AACE INTERVIEW: Catching up with Richard Huang of CLOUDIOUS9
Our design philosophy since day one has been to design innovative and new products from scratch, always striving to deliver a result that consumers have never experienced. - Richard Huang • CEO of Cloudious9
AACE caught up with the very busy, very creative Richard Huang of Cloudious9 to chat about the newest release, the Hydrology9 NX, a flower, and concentrate vaporizer. Richard is one of the few that looks at the future, not what needs to be fixed but what needs to be innovated. The new Hydrology9 NX is a modular and dedicated water-filtered vaporizer for both the concentrate connoisseur and flower enthusiast. Featuring a switchable concentrate atomizer & convection flower heating chamber, the Hydrology9 NX was designed with an uncompromising dedication to each material’s unique vaporization attributes. The cannabis industry has moved beyond the tabletop glass bong, the delivery is controlled to maximize the flavor and efficacy of the flower or concentrate. For us, the biggest feature is the easy open and clean the water tank, we still have flashbacks to seeing a swamp water bong in our dorms. We are honored to have Richard back with his newest innovation and to speak about the issues Asian Americans are facing in the face of racism. - Ophelia Chong
What was the consumer feedback that formed the new design?
The original Hydrology9 was a flower-only vaporizer, and since its initial release, the concentrate market has grown substantially. As a result, one of the top questions we would get about the original Hydrology9 was if it was able to vaporizer concentrates. When we were designing the new Hydrology9 NX, we wanted to make sure that we added concentrate capability, but at the same time make sure that we provided a truly dedicated experience for both flower and concentrates. The end result was we redesigned the NX to be a modular vaporizer that provides the best and dedicated experience for both types of consumables.
The weight and feel of the Hydrology9 NX feel great in the hand, easy to balance and use. Dieter Rams (Braun), one of my design heroes listed the ten principles for good design as:
Our design philosophy since day one has been to design innovative and new products from scratch, always striving to deliver a result that consumers have never experienced. We won't copy others and always release products that feature at least one innovation not seen elsewhere. Dieter Ram's, a famous industrial designer, first three design principles most closely fit with our design principles
(1. Good Design is innovative, 2. Good Design makes a product useful, Good Design is aesthetic).
We’ve seen in the last year racism rise to the forefront in the media and in real life, BLM, and now the Anti-Asian hate from the misinformation trumpeted for political campaigns. How does Cloudious9 work within the cannabis industry and outside of it to educate and renounce racism and bias?
The growing Anti-Asian sentiment and outright assault on the Asian community is a direct result of the community being used as a scapegoat for others’ failure, and for the uninformed to project their misplaced anger. It is very encouraging to see that this generation of Asian Americans will no longer stay silent and are making it known that we have had enough.
The underlining issue of racism is a byproduct of us not understanding each other enough and thus labeling different cultures or skin color as abnormal or inferior. We believe our role is to speak up more in interviews such as this, make our voices heard and help the industry with our existing experience and present our point of view. This allows more people to recognize the similarities as well as respect the differences of our unique cultural perspective.
The best designers do their best thinking in the oddest times, epiphanies strike unannounced, how did the Hydrology9 NX come to being?
One of the key design aspects of the Hydrology9 and the new NX is how we aesthetically wanted to modernize liquid filtration and did not conform with the traditional bong look, and we are able to do so with our patented maze vapor tunnel design. This maze vapor tunnel method of ensuring an unobstructed path between the vapor and liquid filtration while keeping the liquid from spilling was inspired by how the X & Y coordinates on a computer mouse worked and this inspiration came in an ordinary day in front of the computer.
Inspiration or solutions to a problem often happens when you determined in your mind that finding of such a solution is a top priority, and sometimes as you go along in your daily activities, you will make the right external connection with something very ordinary and make a breakthrough.
If the Hydrology9 NX was to appear in a classic or one of your favorites films, which would it be and what role would it play?
If Batman consumed cannabis, I would imagine he would use the Hydrology9 NX, with its modular design, it would fit right in with Batman's other gadgets.
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