WOD members’ research and curate products with a sharp eye for trending designs and innovation. We recently came across this great new product which we believe is not just functionally diverse but also beautifully designed.
Gustav is a personal workmate – an award-winning, office toolbox for agile working.
It is designed for everyone, be it in our increasingly agile offices, new found home-working environments or both of the above.
The first ergonomic and portable solution of its kind, Gustav allows users to carry their workspace with them wherever they go – whether you are working from home or in an office.
Light, beautifully-designed and with capacity to hold all the work essentials anyone needs, it also doubles as a laptop stand. Gustav allows you to carry your personal workspace with you wherever you go, or store it in a locker or shelf in your shared space.
WOD member, Giverny who discovered this great new product believes it can actually help signal the beginning and ending of a work day when working from home. Giverny says, “This beautiful wooden office toolbox from Obo caught my eye because of what he represents: a ritual that signals you’ve begun – or finished – work. “Gustav” is a laptop stand, book rest, has compartments for work diaries, folders, pens, leads and all those personal knick-knacks we have. During this lockdown I’ve heard people say their week feels like Groundhog Day or the never-ending-work-day. An item like this might be the sort of thing that helps change that, and anything that makes life a little bit easier at the moment is surely a good thing.“
We also asked our WOD expert Kirsty Angerer of ‘The Travelling Ergonomist’ fame, to review this product and while she was impressed by the portability and looks of Gustav she questions the usability from ergonomics perspective.
“I think the product makes sense from a storage perspective and that it’s easily portable around the office environment and it looks good too. I realise they have added the feature to place your laptop at a better height and I appreciate the gesture to accommodate laptop users. However from an ergonomics perspective because it isn’t height and angle adjustable it may only suit a small number of users.”
We have shared this review with Obo & with Gustav’s designers, architect Chris Pistauer and Judit Maireder and hope they will take this into account for their product revisions.
Until then we are going to continue admiring this beautiful American oak veneer finished office toolbox. And as soon as we lay our hands on one of these, we are going to put our WOD stamp on its minimalist design and make it our own.
In these unusual times, it’s good to have a little friend in the office!
(Leading workplace advisor, obo, has become the U.K. distribution partner for Gustav)
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