• Industrial Design
  • Project Brief 1
  • Project Brief 2
  • About
  • UX/UI
  • Coloring Book
Katie Mahaney Designs
  • Industrial Design
  • Project Brief 1
  • Project Brief 2
  • About
  • UX/UI
  • Coloring Book

Prayer Mat

 
 
 

The Brief

Muslims pray 5 times a day, Fajr – before dawn, Dhuhr – midday, after the sun passes its zenith, Asr – afternoon, Maghrib – just after sunset, Isha – evening/night.
They do this because it’s a divine obligation meant to sustain faith, foster discipline, and strengthen their relationship with God. A valuable practice but not always a practical thing to accomplish. Our clients came to us with a product to bring comfort to an often over looked user group of 3-4 million in the United States alone. They shared an interesting idea to create a prayer mat with some structure and versatility so they can pray on a clean surface anywhere any time. The client was an active hiker, and having been caught on the trail more than once using his jacket as a mat, he felt it was important that the mat incorporate a durable and waterproof element. As someone who does not practice the faith, I was so excited to do some research and head to my local mosque and get feedback on my sketches and ideas, and eventually test out some prototypes on some friendly participants.

Concept Development

Using quick sketches to present to the client, we were able to converge on a design direction and move forward with prototyping.
I used Procreate to create these digital sketches.

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Prototype

I created a scale prototype out of foam core board and used a Cricut vinyl cutter to put the patterns out and build the scale model. Then I created a white model, nothing fancy, I wanted to check the fit on a range of people. I brought my white model to the park by my house and asked several strangers of different ages, shapes, and sizes to take a seat. I do not recommend this method of testing.

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Technical Drawings

I created a very detailed document to visually communicate the construction, the fabric and components, the dimensions, and the function of the prayer mat. We communicated back and forth and made adjustments which can be seen in red, the things I needed to clarify or edit.

Production Sample

Here are some stills from a video our partner sent us of the sample. He is demonstrating how it’s used and how it folds together. The colors and logo were chosen by the client. It was a successful design with very minimal iteration.

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