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Introduction to Dutch Design Week

In your element

A physical key to your car’s memory of you

MINI Element accessory — © Hana Polak

The MINI Element turns the car's hidden data into a physical object, offering the driver a choice between using it to personalize the interior or keeping it safely stored.

Hidden car data

A car's memory of its driver usually lives in a cloud, unseen and out of reach. The MINI Element captures that data in a physical accessory and puts control back in the driver's hands.

Placed on the central display, it uses physical AI to learn from the driver's data and personalise the hidden elements of the interior: light, sound and temperature. Over time, each one adapts to the individual's routines. The car might learn that you are sleepy on the way to work, and slowly shift the colour temperature of the light to wake you up.

Insert Spark, the Element's alter ego, and the car sheds all smart assistance and personalisation. It becomes a raw machine that ignites the analogue racing spirit of the original Mini. The driver travels incognito while their data stays safely stored in the accessory.

The MINI Element turns the car's hidden data into a physical object, offering the driver a choice between using it or keeping it safely stored.

* developed as a graduation project at the Design Academy Eindhoven in collaboration with BMW in Munich

About Hana Polak

Hana uses design to reveal hidden worlds that are often overlooked. Viewing technology as a hidden magic, she integrates subtle interactions to give soul and character to ordinary objects, offering speculative concepts and stories that open a glimpse into possible futures.

MINI Element, physical model — © Jernej Ravbar, The Wondering Eye Studios

MINI Element and acessories, physical model — © Jernej Ravbar, The Wondering Eye Studios

MINI Element inside structure, physical model — © Jernej Ravbar, The Wondering Eye Studios

MINI Element, 3D rendering — © Hana Polak

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