Idun: Sustainable hotel experiences through local gardening

This report describes a 10-week design project conducted during the spring of 2025 as part of the course 5ID178 Design Project Degree Work (15 ECTS) at Umeå Institute of Design. The project explores sustainable hotel experiences through local food production. Its aim is to create a solution that allows hotel guests to understand and feel involved in local food cultivation. The project focused on designing a physical representation of a cultivation environment tailored to be integrated into hotels. The design process included research on local cultivation solutions and an investigation into how hotels create guest experiences. Concept development followed and was evaluated using tools such as four-field matrices, Kesselring analysis, and feedback from the project partner, Swegreen, as well as hotel staff. The outcome is Idun, a hydroponic growing module designed for flexibility, usable as a standalone unit or integrated into a bar counter system. The product enhances transparency and guest engagement regarding food origins, while also reducing climate impact through minimized food waste and low resource consumption.