority: WO
Inventors: Antonio SQUEO
Original assignee: Kitchen Lifting
Priority date: 2015-08-05
Filing date: 2016-07-29
Publication date: 2017-02-09
Also published as: WO2017021838A1

Abstract

A modular system (100) for the design and selection of components for the realization of furnishings comprising a first module (HJ-EN) configured for performing a three-dimensional drawing of furnishing, a second module (HJ-AS) configured for the execution of the orders of the drawn and personalized components through the first module, a third interface and control module (HJ-TOT) comprising a controller with a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse are connected, the system being characterized in that said third interface and control module (HJ-TOT) is configured to manage with said first module (HJ-EN) the design of the furnishing and to manage with said second module (HJ-AS) an automatic and complete order for all the individual components drawn, even in the case in which said individual components are made by different suppliers.

Description

DESIGN SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR THE REALISATION AND

COMPOSITION OF INTERIOR FURNISHINGS DESCRIPTION

Technical field of the invention

Subject of the present invention is an innovative modular system and method for designing and selecting hardware components for the realization and composition of interior furnishings.

State of the art

As it is known, the manufacturing and assembly processes of furniture can be classified in two main great areas: in series and customized. The in series production provides for the study of design and realization of structures and components in predetermined dimensions, with standard components and very few margins of freedom for customization of the finished product, in which the customized production exceeds these limits, by granting to a person to design and create a personalized furniture in each of its characteristics in terms of size, material, finish, type of embodiment, etc. Such freedom also gives an advantage to the final customer, as he can require the making of single furniture perfectly fitted to his needs in terms of occupied space, used material up to his personal tastes. The finding subject of the present invention is based on the second type of production process, that of a "customized" furniture and more specifically on the production of furniture provided with doors, drawers, and any customized components. Some types of the most popular "customized" furniture in fact provide for the realization of variable components both in terms of number, and especially of dimensions. By way of example, it is sufficient to consider the realization of a cabinet for a bedroom. It can be made depending on the space to be occupied and the personal tastes of the customer to which the furniture is destined, by two or three doors of different dimensions and of finishing material (lacquered, non lacquered, clay, identical in size or with offset formats, etc.), and it might contain in its interior one or more drawers with drawers with a variable height and number as being intended to contain objects of different shapes (two drawers with the maximum depth, one less deep and higher, etc.) .

The demand for furniture "customization" in order to accommodate doors and drawers involves, as it is evident, a number of constructive difficulties and especially for finding the components to use. There are a large number of manufacturers of doors and drawers who are highly specialized and able to produce, also respecting high quality standards, such components. Most of these producers are highly specialized in production of specific types of doors or drawers by using special finishing materials. Such a large number of manufacturers makes it particularly troublesome the selection activities of the product and retrieval of the same for the carpenter or craftsman who wants to build a "customized" furniture.

No systems are known from the art which are able to overcome these drawbacks in the field of "customized" furniture .

There is therefore a need for a system and a method capable of overcome the drawbacks in which a craftsman can incur in the design and purchase of the necessary components for the realization of a "customized" furniture, without incurring in easy mistakes.

Summary of the invention

The finding subject of the present invention proposes to improve the design and selection operations of necessary components and to help the craftsman or the designer of the furnishing in selecting the correct components for the realization of a "customized" furniture .

Subject of the invention is therefore to provide a support for the design referring to the component to be ordered (both doors and drawers), with an insertion in its correct order: guiding the user when entering the specifications of each product, inserting all the product variants which exclude the unobtainable combinations, and performing controls of dimensional constraints and all the features chosen so that the product can be made in its entirety, together with a preview in scale of the product exactly as it will be realized and the execution of the order of the component from the most appropriate supplier.

The modular system according to the present invention is able to support the work of the manufacturer (craftsman or entrepreneur) so obtaining a reduction of the selection time of individual components, ensuring that the selected components are always those most suitable in relation to the furniture to produce and are available on the market, unifying the acguisition procedure of the components produced by different manufacturers through a single order and supply channel.

The modular system has the characteristics set out in the annexed independent system claim.

The method which said modular system permits to implement has the characteristics set forth in the independent method claim.

The dependent claims describe further advantageous details and aspects of the invention.

Brief Description of Drawings

These and other advantages will be better highlighted in the detailed description of the invention with specific reference to Figure 1, in which an example of a preferred embodiment of the present invention is shown, in an absolutely not limitative way. In particular: Fig. 1 shows a schematic or system according to the invention .

Detailed description

With particular reference to Figure shown above, the innovative system 100 proposed comprises a first module HJ-EN having a program for executing a 3D-rendering representing a space in which the craftsman or the designer of an entrepreneur (in any case, the manufacturer of the "customized" furniture) can display a model in three dimensions of the object he wants to make, either a door or a drawer or any other similar object.

Through the indication of the dimension which the object must have (height, width and depth), the component realizes a three-dimensional image of a navigable object, that is it can rotate it with respect to the three axes of the display, and it is also possible to perform zooming operations in order to see the detail of some parts of the object. In addition to the features related to the dimensions, it is possible to select the finishing materials of the doors and drawers by using lists with all available materials of various manufacturers wishing to provide their own items to the system platform. Such module HJ-EN, at the time of specification of the dimensions and the selection by the user of a specific material and a particular color or finish among those available, will update the 3D-model of the objet showing the effect of the selection on the object itself. In this way the user will have an immediate vision of his selection, especially not to be overlooked especially for what concerns the selection of specific colors. It is in fact common that the name of a color name is not always faithful to the actual hue or shade, and there are also frequent cases of returns of doors (or drawers) to the manufacturer, because once received they do not meet the requirements of the final customer, due to a wrong selection of color from catalogs now in use by the craftsmen/designers .

Within the HJ-EN module it is therefore virtually possible to draw the various components which are to be ordered for the realization of the "customized" furniture, simply with a series of selections. It is also possible to realize a single design of several components. For example it is possible to work on the project of a "CABINET FOR A CERTAIN CUSTOMER" and proceed with the drawing and the first selection of the different types of doors, and subsequently proceed with the design of a set of drawers in a specific size which will be contained inside the cabinet and ultimately proceed to the design of an additional set of drawers that will instead be exposed and then with dimensions and finishes different from the previous ones. This set of mutually different items will be operated and stored within the module as a part of a single project realization so allowing an immediate order of all components even if made by different suppliers. A second HJ-AS module is the system component dedicated to the execution of orders of the drawn and personalized components through the first module.

During the actual insertion of the actual order, the HJ-AS module asks a management software connected with the system, which for each component is able to check and calculate different parameters: the price of the single product for the specific customer who operates on the system (for each customer it is possibly combined with a personalized price list including percentages of different discounts) and the expected delivery date (based on the production times and the actual supplies and/or to the average delivery times of the manufacturer) .

Such information enables the HJ-AS module to display (on one of the screens of the HJ-TOT module which will be explained below) a summary, called quote, of the list of the products ordered with price and expected delivery date. The customer, at this point, can save the quote to be consulted at a later time or can confirm the quote itself and proceed with the order. In the latter case, the HJ-AS module proceeds with the actual recalculation of delivery dates and prices, as these could be varied and requires a further confirmation to proceed with the order. In case of acceptance by the customer, the quote becomes an effective order.

As mentioned, it is possible that the desired products come from different suppliers and distributors and then in order to satisfy the customer's order it is not enough to run a single order, but as many as the other producers involved. The HJ-AS module takes care of this. Through a dedicated algorithm, the module is able to subdivide the list of desired products by the customer by classifying them for each manufacturer. For each of these groups a specific order to the supplier is generated in a transparent way for the customer. The different orders are processed by the HJ-AS module and digitally transmitted to the individual manufacturer who shall send the goods to the selling store using the system. He will then collect all of the single order products made by the customer and ship them to the destination specified by the final user.

A third HJ-TOT module is the means by which it is possible to consult the first HJ-EN module. It is implemented as a "facility-totem" to be placed in the selling stores either of mono-brand of hardware components or multi-brand. Through interaction of the user with the third HJ-TOT module it will be possible to use the first HJ-EN module to perform the design of doors and drawers. The HJ-TOT module is designed in the form of a plastic panel with customized finishing depending on the host exhibition space (colors, logos, brand of the supplier or retailer, etc.) . It includes an LCD monitor of great size (42" or larger), a computer with the HJ-EN module previously installed and their corresponding graphical interfaces in order to show them to the user on the monitor, a keyboard and a mouse connected to the computer which allows to interact with the HJ-EN module interface. The third HJ-TOT module permits the user to interact with the system and indicating the basic features of the product it will be possibile to view the components necessary for the realization of the "customized" furniture in order to directly come to the purchase of the same .

In conclusion, the modular system and method shown allow in an innovative way to solve the following problems :

a) waste of time in the selection of products based on the suppliers. As said the number of manufacturers is high and even higher is the number of items available from each manufacturer. The modular system allows through the mechanism of selection of materials and their size to quickly proceed to the drawing and display of the components starting from the requirement of the final customer (type of finishing, for example, or color) in contrast to the traditional process which involves the consultation of supplier catalogs in order to understand if they can provide the particular finishing (and/or color) desired;

b) risk of selection of wrong components. The system through the visual selection of the components and with an interactive drawing of the same, allows to minimize the possibility of ordering the wrong component; c) quickness in the acquisition. It is also possible to order products of different manufacturers and/or distributors without producing for each one a different quote and order. This is automatically done by the HJ-AS module, so freeing the final customer and making it more easy the ordering process.

Although at least one exemplary embodiment has been presented in the summary and in the detailed description, it should be understood that there is a large number of variants falling within the scope of protection of the invention. It must also be understood that the realization or the works presented are only examples which are not intended to limit in any way the scope of protection of the invention or its application or its configuration. Rather, the summary and the detailed description provide an expert in the field of a convenient guide to implement at least one exemplary embodiment, being it well clear that numerous variations can be made in the function and assembly of the elements described herein, without departing from the scope of the invention as determined by the appended claims and their technical-legal equivalents.

Claims

1. Modular system (100) for the design and selection of components for the realization of furnishings comprising:

- a first module (HJ-EN) configured for performing a three-dimensional drawing of the furnishing,

- a second module (HJ-AS) configured for executing orders of the components drawn and personalized through the first module,

a third interface and control module (HJ-TOT) comprising a controller with which a monitor, a keyboard and a mouse are connected,

the system being characterized in that said third interface and control module (HJ-TOT) is configured to manage with said first module (HJ-EN) the design of the furnishing and to manage with said second module (HJ-AS) an automatic and complete order for all the individual components drawn, even in the case in which said individual components are made by different suppliers.

2. System according to claim 1, wherein said first module (HJ-EN) is configured to realize a three- dimensional image of the furnishing in which the dimensions are indicated and the finishing materials of the individual component chosen by the user can be seen.

3. System according to claim 1, wherein said first module (HJ-EN) is configured to manage and store the selected individual components as belonging to a single embodiment project.

4. System according to one of the preceding claims, wherein said second module (HJ-AS) is configured to perform an algorithm which for each component is able to check and calculate the price and the expected delivery dates .

5. System according to one of the preceding claims, wherein said second module (HJ-AS) is configured to divide the list of individual components in homogeneous groups classified by manufacturer.

6. Method for the design and selection of components for realization of furnishings, comprising the following steps :

- designing the furnishings by performing their three- dimensional drawing according to the desired size;

selecting the finishing materials and realization colors ;

selecting the individual components for the preparation of the order;

ordering individual components by comparing the various manufacturers, by performing an automatic and complete order for all the individual components drawn, also in the case in which said individual components are made by different suppliers;

estimating the delivery times of the individual components ordered.