Talking to your toilet...

I don’t know what it says about our personality type, but some of us think quite a lot about toilets.

‘What are the toilets like?” is a question that my friends are very familiar with and don’t even get me started on the dearth of the public toilets and lack of funding for basic facilities here in Scotland. Arghhh.

When it comes to toilets, no one does it better than the Japanese. I’ve posted before about the Tokyo Toilet Project and the latest addition is the Hi Toilet, a toilet you can talk to.

Designer Kazoo Sato has created a public toilet that uses voice commands to control functions including the door, toilet flush, taps and ambient music as part of the Tokyo Toilet project.

Situated in Nanago Dori Park in the heart of Tokyo's Shibuya financial district, the design of the hemispherical toilet was led by TBWA\HAKUHODO advertising agency chief creative officer Kazoo Sato.

The Hi Toilet also responds to increased hygiene concerns around the spread of infection through contact with surfaces, which were heightened during the Covid-19 pandemic.

"After three years of research, planning and designing, we came up with the concept of the voice-command toilet called Hi Toilet, where all commands were activated by voice," explained Sato.

Users entering the toilet are greeted by an automated message explaining that they can use voice commands to operate the door, to flush the toilet, to turn the tap on or off, and to play music.

Japanese toilet manufacturer Toto provided one of its high-tech Washlet toilets that includes a cleaning water jet nozzle and automated lid for hands-free operation.

"This idea has been in place long before the arrival of Covid-19, but  Covid accelerated the acceptance of this unique user experience in terms of 'toilets being contactless'."

I don’t know about you but in these still worrying times, a contactless toilet sounds like a damm fine idea.

Especially if can look as good as this.

Queen Marie