Klemens Schillinger, a Vienna-based designer, in an effort to counteract the negative effects of smartphone withdrawal during digital detox has created therapeuticphone-likeobjects to help us kick our screen-based habits. Our addiction is so strong that a study found 52% of smartphone owners check their devices at least once every 10 minutes, or, as I nstagram revealed, users under the age of 25 spend on average 32 minutes a day scrolling, swiping, or typing on their app alone.
Thetherapeuticphone-likeforms,or,asSchillingercallsthem,SubstitutePhones,attempttoreplicatethemost used gestures on our smartphones: swiping, zooming, and scrolling. To wean users away from these a ddictive interactions Schillinger placed special attention in the selection of his product’s materials: heavy black polyoxymethylene plastic (POM) to replicate handset weight, and howlite gemstone beads to mimic the feel of screen-based gestures. “It was the same thing,” says Schillinger about his analogue designs’ likeness to smartphones, “but without the nicotine, just the physical stimulation.”
Schillinger’s designs aren’t alone in this detox trend. Designer Jasper Morrison’s Punkt MP01, andthe kickstarted Light Phone are two such examples that look to disconnect users. Thetrendtobucksmartphone overuse comes at a time where attention to m ental health issues and their relationship to technology is gaining traction. Digital addiction experts like M andy Saligari compare our smartphone habits to “a bottle of wine or a gram of coke,” further underscoring the dangers of overconnectivity, especially with younger children. Although thePunktMP01andLightPhoneareconsideredluxury‘d umb-phones’,theneedforcovetable,yetaccessible, soft-connected objects in tandem with therapeutic ones is now becoming more apparent than ever.
