Nowadays, personal well-being has become highly valued since the Covid-19 pandemic. With the increasing participation in sports and interests in health and fitness, people are searching for a healthier lifestyle in more convenient and flexible ways.

"Boom" is a smart boxing bag for home fitness. It blends a punching bag, a smart speaker and interactive illumination technology into a streamlined boxing experience for the home.

Fitness boxing is a great cardio exercise, especially beneficial for people with heart disease, diabetes and obesity. However, it is regarded just as a gym sport. Even if someone has a boxing bag, it is hard to enjoy boxing with others in an exciting atmosphere under professional instructions at home. Thus, by taking advantage of high-tech, Boom is designed to create a personalized thrilling workout experience at home, improve the accessibility of fitness boxing, and offer multiple choices of home exercise to motivate a healthy hedonist lifestyle.

The spark:

There is an increasing awareness of the negative effects of obesity, and coinciding demand for getting in shape. With health consciousness, an ever-relevant issue in our time, Boxing–a full-body workout–has gained newfound popularity.

Although there are tutorials on how to set up a home boxing workout, and plenty of sporty workout playlists offered online, people struggle to find the time and motivation to workout regularly–especially during the Covid pandemic.

People training at home during the pandemic found it difficult to stay focused and fulfilled with their repetitive home training routines. Before doing this project, I went to an underground boxing club to take some lessons. Through talking with other students, I found that many of them have already owned a boxing bag at home but seldom train with it. After research into fitness boxing and home exercise, I discovered that there could be an opportunity to take advantage of current hi-tech to rebuild a distinctive boxing experience for the convenience of the home.

By blending game mechanics and cutting edge fitness technology into a streamlined boxing experience, BOOM advances the sport and recreation service, uniquely positioning itself in the home exercise market.

Benefit to User:

During the day BOOM could be treated as a home speaker that blends into a modern living room. Integrated with your TV or other smart devices, we can ask Siri, Google, or Alexa to activate BOOM with a simple command.

When BOOM is used for boxing exercises, the interactive lighting system comes to life. By syncing the workout with TV or the app, lighting elements, voice instruction, and upbeat music will coach users through a wide variety of boxing routines. Thus, a more immersive and convenient Fitness Boxing experience creates a fun fantasy of home exercise for users.

This Smart Coach supports users' custom fitness plans and workout routines. BOOM records a broad range of data sets to track user progress and stores it on the BOOM workout app. The app offers boxing tutorial kits including specific music and voice assistance for solo trainers, families, and couples. The BOOM App can visualize users' progress intuitively to track progress with ease and customize future routines.

Finally, the BOOM streaming service helps users connect, building an online workout club for athletes of any experience level. Connect with users across the globe to share in this energetic lifestyle.

Benefit to Client/Brand:

Nowadays, more younger generations pick fitness boxing. The size of the boxing industry is valued at over $10 billion and grows every year. A rise in the customers' disposable income and an increase in the affluent customer base can be taken as an opportunity to introduce more high-end products. BOOM equipment can enhance a variety of current fitness products and services. It also supports the technology trend in the fitness market where digital platforms are the norm. BOOM will integrate opportunities to build partnerships with multi-media streamers and influencers to enlarge the market impact.

Benefit to Society:

People's lifestyles have been significantly changed by the Covid pandemic. Work, play, study, and exercise need to be ready for Home use now more than ever. It is important to preserve our well-being with products and routines that support our fitness philosophies. Technology's role tends to address daily consumer pain points and promote sustainable behaviors, especially crucial in light of the turbulent global stage and social and travel restrictions caused by Covid-19.

Considering such social and technological factors, I started to design for the post-covid lifestyle. As a lifestyle product, BOOM blends ethitech with fun elements to help people thrive. As a community builder, the digital media developed for the BOOM boxing bag connects people in different regions.

Appropriate Aesthetics:

BOOM is a modern-style boxing bag, standing 68" tall. It allows users in different heights to practice strike skills targeted at the entire range of the body. The punching bag is seated on a rounded speaker foundation with a tilted straight-cut top. The bag is designed with multi-layer construction. It is filled with high-density foam, wrapped by synthetic leather where the electronic pressure sensor could be mounted underneath. Then, the durable photic fabric covers the entire bag featuring illuminated optical fiber with LED lights on the leather. To make it stand stably and used safely, the stainless steel speaker foundation has an unconventional base with weighted sand filler to facilitate roll relocation. The 10 strong suction cups also support the bag fixed on the floor.

For the color choice, the vibrant red will only show when the punching bag is in boxing mode. At this stage, it represents the passion and the furious spirit of trainers. It raises the attention and motivations of active users. For the other colors, it is a bonus colorway for people who prefer to customize their own palette than using the primary colorway.