Tejas Patel
Tejas Patel
write to
tjs13.9@gmail.com
theme

Product Designer, The Framing Project · Sydney

I’m an industrial designer who builds the systems around the product.

Objects first: a wearable ECG, a robot built to clean solar panels, a STEM toy that went on sale, a pocket ESP32 handheld. Since early 2026 I’ve also designed and built a framing workshop’s platform, from the studio where a client prices a mirror to the job card, drawings and cutting files on the bench. It went live on 27 October.

See the work
or read how I work
The live home page: 'Your vision, made to measure.' over the first of its four room slides, a frameless organic mirror above a walnut vanity, with Design a mirror and Design a frame, under a header with Mirrors, Framing, Trade, Shop and Start designing.
The live home page on a phone: the organic mirror above a walnut vanity, then 'Your vision, made to measure.' with Design a mirror and Design a frame.
screen The workshop’s home page on a laptop and a phone, from the live site, 29 October 2026.

Reframed

A legacy-run workshop given one structure, and the site, studios and floor screens that make it visible.

when
2026, at The Framing Project, Sydney
my part
Architect and builder from May 2026.
with
InTechual Solutions. We built the pricing engine together.
status
Launched 27 October 2026.the old program runs beside it for two weeks

how it came to me

I joined on the CNC and the bench. After the ownership changed in February 2026, Nic, one of the owners, asked me to take the systems on.

Cutover was set for 16 September. It slipped.

2,235

past jobs with usable dimensions, replayed through the new pricing engine before launch. Another 1,545 had none and were left out.

Replay report, 26 August 2026

View case study: Reframed

MirrorFactory OS

A shop-floor board for a framing and mirror workshop, built for iPads on the floor.

when
January to July 2026, at The Framing Project. Archived.
my part
Designed it and built it with coding agents, self-initiated.
Black-and-white photograph of the workshop floor: felt-topped benches in front with a drill, tape rolls, spray cans and a mug, lengths of moulding stacked against the back wall, coiled air lines hanging from the roof, and two framers working at benches on either side.
The workshop floor the board was built for. Photograph by The Framing Project.

10 Feb 2026

glass ordered?

0 of 9

drawing My finding as a form. No such form existed.

My assistant’s check of the overdue invoices, 10 February 2026, at my request

On 10 February I had my AI assistant check nine overdue invoices against a cached copy of the workshop’s order data. None had glass on order, and one was still a quote. The board was already a month old by then; by 31 May it put each work-order line on its own card. On 30 June the iPads still weren’t in use; the framers worked from a view on a TV, and in July my pipeline took over feeding it.

The floor kept its TV.

View case study: MirrorFactory OS

Mini Cyberdeck

A pocket terminal on an ESP32-S3: a two-inch touch screen and eight keys under the thumb, built to keep my Claude Code sessions on standby.

when
31 August to 24 September 2026, a personal project
my part
The brief, the hardware and the testing on the device. I drew every icon to the pixel. Claude Code wrote the firmware.
The handheld in a hand, close: the eight-tile launcher on its two-inch screen above the matt orange printed case, fingers either side.
In my hand on 30 October, in a test print of its case.

not yet The final case isn’t printed yet.

In the case, the first palette fought the object it lived in.

141 commits

between 31 August and 24 September 2026, on six days, 72 of them on 3 September. 140 of the 141 were co-written with Claude Code.

Firmware git log, recounted 29 October 2026

View case study: Mini Cyberdeck

Sehat Sathi

A wearable ECG for rural Kutch, in Gujarat, with a shell cut from the region’s embroidery.

when
June to August 2024, UNSW Master of Design
my part
My solo studio project, from the research to the printed shell.
The grey pebble-shaped shell worn at the neckline of a maroon top embroidered with silver sequin flowers, photographed outdoors. Pink light shows through its petal cut-outs and a small push button sits at its left end.
Worn at the neckline, outdoors.

The magnets that hold the module on are meant to be its electrode contacts too. It lifts off, so the garment can go in the wash.

UNSW design report, page 19, August 2024

not yet It hasn’t been through clinical validation.

View case study: Sehat Sathi
The device clipped at the hem of a maroon sequinned top, its petal cut-outs glowing, a USB-C cable hanging down, green foliage blurred behind. Torso only.
Worn at the hem, the cut-outs lit.
The perforated shell held against a light, the Kutch motif glowing through.
The shell held to the light.

Warp Drive

A STEM toy for children from six: one knob, two buttons and a two-inch screen on an ESP32-S3.

when
2025, a personal project
my part
Designed and built it. AI coding assistants wrote most of the firmware; I set what it should do and tested it on the device.
battery
Powered off with a long press, it still drained its battery. I fixed what stayed awake in software in November 2025. The knob still draws a little.
The petrol-blue Warp Drive seen from above and to one side: a lime knob with a faceted grip, two lime buttons, two lit blue LEDs, a USB-C cable plugged in, and a white ring on a starfield screen.
The blue desk unit with two buttons. It was listed for sale on my own shop.

Loading the toy’s ported Discovery mode.

Discovery mode, ported to your browser. Quiz and Story stay on the toy. Left alone, it plays by itself, silently.

knob
Warp, and choose in the menu
left button
Go, and back to the menu. Hold for three seconds to power off
right button
Settings, or a fact about what you found

18 objects

to find in space, from a star and a comet to the Ring Nebula. The firmware is open source (MIT) on GitHub.

Toy firmware, object list, recounted 22 October 2026

turn it off: my mark appears

Its power-off screen is the same face as my mark on this site, in an earlier, plainer drawing.

View case study: Warp Drive

Solis

A robot built to clean rooftop solar panels, so nobody has to climb up with a pole mop.

when
February to May 2021, Nirma University, B.Des
my part
Designed and built it with Devarsh Patel.
The white 3D-printed Solis prototype on a rooftop solar array, a fringe of cotton mop under its edge, string cables running out from its sides and a black lead in front.

one of its four cables

retouched The printed prototype on a real roof.

No cleaning test is recorded in our deck.

4 cables

pull it across the array, wound in and out by four steppers on the carriage. We dropped the gantry: heavy, costly and hard to scale.

Course deck, pages 18 and 22, 2021

View case study: Solis

From the bench

  • A palm-sized ESP32 console on its Snake title screen, the high score reading 65535, a joystick above the screen and a USB-C lead plugged in.

    the high score reads 65535: two bytes of memory nobody wrote

    the high score reads 65535: two bytes of memory nobody wrote

    Snake on a palm-sized ESP32 console, with a joystick and a vibration motor. Four games, wired and coded, 2025.
    more electronics
  • Product sketches in marker on loose sheets: a green hand vacuum, a cordless drill, a spray bottle and a toaster-like appliance, signed and dated January 2020.

    pen and alcohol marker on paper

    pen and alcohol marker on paper

    A hand vacuum, a drill, a toaster-like appliance and a spray bottle: quick product sketches, January 2020.
    more sketches
  • A wooden box with hand-chiselled finger joints.

    cut by hand, with a chisel

    cut by hand, with a chisel

    A wooden box with hand-chiselled finger joints.
    more material studies

Everything else from the bench is in the lab