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Russell Henning's backpacking stove, the Phoenix, includes a stove, stand, fuel, and wind screen, which can be assembled into one piece or taken apart.

Student wins design awards for stove

Idea conceived in SJSU classroom

By: Mandie Mohsenzadegan

Posted: 10/30/07

When SJSU graduate Russell Henning created a portable backpacking stove for a senior project in the spring of 2006, he had no idea that the environmentally friendly cooker would go on to garner international recognition and become an award-winning design.

BraunPrize and Red Dot, two international organizations dedicated to finding and acknowledging innovative designs, selected Henning's design as part of their exhibitions. The latter also presented a 2006 Red Dot award to Henning for his backpacking stove.

The Phoenix, as it is called, was the project that Russell created as a requirement for his industrial design major.

John McClusky, industrial design associate professor, assigned a project called "Designing for Our Future Selves," which he said required students to come up with "the idea to design something that would accommodate our needs as we get older."

He added that Henning's idea of the stove originated from his own hobby as an avid backpacker, and his interest was to design a stove that would target grip-strength and dexterity problems that could arise as he ages.

McClusky said Henning deserves the awards and he feels very proud of his former student for his recent achievements.

"To excel in these types of competitions, you have to meet a lot of levels," he said. "You have to meet appropriate function, appropriate usability and superlative aesthetics."

Henning, who also has a degree in mechanical engineering, explained that his idea for the stove was to focus on its accessibility and usability. "I wanted to design it from the ground up, and was concentrating on making it efficient and lightweight," he said. "Everything about the stove is with an emphasis on environmental sustainability. I felt a strong responsibility as a designer to push those kinds of things forward in society, because I think we have a lot of responsibility to create trends that are morally sound."

The Phoenix comprises a cooker, stand, gasoline and wind deflector, according to the BraunPrize Web site. It described the stove as a "reliable solution for an outdoor gasoline cooker" and also stated that it "offers a high degree of robustness and is easy to operate."

Henning said that it is important to emphasize that the Phoenix is a design, and not an invention. "I was using technology that already existed, and the work I did was the design," he said.

BraunPrize, a biannual competition that was created in Germany in 1968, describes its purpose as promoting the work of young designers, according to its Web site. Henning was the only finalist from the United States to have his design in the BraunPrize exhibition, a ceremony held in Kronberg, Germany on Sept. 12.

Red Dot, which is also an international competition, groups its recipients into three different award selections: product design, communication design and design concept. Henning won two awards under "design concept," for his stove, along with another design project he created at SJSU called the Grasshopper, which is a tractor that uses grass as fuel and is designed for rural villages in Africa.

His stove won in the "Best of the Best" category, which is the most prestigious Red Dot award, and is given to only 18 members in the competition.

Red Dot Award 2006 received almost 6,000 submissions from 52 countries, according to its Web site.

Henning said that he suffered many sleepless nights while working on his project, but that the end result made it all worth it.

"He put a lot of pressure on himself," McClusky said. "His biggest concern was that the most revolutionary backpack stoves on the market were developed over a ten-year period by multiple people, and he was looking at 15 weeks as one individual."

Eduardo Solis, another former industrial design graduate and a close friend of Henning, described him as "very studious" and said, "Russ was very well known for his hard work, successful projects and great personality."

Despite the large amount of recognition he received, Henning said he believes the stove "has to serve a purpose."

"If I can use the exposure to push the idea that designers have a responsibility to the environment, to shaping trends and the higher cause, that would be what I would want to convey," he said.

To current industrial design majors at SJSU, he offers the following advice: "Listen to McClusky. He knows what he's talking about."