Ambra Ultra Lightweight Infant Carrier

Grounds up development, from initial sketch through to production and launch. I led the design on this project touching all aspects from innovative mechanical details and surface treatments to softgood connections. A feature rich ultra-lightweight (<7 lbs) carseat at a $399 MSRP that sets it apart from its competitors.

Year: 2023-2026

Timing: 3 years

Project Type: Object // Safety System

Role: Design Lead [Corporate in House]

Skills: Concept Sketching // Team Leadership // Technical Documentation  // Surface CAD // Design for Manufacture // Visual Brand Language Development // UX Research // Supplier Communication // Prototyping // Problem Solving // Cross Functional Alignment

Acknowledgments:

MaxInf R&D Team [Supplier] Nathan Heisey, Jacob Bailey, Otis Zheng & Bruce Li [Key Engineering Partners] Carla Francesshi-Green, Shannon Fineout and Denice Kresker [CMF/ Softgoods] Grant Mason [Design Director/ Collaborator] Kirk Morris [Perf pattern sensei], Trevor LaRochelle [bouncing ideas + extrusion]

Shoutout the whole ID team for giving me feedback, guidance along the way.

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Series of prototype infant carriers
Series of prototype infant carrier bases

Key Details

Selection of the design decisions and details I am most proud of.

Integrated Release Handle
Cohesive surface lines around the entirety of the product make it feel more seamless considered and premium.Throughout the project I pushed very hard to integrate the release handle with the shell surfaces. This took a lot of surfacing iteration, prototypes and collaboration with engineers to achieve.

Climaflow Ventilation
Allows breathability to keep infant cool. Designing this pattern allowed me to learn a unique workflow from Kirk Morris iterating on a dynamic DXF pattern til it jived with the shell and then integrating the design in CAD, also allowed me to push my understanding of tooling considerations to a new level.

Rigid ISOFIX with Indicator
An innovative feature for an IC base at this price point affording parents an easy and confident install. I pushed the team to allow me to design a custom housing for a few reasons, to be consistent across our products going forward, to add our design language in subtle details and improve ergonomics.

New Recline Mech/ Housing
The method for reclining the infant carrier had to be rethought due to the novel ISOFIX system. The base couldn’t move but the carrier itself needed to rotate for different car bench angles. Displeased with the initial solution I proposed this alternative and refined the mechanism with the help of engineering.

Cost Effective and Premium
Uniform color across plastic components and details popped via in mold texture change make the whisper instead of shout. I proposed this direction after a previous stamped metal inlay was found to be too expensive, it catches the light nicely and isn’t too loud winning on both fronts and unifying the item.

On Shelf Branding
Another polished detail with the word-mark on the backside of the base so that the brand has visibility on the store shelf. When integrating this logo I used the opportunity to add a surface detail which resonated with the inversion on the recline block, this took some tight tooling constraints into account.

Subtle Surfaces and Accents
Taking the time to push A level surfaces a little bit further is in my opinion what makes a design sing. On this taxi-belt cap the outer surfaces have been cut and swept in to relate to the large bands of surface on the base and carrier, the polish ties it together with other user touch points.

Softgoods Connection
Fully external wrap of the main softgoods pad as well as a premium zip in canopy with zip peek-a-boo window. After learning from consumer insights on predecessor platforms attempted to improve ease of redressing the soft-goods through new connection.

Process:

  • Initial Concept

    A lot changes over the course of development but the large surface band echoed between the base and carrier was maintained from initial sketch to finished product.

  • CAD Development

    Referencing existing seats and critical ATDs in an assembly, I built a coordinate system with critical details such as harness positions and central front adjustor this allowed me to pull in surfaces and key visual lines where I was able to create a CAD handoff document for the supplier.

  • Prototype Reviews

    Image of the initial prototype. Through the project we went through three rounds of full proto development. At each stage many issues were found and addressed. Simple things like tape ups helped me visualize surface changes and think through functional details to improve.

  • Sketchovers

    Sketchovers helped to keep myself and the suppliers on track in making updates to key surfaces. Shown is an example of smoothing out the backend of the shell making the crease and overhang more pronounced and better integrating the release handle.

  • Surfacing

    Some key surface details improvved throughout the project:

    [A] integrated release handle

    [B] blended fillet widens toward back surface softening the back and making the release handle a cohesive feature of the shell

    [C] Large rounds and rolled in back trusses to make the shell lighter and softer

    [D] Handle hub is integrated further by sweeping shell surfaces which minimizes the boss visually.

  • Considerations

    Getting to a final detail takes a fair bit of thinking through details on paper and at scale before integrating in the assembly.

  • Mockups

    Getting the handle to feel right. An initial surface some sketches, foam core and then remodeled to achieve desired result.

  • Rigid Isofix

    This was a key component in the carriers story, so I pushed myself to create an ISOfix housing that was visually clear and spoke to the design language of the product as well as being ergonomically inviting.

  • Polishing Details

    There were many instances throughout the project where sketches didn’t communicate the whole story so A surface direction was provided in CAD.

  • Design for Manufacture

    Certain areas required close care to achieve clean parting lines and adequate draft along the entirety of the part. Examples from the base main shell.

  • Communication

    Working closely with a new supplier meant a lot of this. Hundreds of slides of issues to be tracked and closed between the two parties and keeping the teams aligned with weekly phone calls to address and troubleshoot issues.

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