Empathy Statement: We were unhappy that our bags were too plain, and just generally didn’t have enough space to hold all of my things.

1. Was your design the same or different than your final design?:

We found that our final design was incredibly different from our first design at the start of the process. We were thinking about making something pretty normal because we couldn’t find a good alternative to the bags that we already had, which we were semi-content with. When brainstorming we decided to exaggerate our dreams for the bag, but just decided to make them a reality in the actual bag.

2. Where did you get stuck?:

I feel like because we had decided all of the things that we wanted to originally put so much on, our biggest problem because where to place things without them being a nuisance. Even though our bag was pretty fictional, with the solar panel and chargers, etc., we didn’t want it to be non-functional in total.

3. When did you get your best idea? Describe the moment?:

The best moment was easily when I first put on the bag and decided that it was really uncomfortable to keep on my back for more than 10 seconds. To solve this, I grabbed a large block of large bubble wrap and told my teammates to tape it onto the bag which made it super comfortable in the end.

4. How well did you capture your partner’s needs?:

Because my partners and I all wanted to make the bag really cool and have a ton of inventions on it, we found that the best thing when someone recommended something was to just throw it on the bag for the fun of it. If something didn’t make sense, however, then we’d question their thoughts and challenge them to make it better or to just take it off in general.