Gardening Trowel*

*Product Design | Hand-formed maple handle with rubberized coating, hydrolic-formed aluminum head.

Starting with research and user prototyping, this gardening trowel was built around a specific set of constraints; how can a trowel be more comfortable to use, hold, and live with for those suffering from Rheumatoid Arthritis. While this product is built around those extremes, it’s also meant to have wider appeal as a more versatile, comfortable, and ultimately usable gardening trowel than others on the market.

Through several prototypes, the largest challenge of this product was fitting every hand size; this proved to be difficult, and only compounded when testing it with those suffering from RA. There are several features which help accommodate all sizes and mobility-levels of users. Chiefly, the thumb and finger indents at the top of the handle serve as a visual and tactile marker, the large detent along the profile of the handle also helps to distribute the gripping pressure across all fingers evenly - important for both RA patients and really any user.