Bee & Bee PDX
Bee & Bee Digital Rendering
This digital rendering shows off the Bee & Bee’s special features. It is a modular design and can include as few elements as one sealed Bee-First module, one Harvest drawer, and two native bee modules to which complete the stack. If the hive needs more space additional Bee-First and Harvest modules can be added. The Bee-Frist module has a plexiglass front which allows the keeper to inspect the bees inside. The Harvest drawer has a viewing window on each side so the bees can be seen without removing the Honey bars.
A Modular Beehive for Portland Backyard Beekeepers
In collaboration with Blendily Skincare Kitchen, the Pacific Northwest College of Art Collaborative Design Cohort of 2021 designed a new modular backyard beekeeping system. The Bee & Bee PDX was designed to balance the needs of the Pacific Northwest backyard beekeeper as well as the needs of honey bees, native bees, and the garden environment. The Bee & Bee PDX was a finalist in Fast Company’s World Changing Ideas Awards.
The Bee & Bee was a collective project in every sense of the word. The team itself consisted of five graduate students from a variety of educational and professional backgrounds and our instructor Skye Moret. We worked with a local client, Ivy Chung, the owner of Blendily Skincare Kitchen, and conducted broad research including interviews with Northwest beekeepers. I documented the project on behalf of the team in a case study which chronicles our research and bench scale prototyping process. Unfortunately we were disrupted by the Covid 19 pandemic at the bench scale stage and the full scale prototype was built in July 2020 after small outdoor gatherings were understood to be safe.
Sketches and Bench Scale Prototype
Each team member was responsible for proposing a design and bench scale prototype to present to our client. My prototype the ‘ModHive’ was an updated modular design based on a traditional top bar hive. Similar to the final Bee & Bee design it included an array of modules with a brood box, up to four honey boxes, native bee habitat, a watering system, tool storage and a pull out work bench.
Following the end of the semester team members SJ Bowden and Skye Moret joined me to build the full scale prototype of the Bee & Bee and deliver it to our client. We worked with a local woodworker to produce the custom half-hexagon honey bars which required specialized equipment, and who also gave some guidance on the best techniques to complete the remaining components.
What makes the Bee & Bee unique is the system of slides that enables bees to move freely between modules most of the time but also enables the keeper to contain them within the bee-first module while honey is harvested from the harvest drawer. The idea behind the slides is simple, but it proved to be one of the most challenging elements to build. Bees are particular and will only move through spaces of a specific size, this required highly precise building techniques.
