design

‘Tilt’ Goldsmiths MA Design Show, Sep 19 – 22

12 September 2013

Problem-solving is at the core of design and for Goldsmiths MA Design show Tilt at Hoxton Gallery at the Arch, running September 19 to 22, some of those problems include London food waste, the perpetual pursuit of more space and future landfill. Hence the fox diners, Japanese modular shelving and a design disposal manifesto being just some of the conundrums showing during London Design Festival.

Covering industrial, communication and spatial design, 40 projects from graduates who’ve already shown at Milan Salone, 100% Design and been recognised at the A’Design Awards, there’s little doubt of the world-class ideas generation no doubt on display.

See the Hoxton Gallery website for more details. **

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Pox Party release Inter FacePainter.

InterFacePainter.
23 April 2013

Putting the creativity back into the interface, art and funware developers Pox Party have released a new tool allowing for businesses and their users to individualise their own interfaces with Inter FacePainter. Drawing attention to the fact that, despite a history of progress in, say, arts, technology, literature, film, theatre, performance… the abstracted enrichment of the grids and boxes of our digital surroundings has yet to catch up. You can download the app from the Pox Party website and be comforted by the fact that, in having partnered with all the major desktop and OS developers there won’t be any headaches in the near future. InterFacePainter-boring

aqnb’s interest in the duo grew after seeing their talking heads discussing the functional nightmare of Apple’s planned obsolescence on Nik Briz’s prosumer manifesto and while they’re rolling with the punches, don’t’ expect to be able to use the system if you have a Mac OS operating system that is any older than 10.7. But in being, as they call it,  “future proof” the line must be drawn somewhere, so let’s start from here.**

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Arnaud Mercier retrospective

17 November 2012

One of the big names in the French design industry passed away last year, a big loss especially considering Arnaud Mercier was one of the youngest and most successful interaction designers from the hexagon.

While the agency Area 17’s created a dedicated  design timeline with some of his latest works Parisian gallery Since have decided just put together a dedicated retrospective of the artist: “This is definitely not a website“.

Arnaud - This is definitely not a website
Arnaud – This is definitely not a website

Known for his meticulous interactive design systems, it is little known that Arnaud was a developer with a degree in computer science. His belief was that in order to design, one must intrinsically understand and master the medium before it can truly be explored, reinvented and used as a means of expression.

Having worked with some of the most important brands on the planet Mercier became one of the most prolific designers over the past few years and really inspired many people with some of his latest website creations  like the cultural mag “Slash” or Ora-ïto’s website. “This is not a website” will try to act as a retrospective but also as an exploration of all those ideas that guided him throughout his life, and you’ll be able to visit it until December 7th. More info this way.

Ora-Ito website
Ora-Ito website
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Feel UX

19 June 2012

There was this thing called Surface that was announced yesterday, some sort of tablet with a great keyboard+smartcover fusion that (admit it) has surprised quite a few people. A (risky) move by big M to set a pretty high standard of what future Windows8 and WinRT slates should be like, but no big details have been announced yet (no official price, specs…), so we decided to move to the next best thing announced this month: Frog’s Feel UX for Sharp.

Sharp - Feel UX app-widget-shortcut drawer
Sharp – Feel UX app-widget-shortcut drawer

Japanese manufactures (as well as carriers) are known for having added some pretty amazing customizations to the Android universe and Sharp is no exception. Their newest Aquos phone model with Android 4.0 will include a new usability approach starting this summer (Japan only unfortunately) to correct some of Android’s  fundamental  issues.

Sharp - Feel UX lock screen
Sharp – Feel UX lock screen

This user interface has been designed in collaboration with Californian studio Frog well-known for many of their other collaborations with the tech-industry (HP, Intel..). As in many other cases the paradigm of simplicity + usability was installed @ Frog’s headquarters and pretty much after a year the final result is ready to reach some of Sharp’s smartphones. Some nice features include the animated weather motion screen or the highly customizable lock-screen, and for the rest… you have the video up here.

No Feel experience outside the land of the rising sun, and much like Infobar, Plenue and many other Japanese candies I guess we’ll only get them in our dreams.

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Google’s Project Glass

4 April 2012

Not only Nokia & Microsoft can be the only brands that imagine the future and envision the needs and usages for the coming decades, give Google an opportunity ok?

Maybe wave, video or buzz were ahead of it’s time, so Google is trying a new strategy for it’s “futuristic” products… instead of releasing them they’ve now decided just to design prototypes… and test them via viral ads! Much funkier and cheaper than building and closing down entire teams right?

Project Glass” was just uploaded to Utube this morning with hints about our future devices and the wonderful integrated world of all current Google products. The idea comes from Google’s X Labs who (if we trust NYT and Cnet) are the ones responsible for big G’s driveless car technology.

Project Glass act as a second layer on top of your glasses (if you need them) becoming that Augmented Reality layer that we’re still missing within our retinas.

The group have created this Google+ space to “share some ideas” and evaluate the public reaction, who knows… maybe now that Google is starting to “manufacture” its own hardware Project Glass is just around the corner….

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Making believe 2011

15 September 2011

As part of this year’s London Design Festival alternative trail and complementing all East London’s must-go events for the week, there’s also a less impressive but probably more interesting (and surely less crowded) venue to add to your list: the Mile End Art Pavilion.

Ami's map in Dalston from wandermap.org project

What’s happening there? This year’s Goldsmith’s graduates will be showcasing their projects (you can already have a quick glimpse on their website). An enormous list of design works that go from the most complex current education system reviews to the most trivial food paradigms…. a lot of cultural entrepreneurship, social & urban interactive gaming proposals and even a world shark population reclassifying attempt (with a fake-flavored shark soup along the way)!

Some are good, some are bad, others are just OK as Mr Ozio would say, but the only way to judge and discover each and everyone of them is to go & visit that far away Mile End Pavillion starting mid-September.

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