Hi,
Doing a project on a water cooler just now, so your opinions would be good.
How does anyone here relate to a water cooler, what’s the first thing that you relate to it? Is it a focus point for meeting colleagues, do you enjoy the gurgling sound of the cooler or is it just a thing in the corner that puts you off your work by humming and leaves empty bottles to cross your path?
Or does no one even notice it or care about it?
Ta!
Illuminate it! That would be cool. Good place to post company announcements.
Also, I only use it to fill up my Nalgene bottle, which takes forever. Leaning over, holding it in place for at least a full minute. A little awkward and boring! Maybe integrate a special shelf for these kind of bottles, and a spickit (spelling?) at chest level. I might have a cute butt, but I still hate to be leaning over like that. ha ha
Maybe it calls in to the refill company when it is getting low?
I can’t for the life of me remember where I saw this or which designer it was, or I would post it…
Somewhere I read that one famous NYC Designer would fill his office water cooler up with martinis every once and a while. It was a designer who was famous like Raymond Lowey or Charles & Ray Eames. Had anyone else seen this?
I’ve never heard of that, but I’m gonna do it 
The water cooler where I work is hard wired into the water lines, and acts as a filter and cooler/heater for water. This is nicer than loading and storing those big jugs, although I am sure the business model of receiving a monthly shipment of water is much more lucrative…
I remember the one we had at work. I didn’t like it. The water was always way too cold. Oh, and being a girl lifting those 20l or 30l bottles and then having to turn them upside down in order to put them on the stand always killed me. Prefer to drink tap water. Then again not really possible in England as the tap water tastes awful!
either design it to be discreet and blend into the background, or as a focus point for people meeting. If its the second consider a design that can accomodate (sp?) as many people as possible without being an obstruction.
CADtalent.com is not a good place to learn about the life cycle of sporophytes.
I can see another problem being a girl using the water cooler. The tap is always too low… Well, an old man with bad back will find it hard to use too 
lol … I see your point here …
Then again, for a child, having the tap above his/her face may not be a good idea, especially hot water dispensers.
Appropriate height where you place the faucet is always a problem in water coolers, i haven’t seen a single water cooler where the user does not have to bent to get a glass of water…
with the availability of table top water coolers this problem is attended to some extent, at least you have the liberty to place the cooler at an comfortable height.
the context or the surroundings are also very important for a water cooler. For example: office, canteen, executive pantry, schools. And so on.
how should a water cooler designed for an executive pantry should look??
trendy
hi-tech
contrasting
…
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I would like to add some of my queries
What factors influence a table top water cooler. Other than ergonomics.
any well designed water coolers you people came across!
thanks to everyone that replied, good food for thought!
the problem with the tap height is due to the system being gravity fed. Raise the tap and then the user has even further to lift that giant water bottle.
the stigma of water is what rules this category, tap water is actually cleaner in alot of ways due to the bacteria that can grow in the water coolers. A water cooler is an open system that ‘holds’ air as the bottle gets more empty, that air and what is in it, opens up the possibility of bacterial growth.
a ‘tap’ system (esp. a filtered one like fueledbycoffee mentioned) is closed and clean.
ppl just think the fancy water bottles are ‘clean’ water.
Altitude worked with PUR to come up with a nice version that is neither a tap nor a traditional bottle, but the office incarnation of their fridge systems with built in heating and cooling.