Nothing unveils first co-created smartphone with its community

Pioneering a new way of working which seeks to erase the barrier between company and community, Nothing had embarked on a Community Edition Project to co-create hardware, software and content with its community.

With over 900 entries from 47 countries around the world, Nothing has finally co-created its final product with inputs from the community to unveil the Phone (2a) Plus Community Edition, a glow-in-the-dark interpretation of the popular Phone (2a) Plus.

Winners Astrid Vanhuyse & Kenta Akasaki, Andrés Mateos, Ian Henry Simmonds and Sonya Palma collaborated closely with Nothing’s Design Studio, Creative, Brand and Marketing teams in London to further refine their winning concepts.

Here’s how it went.

Stage 1: Hardware Design

Astrid Vanhuyse & Kenta Akasaki collaborated with Nothing’s Design Director Adam Bates and CMF Designer Lucy Barley to experiment with a variety of materials and colours in order to bring their “Phosphorescence” concept to life, while preserving Nothing’s DNA for the device.

Using green-tinted phosphorescent material finishing, the back of the phone emits a soft glow-in-the-dark feature that is purely analogue, requiring no power source, with the ability to last for hours before gradually fading until it is recharged by daylight.

Stage 2: Wallpaper Design

[CLICK ON THE IMAGES FOR MORE. IMAGES COURTESY OF Nothing.]

Using a mix of AI tools and digital designs to build on the hardware design to create the “Connected Collection”, Andrés Mateos was initially tasked with developing four wallpapers but decided to expand the final collection to six wallpapers, created with Nothing’s Software Design Director Mladen M Hoyss and Software Designer Ken Giang.

Stage 3: Packaging Design

In his design, Ian Henry Simmonds reinterpreted Nothing’s packaging design with his “Less is More” concept in a graphically bold, yet simple super-macro crop that includes reflective elements which glows in dark environments to complement the winning hardware design.

Stage 4: Marketing Campaign

All the elements were brought together in a powerful marketing campaign by Sonya Palma with support from Nothing’s Creative Team to develop a suite of elevated assets, including a film campaign and digital assets for the launch of the product.