Posted: September 6th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: design | Tags: Chicago, los angeles, Ork Posters, StudioBooth | View Comments
I’m traveling this week with The StudioBooth, where we’ll be helping HBO with a four city tour to premiere their new show Boardwalk Empire. In honor of the two cities I’ll be hitting up, I’m giving a shout out to Ork Posters. Designer Jenny Beorkrem created Ork Inc. when she couldn’t find a neighborhood map that fit her penchant for good, modern design. I’m a big fan of her work and her use of typography. Most of the maps are available as either a poster or a screen print in a variety of colors. Be sure to check them out here.
Posted: August 30th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: Uncategorized, reference | Tags: Design Thinking, Harvard Business Review, Warren Berger | View Comments
The Four Phases of Design Thinking
by Warren Berger
What can people in business learn from studying the ways successful designers solve problems and innovate? On the most basic level, they can learn to question, care, connect, and commit — four of the most important things successful designers do to achieve significant breakthroughs.
Having studied more than a hundred top designers in various fields over the past couple of years (while doing research for a book), I found that there were a few shared behaviors that seemed to be almost second nature to many designers. And these ingrained habits were intrinsically linked to the designer’s ability to bring original ideas into the world as successful innovations. All of which suggests that they merit a closer look.
Question. If you spend any time around designers, you quickly discover this about them: They ask, and raise, a lot of questions. Often this is the starting point in the design process, and it can have a profound influence on everything that follows. Many of the designers I studied, from Bruce Mau to Richard Saul Wurman to Paula Scher, talked about the importance of asking “stupid questions”–the ones that challenge the existing realities and assumptions in a given industry or sector. The persistent tendency of designers to do this is captured in the joke designers tell about themselves. How many designers does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Does it have to be a light bulb?
In a business setting, asking basic “why” questions can make the questioner seem naïve while putting others on the defensive (as in, “What do you mean ‘Why are we doing it this way?’ We’ve been doing it this way for 22 years!”). But by encouraging people to step back and reconsider old problems or entrenched practices, the designer can begin to re-frame the challenge at hand — which can then steer thinking in new directions. For business in today’s volatile marketplace, the ability to question and rethink basic fundamentals — What business are we really in? What do today’s consumers actually need or expect from us? — has never been more important.
Care. It’s easy for companies to say they care about customer needs. But to really empathize, you have to be willing to do what many of the best designers do: step out of the corporate bubble and actually immerse yourself in the daily lives of people you’re trying to serve. What impressed me about design researchers such as Jane Fulton Suri of IDEO was the dedication to really observing and paying close attention to people — because this is usually the best way to ferret out their deep, unarticulated needs. Focus groups and questionnaires don’t cut it; designers know that you must care enough to actually be present in people’s lives.
Connect. Designers, I discovered, have a knack for synthesizing–for taking existing elements or ideas and mashing them together in fresh new ways. This can be a valuable shortcut to innovation because it means you don’t necessarily have to invent from scratch. By coming up with “smart recombinations” (to use a term coined by the designer John Thackara), Apple has produced some of its most successful hybrid products; and Nike smartly combining a running shoe with an iPod to produce its groundbreaking Nike Plus line (which enables users to program their runs). It isn’t easy to come up with these great combos. Designers know that you must “think laterally” — searching far and wide for ideas and influences — and must also be willing to try connecting ideas that might not seem to go together. This is a way of thinking that can also be embraced by non-designers.
Commit. It’s one thing to dream up original ideas. But designers quickly take those ideas beyond the realm of imagination by giving form to them. Whether it’s a napkin sketch, a prototype carved from foam rubber, or a digital mock-up, the quick-and-rough models that designers constantly create are a critical component of innovation — because when you give form to an idea, you begin to make it real.
But it’s also true that when you commit to an idea early — putting it out into the world while it’s still young and imperfect — you increase the possibility of short-term failure. Designers tend to be much more comfortable with this risk than most of us. They know that innovation often involves an iterative process with setbacks along the way — and those small failures are actually useful because they show the designer what works and what needs fixing. The designer’s ability to “fail forward” is a particularly valuable quality in times of dynamic change. Today, many companies find themselves operating in a test-and-learn business environment that requires rapid prototyping. Which is just one more reason to pay attention to the people who’ve been conducting their work this way all along.
Warren Berger is the author of GLIMMER: How design can transform, business, your life, and maybe even the world. He also edits the online magazine GlimmerSite.com.
This article was originally on the Harvard Business Review Blog. You can see the original here.
The image is actually a visualization of the whole flickr processing.org group which was created by Andreas Köberle
Posted: August 25th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: fashion | Tags: Anna Wintour, Humberto Leon, Opening Ceremony | View Comments
“It’s not about forcing how we choose to present our stories into the same mold. It’s about seeing how our readers interact with each medium, and what we feel each medium has to offer the reader.”
-Anna Wintour
Humberto Leon, one of the co-founders of Opening Ceremony, recently had the opportunity to speak with Anna Wintour.
There’s something truly inspiring about discussing fashion with Anna Wintour that goes beyond her great influence. When Carol and I were invited to her office to discuss Fashion’s Night Out, among other topics, we were struck by how passionate and curious she remains about the fashion world. We were surprised to find ourselves geeking out with Anna on ‘Like a Prayer’-era Madonna, her iPad, lost Soho oculists, and what prompted her to put a pair of jeans on the cover of Vogue in 1988. Of course, the order of the day was Fashion’s Night Out, the event she developed last year to jumpstart global retail. I think that one of the things we share with Anna is an excitement for shopping, and a belief that retail should be fun, which is why being part of the event comes second nature to Opening Ceremony.
Humberto Leon: What’s new for Fashion’s Night Out (FNO) this year?
Anna Wintour: This year we have a CBS documentary on the making of the event, and we’re staging the largest public fashion show in New York’s history with some of the world’s top models. It will be a carnival-style celebration like last year, only bigger and better, with more cities and retailers participating.
HL: We hear that Vogue is organizing a giant FNO fashion show at Lincoln Center, the new home of Fashion Week. What can we expect to see?
AW: Traditionally, shows are industry events, so this is unique as we’re staging it for the consumer. Not only will shoppers preview the best trends for fall on many of the world’s most recognized models, but they will also have the opportunity to purchase those trends on Fashion’s Night Out. No matter their style or budget, anyone can translate the latest trends to suit their tastes and wardrobe.
HL: How can FNO achieve the same impact abroad as it has in NY?
AW: Last year, many cities had very successful celebrations. The fact that 3 more countries have decided to join in is a testament to last year’s success. At its core, FNO is a celebration of fashion, and each city knows best how to tailor the event to suit the needs of its culture. But what’s interesting is the transactional element – stores are taking the creative initiative to draw consumers in. Each city is responsible for thinking outside the box to create that unique environment and connect shoppers with fashion on a whole different level.
HL: As a retailer, Opening Ceremony realizes that FNO is the best excuse to do something really fun, exciting, new, and fresh for our customers. Is this what you imagined for FNO?
AW: Absolutely. Opening Ceremony is a great example of a retailer that knows its consumer and is responding to their interests, personalities, and shopping habits. The store is always current and exciting, so people are destined to return again and again. It is a wonderful microcosm of what we hope the world of FNO will be on Sept 10.
HL: Ignoring budget and logistics, can you describe your fantasy FNO?
AW: Looking at the impressive lineup for this year, I think we are already seeing the fantasy being played out in reality.
HL: What is a change you’ve seen in the fashion industry since the first FNO?
AW: I believe consumer confidence is being restored. People are out there shopping again without the level of guilt or concern of the previous year. Also, it’s built community amongst designers and retailers, both competitors and otherwise, and brought together all aspects of American culture and arts, which is an exciting aspect in and of itself. It’s a time of the year when fashion cities around the world are united in a cause, which is wonderful.
HL: What’s your vision for FNO 10 years from now?
AW: That retailers and consumers will be inventing bigger and better ideas to celebrate fashion.
HL: Do you read fashion blogs, and if so, which ones are your favorites?
AW: Yes, of course. We’ve featured many bloggers in Vogue. Hanneli Mustaparta and Rachel Chandler are regular contributors to Vogue.com.
HL: How do you think fashion blogs have affected magazine content?
AW: Like any evolution in the industry, they force you to become better at what you do. Vogue’s in-depth articles and beautiful fashion stories, along with coverage of the arts within a fashion context, is not something that exists in the same way on blogs. They force us to dig deeper for stories, but we’re not competitors; we serve different markets.
HL: Can photography and fashion editorials exist on the Internet?
AW: Yes and they do. They are just presented in a different manner and provide more of a complementary voice to what lies in the pages of Vogue. Every medium serves a great purpose to reach our readers. It’s not about forcing how we choose to present our stories into the same mold. It’s about seeing how our readers interact with each medium, and what we feel each medium has to offer the reader.
HL: Your first Vogue cover featured jeans paired with a Christian Lacroix jacket. How did this idea, which was so revolutionary at the time, come about? Do you still take inspiration from youth culture? Is there anything happening in street style that you find interesting?
AW: It was first and foremost a translation of a European aesthetic for the American consumer. It brought couture to the street and streetwear into Vogue during the era of Madonna’s Like A Prayer. It was also a recognition of the importance of personal style in fashion, which has played a role in Vogue ever since.
HL: Who do you think is New York’s #1 shopper?
AW: New York is a fashion-conscious city, and there are many anonymous shoppers who could claim that title.
HL: What influences your own sense of style?
AW: I think style should always be an expression of an individual’s personality and tastes.
HL: What is your favorite store in New York that is no longer open?
AW: There was an oculist on Prince Street that had great sunglasses and is sadly now a wine store.
HL: Do you own an iPad?
AW: Yes, I do.
HL: Our FNO concept is patterned after great Parisian flea markets such as Clignancourt and Vanves. Have you ever been to any of them, and if so, what have you purchased?
AW: I am usually in Paris on business and don’t make it out to the markets, but they are wonderful places with incredible history and serve an important role in the fashion industry.
HL: As you know, our country collaboration this year is with France. Would you mind sharing your favorite French spots? What are the best shopping neighborhoods/streets?
AW: There are so many wonderful shopping areas in Paris. Different streets cater to different tastes, so it depends what I’m looking for.
HL: The place you most wish existed in NY?
AW: I love the Place des Vosges and wish there was something like it in New York.
HL: The best hotel bar?
AW: The bar at the Ritz.
HL: And finally, your favorite hidden spot?
AW: If I told you it wouldn’t be hidden!
Posted: August 16th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: art | Tags: MoMA | View Comments
MoMA is ahead of the game. While many other museum have failed to accept the digital age, MoMA has embraced it with a free iPhone application that allows you to browse their latest exhibitions, daily events and film screenings as well as over 32,000 works in their permanent collection. It even lets you create a playlist to listen to while you visit the museum. True to MoMA’s mission, the visual interface of the app is engaging and inspiring and makes me want to visit Bruce Nauman’s Days, a “sound sculpture” consisting of a continuous stream of seven voices reciting the days of the week in random order. Who wants to join me?
You can download it from iTunes.
*via Cool Hunting
Posted: August 5th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: reference | Tags: burning man, infographic | View Comments
Off and on over the past ten years, I’ve told myself that I’d make it to Burning Man, which is known as one of the wildest, craziest, and to some, life changing experiences out there. I have yet to make the journey, but every year when August rolls around and I hear whispers of people’s creations for the week long festival and my curiosity is once again piqued. To deepen my fascination even further, I came across this infographic. Never heard of Burning Man. Check out some Flickr action here.
Designed by Flint Hahn of Xmasons
*via Co Design
Posted: July 21st, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: drink | Tags: Breaking Down, coffee, infographic, Plaid | View Comments
Plaid, the brand and innovation consultancy, just created an infographic to illustrate the complex world of coffee drinks. It has already been talked about and featured on some of my favorite resources of daily inspiration including Fast Company, NOTCOT, FFFFound, Idsgn and Design You Trust. Congrats Plaid!
Posted: July 19th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: connecting, Daniel Pink, leadership | View Comments
One night last month, a Virgin Atlantic flight left Heathrow Airport bound for Newark, New Jersey. As the plane neared the Eastern Seaboard, bad weather forced the flight to divert to Hartford, Connecticut, some 106 miles north of its destination. The plane sat on the runway there for four hours – without air-conditioning, food or water – as babies wailed and adults anguished in the darkened cabin.
The next day, the airline, which explained that the Hartford airport lacked the customs personnel to process an international flight, offered this response: “Virgin Atlantic would like to thank passengers for their patience and apologise for any inconvenience caused.”
Jason Fried, co-founder of the American software firm 37 Signals and co-author of ReWork: Change the Way You Work Forever, finds the language of that statement almost as inhuman as the problem that prompted it.
Not too long ago, Fried saw a similar, though less calamitous, disaster in a Chicago cafe. A woman had just purchased a large cup of coffee. On the way to sit down, she tripped, and spilled the entire contents all over another customer.
Here’s what she said: “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
“If someone is really, truly sorry,” says Fried, “that’s how they respond.”
But in business we rarely talk like that. Instead, we resort to a weird and inadvertent bilingualism. We speak human at home and “professionalese” at work. And that might be hurting our businesses more than we realise.
Go back to that all-too-common phrase: “We apologise for any inconvenience this might have caused.” Would you say that to your daughter when you were late picking her up from football practice? To your neighbour when your dog trampled his flowerbed?
“Any inconvenience” is emotionally anaemic and lacks the specificity to make it meaningful. “We apologise” isn’t much better. It’s distancing almost to the point of dismissiveness. “When you say, ‘I’m sorry,’ you’re owning,” Fried explains. “When you say ‘I apologise,’ you’re renting.”
Professionalese is a renter’s language. It doesn’t expect to be around for very long and has no stake in the long-term prospects of the neighbourhood. It says, “mistakes were made” rather than “we messed up” and claims to “take responsibility” instead of acknowledging “it’s my fault”.
Using business-speak at work rests on the notion that the distance of professional language is inherently strong – and the closeness of personal language inherently weak.
But this idea may be wrong.
The behavioural economist Dan Ariely has conducted research showing that when people are treated rudely, they’re more likely to behave vengefully – for instance, by not saying anything when they’re given too much change in a transaction. But when rudeness is followed by a clear and simple “I’m sorry”, the annoyance dissipates and people tend to behave as honourably as they do in ordinary circumstances.
Or consider medicine. In the US, where physicians fret that every patient is a potential plaintiff in a malpractice lawsuit, lawyers counsel doctors never to admit a mistake. But evidence shows that when doctors apologise for an error and show how they’ll avoid it in the future – that’s to say, when they talk and act like human beings – aggrieved patients think more highly of the physician and are less likely to sue.
In 2006, Threadless, an online T-shirt company, confronted a case of technological malpractice. While upgrading its computer system, the company accidentally deleted all of the blogs that its customers had maintained for several years. Yet when Threadless, instead of hiding behind the stilted language of “inconvenience caused”, explained its errors, apologised directly for them and even invited comments on the blunder, customers reacted with surprising empathy.
“The best way to figure out if you’re running a good company is to figure out if your customers trust your apology,” says Jeffrey Kalmikoff, who was Threadless’s chief creative officer during the snafu.
Like any valuable relationship, the ones we have in business hinge on trust. And trust depends on openness, respect and humanity. Yet we often resist taking that approach in our professional lives, even though we know it would be absurd to do anything else in our personal lives.
For instance, suppose I’m talking on my mobile phone – maybe doing an interview for this column – when my wife calls. I can’t speak with her at the moment – I’m on deadline – so I say to her: “All of my brain is busy right now, so please hold and I’ll be with you shortly. Your call is very important to me.”
I guarantee that my customer satisfaction scores at home would suffer.
But if that’s true, why not re-craft the waiting message in our call centres so that it’s more like what we’d say to our spouses? “We know it’s frustrating to wait on hold – but we’re swamped right now answering other calls. We’ll get to you as soon as we can – probably about [insert an accurate number] minutes. We’re sorry for making you wait.”
In a world awash in information and choices, clarity is now a source of competitive advantage, says Fried. “The real winners in business are going to be the clear companies. Clarity is what everybody really wants and appreciates.”
So try an experiment. For the next seven days, go monolingual and speak only human at work. Don’t say anything to your boss, your staff, your teammate, your supplier or your customer that you wouldn’t say to your spouse or your friend.
It might startle people at first. But I suspect that they’ll reply in the same vernacular – and you might start actually understanding each other and getting something done.
However, if I’m mistaken – and this test flops – I apologise in advance for any inconvenience caused.
Daniel H Pink is an author and business leader who writes about the world of work. His most recent book is Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
Photo via Flickr
Posted: June 28th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: recipe | Tags: New Amsterdam Market, Smitten Kitchen | View Comments
Inspired by the gorgeous produce we picked up yesterday at the New Amsterdam Market including the most perfect little organic strawberries from McEnroe Organic Farm, I spent my evening recipe hunting. One of my favorite sites to peruse, Smitten Kitchen, once again proved to be the winner.
Strawberry-Ricotta Graham Tartlets
Adapted — barely, as the recipe was just about perfect — from Food & Wine
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
1/4 cup whole wheat flour, or graham flour if you can get it
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
Pinch of ground cloves
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
3 tablespoons plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 tablespoons honey
1 1/2 teaspoons molasses (you can swap this with additional honey, if desired)
3/4 pound strawberries, thinly sliced
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 1/4 cups ricotta (10 ounces), fresh if you can find it, a full-fat store bought if you cannot
2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
Make grahams: In a bowl, whisk both flours with the cinnamon, salt and cloves. Beat the butter, light brown sugar and 2 tablespoons of the granulated sugar at medium speed on an electric mixer until fluffy, about 1 minute. Beat in the honey and molasses, about 30 seconds. Scrape down the side of the bowl and beat in the flour mixture at low speed, just until incorporated. Pat the dough into a disk, cover with plastic and refrigerate until firm, about 1 hour.
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the dough 1/8 inch thick. Using a 3 1/2-inch oval cookie cutter (recommendation of original recipe), a 3 1/2-inch round cutter (what I had, and used) or a smaller cutter of your choice (I might go with 3 inches next time, as I like petite desserts), stamp out your bases. (About 16 with a 3 1/2-inch oval, 10 with a 3 1/2-inch round or more with a smaller cutter.) Reroll the dough scraps if necessary. Transfer the grahams to the baking sheets and bake for about 12 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through, until lightly golden around the edges. Let cool on the pans for 5 minutes, then transfer the grahams to racks to cool completely.
Make toppings: In a bowl, toss the strawberries with the remaining 3 tablespoons of sugar and the lemon juice. Let stand until syrupy, 20 minutes. In a medium bowl, mix the ricotta, confectioners’ sugar and lemon zest.
Assemble tartlets: Spread about 1 tablespoon of the ricotta mixture on each graham. Arrange the strawberries over the ricotta, drizzle with the syrup and serve.
Do ahead: Grahams will keep in an airtight container for up to two weeks. They will keep longer, unbaked, in the freezer. Ricotta mixture, if your ricotta is fresh, will keep for a day or two and up to a week if from packaged ricotta. Strawberry mixture should, in theory, keep for a few days but will not because it is delicious enough to spoon over every yogurt, oatmeal or ice cream scoop you can find.
*All images and recipe via Smitten Kitchen
