The presentation of products selected by the ADI’s Permanent Observatory of Design, for publication in the 2020 ADI Design Index, took place on June 3rd in Milan at the ADI Design Museum. This first volume of a two-year cycle which collects the preselections that will eventually compete for the 2022 ADI Compasso d’Oro Award.
Amongst the “solutions that quickly emerged with an extraordinary reactivity from the world of projects, to provide answers to the pandemic related emergencies that have unfolded”, which Francesco Zurlo of the ADI Design Index Technical Scientific Coordination Committee highlighted during the presentation press conference, Manital’s NoHand, designed by Mario Mazzer and Giovanni Crosera, clearly sticks out. As Francesco Zurlo explains, the handle designed by the Brescia-based company is a “significant” model as it represents a “new behaviour” designed to protect the hands from contamination by viruses and bacteria. The elbow and forearm, and not the hand, are in fact the parts of the body which NoHand engages in the opening and closing of doors. A change of habits which was proposed by Manital and awarded by the ADI Design Observatory, due to the important collective benefit, especially in highly frequented public areas where continuous sanitation is very difficult.
The recognition also rewards the ability to quickly react by Manital, who in less than two months, developed NoHand during the lockdown from March-April 2020, focusing their experience, vision, and resourcefulness into this new handle, which is intended to bring a social contribution within the context of the global pandemic.
With an essential and modern shape, NoHand is a patented model made of 304 stainless steel, a material which is recognized for its hygienic properties and is offered in satin, glossy, and white and black powder coat. Upon special request, NoHand is also available in natural copper, a metal which, thanks to its long-lasting antimicrobial properties, considerably reduces the transmission rate, avoiding the contamination of garments.
As Manital’s president Luigi Bigoloni explains, “the global health emergency pushed us to make a contribution to society as quickly as possible by exploiting our know-how, which has led us towards a different way of conceiving the opening and closing of doors, to protect our hands, the body part most exposed to contamination, which from today onwards is no longer needed to operate the handle. We are very satisfied that the new gesture proposed with NoHand has been fully understood and appreciated by the Technical Committee of ADI Design”.
