I decided to create another prototype for the paintbrush idea. While I had a bunch new sketches and ideas for the curtain grabber, I didn’t really know how to execute my sketch into a physical product.
Sketching Process
I decided to do a little more research on the paintbrush rack idea and found these two products. I really liked the right one because of the size, how it utilizes a spring to hold the brushes up, and how it has a container at the bottom the catch water droplets. This product is basically what I wanted to create, but I didn’t want to just copy it. So I thought of implementing the spring rack into my paint cup and make it removable, but I scrapped that idea because then the water cup won’t really be a water cup anymore.
The left product sparked my next prototype. After making my first prototype, I had an idea of combining the water cup and paintbrush rack together; the left product is kind of like that idea. I also thought, “what if I also make it into a travel paintbrush kit?” That way I don’t have to carry the paintbrushes in a separate case if I ever do want to paint on the go.
The rough sketch of my idea is to have a divider in between the case: one side will be the water cup and the other side will be like a drying rack. The brush can rest on the divider, since it has ridges, when the case is closed.
However, the actual prototype didn’t really end up looking like this.
Building Process
I made the prototype all out of foam board, which means it can’t hold water. So I basically created a prototype before the prototype because this one just shows how the design works.
First I began with the box shape. I had to remeasure it a few times because the first time I forgot about one of the flaps. I made each flap/side 5cm and the middle rectangle (the container part) is 7cm. I measured the box to hold all 7 of my most used brushes, but if I didn’t have the center board it could probably hold more.
I then cut slits where I would fold the flaps up and flattened that cut with a marker so it would be easier to fold. I used hot glue to connect the flaps, but it seemed like the hot glue wasn’t strong enough so I had to force it together. It ended up looking a bit messy on one side because I figured out the right technique after messing up the first time (basically glue both sides of the flap and then push it together instead of doing one side).
For the center board I cut a 7cm x 5cm rectangle. Actually, 7cm was a little too wide so I had to trim it a bit and it ended up being roughly 6.5cm x 5cm. I had 1cm vertical lines to indicate where to draw the semicircle ridges where the brush would rest.
At this point, I had been using a box cutter to cut the foam board. I ended up switching to an X-Acto/craft knife which made cutting a lot easier. Granted, the cuts are still pretty uneven, but it did the job.
Finally, for the lid I kept messing up the size because I didn’t account for the thickness of the board. In the end, the lid is roughly 21.5cm long and 7cm wide, but the width should’ve been 7.5cm. The flaps are 2cm wide and 4cm long. I wanted to add Velcro so it would stick together, but I didn’t have any. I wanted to make it close like a tupperware, but I didn’t plan this part out so I just used tape for now to illustrate that it closes.
Future Directions
I think it’s a decent size now (20cm x 5cm x 7 cm) compared to the last prototype. It’s also less flimsy than the other one since the box is all one sheet of foam board folded together.
Some future improvements would be creating this with a waterproof material or maybe coating it with polymorph (that would be a lot of polymorph though). The center piece where the brushes rest isn’t directly connected to the box and the cut isn’t accurate because there are some gaps, so that’s another area to improve. I also definitely want to make the lid work, maybe by creating a twist lock or hook/seal like tupperwares have.
I noticed that the other side of the box is kind of pointless, but I realized that it could hold my paint tubes. And I can make the lid like a palette for mixing paints (kind of like this product‘s lid). In the end, my initial idea of just having a paintbrush rack has turned into a travel painting kit.