I see design as a form of art that unites rational and emotional perception of objects, where aesthetic values of the object have roots in craftsmanship and engineering and become visible through the functionality of objects and highlight the value of the selected material. Useful things should be made beautiful.https://www.rihardsfunts.eu/

Mad Design Summer School was created as an immersive intensive course where artisans, design students, professors, and experts from various fields work and live together for a determined period of time to create design pieces with purpose. In MAD’s philosophy, new values for design and craftsmanship can only emerge by developing creative works and understanding the two disciplines deeply, blurring the boundaries between the fields of design, art, crafts and science.http://designsummerschool.com/

I have been running design studio RIJADA since year 2007. Specific character of RIJADA is formed by combining art, science and social responsibility, simultaneously ensuring high quality of product. Creating design studio was essential to understand product development and business side of it and also helped later on to become lecturer and tutor in Latvian Art Academy and different national and international courses and schools. I have created my own course based on design thinking theory and practical experience that helped me to explore innovation and creativity. Studio acted in industrial, exhibition, environment and graphic design. Providing customers with full design cycle from concept - till realized objects.

Hardware startup "sonocase". An iPad case featuring "Coneq", a pro–grade sound correction algorithm, and an innovative acoustic design in the inner sound channels of the case, "sonocase" produces powerful audio via its front facing speakers and makes the iPad three times louder. Powered with Bluetooth technology, in addition to iPad Pro, iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 4, the "sonocase" speaker case can also be paired with other Bluetooth–enabled devices.

Development of GYMNASIUM project. Project of the improvement of urban areas, which plans to set up new design vertical urban gyms in degraded districts of cities. Project is about popularizing healthy living, harmonic society and facilitated environment. GYMNASIUM focuses on the wider view on the urban environment and urban design issues in the public and private space, including the responsibility for design manufacture, design users and ecology. Made in cooperation with design studio RIJADA and Kristaps Grundšteins.By creating a public space, the city determines the social process development, like the physical and intellectual development of a child is determined by the environment in which he grows up. The necessity of this project is to take part in the processes of the society by using the publicly accessible urban space and design as an active process and to show that design and social accountability as a sociological aspect are closely connected phenomena.

Course on design thinking for Master Degree students.

Course on design thinking for 4th year design students, head of diploma thesis works