It Is Now Possible to Type on Toast

Ritika Kedia is a recent graduate of New York’s Parsons School of Design and like all new professionals, she wants to make an impact in her industry. She has a particular interest in the role of humor as it relates to design and her thesis project was an exploration of that concept. Why don’t designers embrace humor when conjuring new products? How can a dash of levity improve the user experience? As part of her thesis project meant to answer those questions, Kedia built this very unique toaster-typewriter hybrid.

I’m not sure that I agree with the premise of Kedia’s thesis, because I think that designers often do incorporate humor. But we create designs for the customers and not for ourselves. Outside of novelties and gag gifts, humor isn’t often a high priority for those customers. Regardless, the is no denying the intrigue created by Kedia’s toaster-typewriter.

Kedia started by disassembling and cleaning an old Smith Corona manual typewriter that was probably manufactured sometime in the 1960s. She then cannibalized a toaster from Target’s Made by Design brand to harvest the ejection mechanism. But the toaster’s heating elements were not connected to power, which is important because the toasting action comes solely from typing.

Certain character arms — those for the O, U, and S letters — have special heating elements attached. Each of those consists of a small length of nichrome wire formed into the shape of the letter and a clay backing. When the hungry user wants a piece of toast, they can press those keys to swing down the arms and force the heating elements against the bread. When the arms come away, they leave behind a toasted imprint of each letter.

Those heating elements are much larger than the original embossed letters, so Kedia couldn’t have included the full alphabet. But the three letters illustrate the concept. Power for the heating elements comes from a transformer connected to mains AC power, but otherwise this is an entirely mechanical contraption. It isn’t clear if the carriage moves, but it seems unlikely that the spacing would be correct. In any case, the idea has charm.

But does it accomplish Kedia’s goal of bringing humor into industrial design? Is that even a goal worth pursuing? I can’t answer those questions, but it is interesting to see young people trying new ideas in an industry that has become inflexible and homogenous.