A Design That Came Back to Me After 12 Years

In 2013–2014, together with my colleague, I worked on the industrial design of a series of plugs and sockets for the ERA brand.

These were everyday electrical products: simple, affordable, functional objects for the mass market. But even in such products, design matters. A plug is not something people usually admire — but it is something they touch, see and use every day.

For this series, we chose a softened square as the main plastic key. It became the visual foundation of the whole line: calm, compact, slightly rounded, easy to recognize, but not overdesigned.


Twelve years later, I unexpectedly found my own design on a store shelf in Portugal and bought it.
Twelve years later, I unexpectedly found my own design on a store shelf in Portugal and bought it.

The moulds were ordered from a factory in China. To reduce the tooling cost, we agreed that the factory would pay for the moulds, and in return they would be allowed to use our design for other clients.

While we were preparing the products for sale in the Customs Union markets, the factory had already started selling products based on our design in Germany.

Almost twelve years passed.

Recently, in Portugal, I needed a simple standalone plug. I walked into a shop almost by chance — and suddenly saw my own design hanging there on display. I bought it. Now I use a product that I designed many years ago, in a completely different country and in a completely different context.

There is something quietly satisfying about this.

A product's real success is not an award or a launch. It's still being sold years later.
A product's real success is not an award or a launch. It's still being sold years later.


Industrial design often becomes anonymous. It moves through factories, catalogues, distributors, shops and homes. It is rarely signed. It does not always stay connected to the designer’s name.

Exploded view of the ERA industrial socket, developed by Vladimir Shmoylov and Dmitry Lyubimov in 2014. The project combined industrial design and engineering to create a durable product for demanding environments.
Internal construction of the ERA industrial socket, designed by Vladimir Shmoylov and Dmitry Lyubimov, 2014.

Internal construction of the ERA industrial socket, designed by Vladimir Shmoylov and Dmitry Lyubimov, 2014.

But if the construction works and the form is right, the product can continue to live for years.

Apparently, this one did.

The ERA plugs and sockets range, designed by Vladimir Shmoylov and Dmitry Lyubimov, 2014. A unified design language built around a softened square geometry was applied across the entire product family.
What started as a single design idea evolved into an entire family of ERA electrical products. Designed by Vladimir Shmoylov and Dmitry Lyubimov, 2014.

After publishing this story, I received an unexpected message from Matteo Turconi, who was part of my design team during those years and contributed to many remarkable projects. Matteo shared photographs of an earlier version of the plug concept that he had developed during the initial stages of the project and mentioned that, as far as he knew, it never reached the market.

Seeing those images after twelve years was a reminder that successful products are rarely the result of a single idea or a single designer. They evolve through collaboration, iterations, and the contributions of talented people whose work often remains behind the scenes.

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An early design iteration developed by Matteo Turconi during the initial stages of the project. Matteo was part of my design team at the time and contributed to many successful product development projects.
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One of the original design review boards from the project archive. 2017


Vladimir Shmoylov | Chief Design Officer | Industrial & Packaging Designer