OXO’s Tot sub-brand has been extremely successful by solving parenthood’s problems in an elegant and thoughtful way. Our team was challenged to design a collapsible infant bathtub that grows with the child’s needs from newborn to 24 months.

Being a keen observer helped to identify the needs of a user who couldn’t speak yet. We also repeatedly heard that bathing the child was a two-person job because one parent needed to hold the (slippery) baby in a towel after the soap phase while the other dumped the water and refilled the tub. They couldn’t use the drain plug because the water drained too slowly, and the baby would get cold. And they didn’t trust themselves to hold the slippery baby while dumping the tub. “How might we make the bathing process easy enough for a single parent?” became the driving question, resulting in a large drain hole, a tapered newborn end that keeps them from tipping to the side, and the safety bump in the middle.

This was my second project out of college, and I’m very proud to say it won an iF Design Award in 2020.