Fashion and functionality are the principles on which the Helix was created. Helix solves the problem of dealing with tangled and easy to lose headphones. What do you do with your headphones when they aren’t plugged in? Instead of keeping them in your pocket or purse, access them in a fashion-forward cuff for easy convenience. It can take minutes to unravel earbuds. With Helix, you’ll plug in your headphones in just seconds.
Helix was designed for people who are always on and always in style. We want to create something unique for music-lovers, tech users, and smartphone mavens. We want to deliver an incredible sound experience in a wearable that’s on the cutting edge of modern fashion trends. Our goal is to make carrying headphones convenient and fashionable. The discreet, miniature compartment inside Helix accomplishes just that.
We’ve created a wearable that complements your style and takes your tech to a whole new level.
Amidst the wearables market, which is overflowing with fitness trackers, biomarkers, and smart watches, there has never existed a complementary accessory allowing you to effortlessly keep your headphones with you at all times—until Helix.
A headset is something you want with you wherever you go. Most of us just throw headphones into something we carry with us and later spend hours untangling them. Helix is an elegant solution to this problem. Instant connection to music, podcasts, or phone calls becomes a reality.
We’re all “always on” in this digital age. According to a PR Newswire study, on average we use headphones for four hours a day. The majority of those surveyed had 3 or more pairs of headphones with 48% using them every day. Constantly taking the extra time to deal with earphones is an unnecessary waste. Traditional wired earphones can be hard to carry and untangle. Say goodbye to inconvenience and stay connected. Effortlessly store your headphones with Helix.
“Fundamentally, the marriage of fashion and functional design to create a storage element for headphones simply didn’t exist,” said Mika Nenonen, the Chief Designer of the Helix Cuff.
Design Mindset: We believe that the most interesting things happen in the in-between spaces. Therefore, in the research phase of Helix we looked at both fashion and tech – the catwalk stuff and engineering. We wanted to create something new and usually new things come together from existing elements put together in a novel way.
We created Helix knowing that the human wrist is valuable real estate. We knew we would have to provide a lot of value in order to persuade people use a wearable that they will see all the time. It’s a lot different from something you would carry in your pocket or purse. We paid a lot of attention to the quality of the aesthetics and materials and created a design that looks sleek and stylish, feels comfortable, and cleverly hides its technological power.
Cuff: It’s the loop design that makes Helix fit to your wrist. Three magnets on one side of the loop connect with the other side to adjust to your wrist size. It takes seconds to slip on and fit to your size. That’s just part of why we love Helix’s loop design.
It’s thinnest right below your wrist, where you want it to be, so that you can rest your arm on a table normally. This was one of the main drivers for the Helix’s design. We realized that usability is extremely important for a wearable product.
A loop with a soft curvature is a pain to build. Especially when you add wired earbuds into the mix. Helix has a pretty complex entity of design elements. The challenge is how to make everything look and feel nice.
The unique looping design of Helix allows you to wrap the connecting cord for the earphones into a groove on the wrist cuff when the headset is not in use. A tiny cache on the cuff provides a convenient place to put the earphones.
Earbuds: Helix is designed to make the headphones look natural when in use. Measured to the perfect length, the headphones are short enough to wear on your wrist and long enough to comfortably sit in your ears.
A light shines through the center of the control unit to signal that Bluetooth is on and your device is connected.
Materials: We created internal structure force in the manufacturing process to keep the loop together and a compartment to hold the earbuds. The cuff is made out of fluoroelastomer, the same material as the Apple watch. Anodized aluminum is used to make up the cuff compartment, control unit, and headphones.
Design Process: The design process consisted of multiple iterations. We went through hundreds of sketches to find the right look. 3D Prints were a useful tool in testing models. Finally, we narrowed the design down to a few prototypes until we found Helix.
Compromising earbud size and sound quality gave us lots of design constraints, but at the same time, constraints are fundamental for design and they pushed us to be more creative. The Helix is made so that it contains high quality sound in conveniently small headphones. It was challenging to engineer this given the incredibly small sizes of the speakers, but our engineers managed to overcome this obstacle impressively. Details on Helix’s Specifications:
Ultra-Small Size Earbuds:
Mic with Call Controls:
Helix is compatible with all major mobile and wearable devices. From iOS to Android and Windows, you can connect with Helix. Helix can play for up to three hours (expected) and rest on standby for up to 200 hours (expected). Charge time for Helix is less than one hour.
We offer Helix in two unisex colors: White and Black in the classic edition. The classic edition comes with accents of silver or champagne gold aluminum embellishments. Helix also has a Gold Edition which comes with Bright Red color on the cuff and 18k plated-gold embellishments. These embellishments will be delicately placed to cover the storage cache for the wireless signal receiver and the stereo sound-quality in-ear headphones when not in use.
With a perfectly structured look and feel, we aimed to make Helix an accessory that cleverly masks its technological power so that both men and women can wear it with complete comfort and versatility. The design celebrates functionality.
From your home, to the office, about town and to the gym, the Helix Cuff is the first product of its kind to keep music lovers and other audiophiles stylishly and conveniently connected without compromising fashion sense or sound quality.
Helix offers complete versatility. Easily pair it with whatever you’re wearing without having to worry that the Helix won’t work with your outfit. The Helix’s designer brand ensures quality and style. The aesthetic value of Helix is not something to be ignored. It’s designed to last as fashion moves forward. Both men and women deserve to have tech that looks this good, so we’ve designed Helix to work for any gender.
Our team reflects the blend of style and technology that is the Helix. Our core team includes industrial designers and engineers who hail from Nokia, Nest, IBM, Lenovo; marketing and branding know-hows in fashion and consumer electronics; and hardware and software experts with deep supply chain expertise.
Angela Pan is a self-taught designer and our enthusiastic leader. Her drive as a female entrepreneur impresses us all. With the success of founding two startups and her experience in early stage investment of IOT wearables and hardware related companies, she is the force behind what Ashley Chloe is and what the Helix will soon be.
Mika Nenonen is the Chief Designer of Helix. He is a former lead industrial designer at Nokia and Nest and won over 20 prestigious design awards including IF Design Gold Award, IDSA Gold Award, and Red Dot Design Award. We are all wowed with the amazing things Mika achieves.
Finally, our production and engineering team is reliable, experienced, and ready to start creating Helix. Our team has been working tirelessly to create Helix. Now we need you to join our team to bring Helix into production.
Your Support Is Critical! We’ve been working on this project since November 2014. We’ve gone through numerous engineering and design phases to come this far and now we’re ready for production.
We believe collaboration leads to improved innovation. We value all the great minds of the Kickstarter community and we need your support and feedback to make our product design even better. Have any ideas? Be part of our community and give us a timely comment. We’re on a mission to create an innovative tech wearable. We can’t do it without you!
Without your support, all our efforts and ideation would be in vain. We need you! We will use the funds raised from you for:
Testing: It’s not easy to hold small earbuds in our Helix Cuff without sacrificing the sound and battery quality. But persistent and vigorous product development process and testing can overcome this challenge. Helix’s life is in your hands.
Manufacturing: Quality is extremely important. Helix reflects a complex entity of design elements, we need the capital to kickstart production tooling, to purchase raw materials and to cultivate a close dialogue of our engineering team and a world class manufacturer to enable high volume production and to ensure you receive the Helix in its best shape and status.
Become a part of the Helix Project and you’ll help us bring our vision of fashionable and functional wearables to life.
If you decide to support Helix now, we’ll have it shipped to you in December 2015 just in time for the holidays. It’s a perfect time to give that special someone (or yourself) a one of a kind gift.
Haven’t decided yet? We have a whole site dedicated to Helix. Check out more pictures and learn more at