Asus Hosts Design You Can Feel Event

Asus hosted a small media event called Design You Can Feel, which celebrates the craftsmanship behind the Zenbook Ceralumium and Zenbook Duo laptops.

The event was held at Nirox Sculpture Park and the on-site restaurant, but was not your typical laptop launch. It was more about showing what went into the design by making us invoke the senses.

Coraline Lin from Asus Taiwan’s design team flew to South Africa for the event. “We created various models and prototypes, testing feasibility, including screen angles, stand designs, and keyboard positioning back and forth. Through a user-cantered design mindset, we integrated a detachable Bluetooth keyboard and a built-in foldable aluminium stand to enhance flexibility and usage modes, providing a seamless and convenient experience.”

The experience aimed to showcase the Asus design philosophy by bringing together the five senses in a “smell room” featuring various perfumes, followed by a culinary experience presented by Chef Ransley, Leah Tsonye, Andrea Burgener and the Nirox team.

While it felt like we were enjoying a leisurely afternoon with a gourmet meal, media eventually got a little hands on with the devices after a short interactive presentation featuring its Ceralumium prototypes and the evolution of its dual-screen technology.

The Zenbook Ceralumium range is ultra-light and ultra-strong, bringing in minimalist elegance, with raw samples from the ceramic-aluminium blend on display.

According to Asus, its patented Ceralumium technology took four years to refine, for its precise colours, hardness and texture. It is also scratch resistant and promises longevity, inspired by nature.

“This high-tech ceramic, revered in aerospace and luxury watches, being 3X harder than anodized aluminium, it merges metal’s lightness with ceramic’s resilience through a ceramisation process.”

Both laptops are already available to purchase, with the Zenbook A14 built with high-tech ceramic, featuring a Snapdragon X Elite processor and a weight of 980g.

It runs Windows 11 Pro, claims up to 32 hours of battery, up to 32GB of RAM, up to 1TB SSD, and Snapdragon Sound. Ports on this ultra-light laptop include HDMI 2.1; 1x USB-A; 2x USB-C and an audio jack.

Meanwhile, the Zenbook Duo 2025 is a dual screen laptop featuring 2x 14-inch 3K OLED displays (120Hz) with detachable keyboard for the bottom screen plus a kickstand to allow for various usage modes.

Its unique design allows it to be used in four ways: Laptop, Dual-Screen, Desktop or Sharing mode in vertical or horizontal orientation to adapt to any workflow in seconds.

It runs Windows 11 Pro with an Intel Core Ultra 9 Processor, up to 32GB of RAM and 2TB SSD, and a long-lasting 75Wh battery.

Experiencing all of this in a way made me appreciate what goes into the design process of a laptop, one I wouldn’t ordinarily even think of. The result is a beautifully crafted laptop, especially the Zenbook A14, considering it’s under 1kg. If you’re a traveller like me, these thing matter, plus you’re getting the longevity from the strong materials.

The Zenbook A14 retails for R22 999 and Zenbook Duo retails for R43 999 on the Asus South Africa online store and can be found in-stores at Incredible Connection.

Thank you team Asus South Africa for hosting me.