A Miracle Material: Graphene

New materials play a instrumental role in unleashing new ways of solving problems and improving products.

"Although it was the thinnest material in the known universe, it was a hundred and fifty times stronger than an equivalent weight of steel—indeed, the strongest material ever measured. It was as pliable as rubber and could stretch to a hundred and twenty per cent of its length. Research by Philip Kim, then at Columbia University, determined that graphene was even more electrically conductive than previously shown."  - John Colapinto


New Yourker Article: Material Question

Industrial Deisgn needs to change...

One Industrial Design willing admits that the profession needs a serious update to better serve the work of today which increasing has a technology component.

Article: Industrial Design Needs to Grow Up

The New Rock Stars: Coders?

One thing that can not be denied is that the digital world is reshaping the world as we have known it, and those that can code can demand a handsome pay check for their skills.





Article: The Programmer's Price

Coming Soon! The Newly Revonated Cooper Hewitt Musuem

The Smithsonian National Design Museum will be opening in the coming week after under going a multi-year upgrade.

Core77 Interview with Caroline Baumann

Cooper Hewitt Opening Exhibitions

Apple Introduces its First Wearable Products

What does Apples foray into wearables mean?

The core beliefs behind this category of product for Apple is considered in the article below.



6 Core Beliefs Behind the New Apple Watch

Nike Unveils the Future of Basketball Courts

This has amazing potential to enhance the excitement of performances of any kind, not just basketball.



Washington Post Article: The Story Behind Nike's Basketball Court

U.S. Governments: New Digital Service

In a move parallel to the successful United Kingdom Digital Services a small team of experts are tasked with improving the value government delivers to citizens through Federal IT. 

White House Blog Post

Article: White House launches digital team for online upgrades

Update:Cape Town 2014 World Design Capitol

Some of the many projects part of Cape Town's desire to "Live Design, Transform Lives" are discussed in a Metrpolis magazine article.

Article:Eyes on Cape Town

A product to stimulate hair growth.....Okay it caught my eye because of the growing bald spot atop my head.

Article: The Helmet that Could Cure Baldness

The Bike Design Project: Urban Bike Design Contest

 This competition isn’t on paper. Each team is developing a fully functional, road-tested prototype. High design and deep craft combine to create a very real and viable end product.



The solutions will be revealed today! and voting opens.

The Bike Design Project

The Design Brief

How to Vote

The Bike Designs

Architecture Icons Animated

Iconic homes of the 20th century have been placed into animated video. Graphic designer Matteo Muci breaks down the intricate buildings into simple lines and geometric shapes.

The Internet of Things, Enchanted Objects

A discussion on the new frontier of connected things and how it can be made magical and not intrusive.


Video: NYTimes

Design Curator: Paola Antonelli Speaks

Design and Violence is an online curatorial experiment that explores the manifestations of violence in contemporary society. Pairing critical thinkers with challenging design case studies, the project aims to spark discussion and bring the ambiguous relationship between design and violence to center stage for designers and the people they serve—all of us.  -MOMA

Video: Discussion on Design and Violence

Website Redesign: Design Observer Hits Refresh

A well know site for critical conversations on design has redesigned it's website. I encourage you to take a look at the new layout and consider the content.

Site: Design Observer

Brief History of Interior Design

A look at Interior Design through the decades.

A Historical Interactive Illustration

Is Data the New Material for Designers?

Vinay Venkatraman tells us why data and technology are fundamentally changing the way designers are creating new products.

TED Talk: Tinkering Crafts

Apple After Steve Job's: The Question is Slowly Being Answered...

The status of Apple is an open debate among tech watchers, here is an article that attempts to shed some light on the company after Jobs.

NYTimes Article: Tim Cook Making Apple His Own

Apple's Design Process and Product Philosophy

A Start-Up Design School: 30weeks

An experimental program to give talented designers the hands-on experience, mentorship, critiques, tools, workspace, and connections they need to create products and start companies that may just change the world. It’s 30 weeks. It’s in New York. And it starts September 2014.

Website: How to Apply

FAQ's

Should Creatives Learn To Code?

Should Creatives Learn To Code? is a question many creative types are asking themselves.
Recently I've encouraged many young aspiring creatives to consider exposing themselves to coding, "just to become familiar with the language of the digital age".

 Writer John Pavlus tackles the question in the article below:

Article: Should You Learn to Code?

Design Milestone: The Beats Goes Mainstream

With the recent purchase of the Beats headphone and streaming music company by Apple, tongues are a wagging trying to understand what it means. For me, the insight is urban hip-hop culture has arrived at the door of this generations most successful design centric company. Not since Nike teamed with Micheal Jordan to release his trail-blazing Air Jordan line of shoes and apparel has the urban hip-hop aesthetic been so unapologetically embraced by an industry leading business organization.

Article: Why Isn't the Guy Who Designed Beats Going to Apple?

The designer of the Beats Robert Brunner's open letter in response to the purchase Beats.

The Letter

Painters as Foretellers of a Coming Aesthetic: Picasso and Basquiat

Picasso's revolutionary cubist inspired painting Les Demoiselles d'avignon broke with the past signaling the birth of Modernism.

Basquiat's graffitti inspired paintings pointed to a new urban aesthetic were words and images led a cultural revolution of HipHop.

Design Firm: Walker and Company

Tristan Walker has taken on the challenge of identifying and addressing the black consumer market with products designed with their needs in mind. His first product offering seeks to address the grooming products category with a shaving system called Bevel.

CNN Article: Path Through Silicon Valley

Fast Company Article: What High Design Can Do For Neglected Black Consumers

Walker and Company Website

Bevel Shaving System

CODE2040 Fellows Program

I find this story interesting on many levels: there is opportunity to bring the learnings and skills gleaned from silicon valley startups an apply it more broadly to under served markets I get it; the discovery of design by young entrepreneurs is exciting for the aesthetic that can be brought to the marketplace, just think of theBEAT headphones by Dr.Dre's; the time is now to sit at the table and be heard, think of Kayne's demand's and frustration with NIKE.

Fashion: Jeans have Faded and Athletic Wear is the New Denim

Athletic wear has surpassed jeans as the preferred clothing among the young with Lulullemon and Nike leading the pack.

 

Piper Jaffray Study Results 

Graphic Designer: Milton Glaser

The legend of modern graphic design is still sharing his unique point of view. Glaser known for the body of his work, but most associated with the 'I Love NY' logo.



Article: Getting to know Milton Glaser, the Godfather of Modern Design

NYTimes Article: "Mad Men" Enlists the Graphics Guru

MiltonGlaser.com

Design Conference: Bloomberg Businessweek Design 2014

This conference is looking like the place to be for bleeding-edge look at opportunities for design and designers.
Bloomberg Businessweek Design 2014 Website

Architecture: Zaha Hadid

Easily one of the most influential architects of the moment, Zaha Hadid has unveiled images of a 40-storey hotel with an exposed exoskeleton that is under construction in Macau, China.

Graudian Article: Zaha Hadid beyond buildings...

Marc Newson Talks About Fashion and Furniture

Newson shares his thoughts on the state of fashion and furniture design.

de zeen Article: The design industry is "really pathetic"

Design History: Charles Rennie Mackintosh - A Modern Man

Easily one of the most inspiring designers of the early 20th century, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, along with his wife Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, produced beautiful architecture, interiors, graphics and furnishings that referenced the movements of their generation: Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau. But the couple's work pushed beyond the traditions of 19th century conventions to give life to a truly wholistic view of modern living.

Design History: The Allure of Art Nouveau -BBC Videos

This BBC series of videos capture the context and power of the design movement Art Nouveau at the turn of the turn of the 20th century.

Digital Design: Sha Hwang

Sha Hwang discusses his experience as member of the surge team brought together to save the healthcare.gov website and other opportunities he has had as a designer.

Bloomberg Article and Video

30 Most Inflential Designers by Complex Magazine

 

These designers have forged products that have been seamlessly integrated into our lives. Their objects and images have become so much a part of our visual vocabulary that we forget that there was once someone there to plan, edit and create them. The innumerable logos, book covers, typefaces, chairs, buildings, shoes, and furniture featured in this list have gone on to not only outlive their creators, but take on a personality and life of their own.   

The List of Influential Designers

Type Design: The Final Interview with Designers Hoefler & Frere-Jones

The Font Men, a short documentary highlighting what made Hoefler and Frere-Jones unique during their 10-year partnership.

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Interview with Jonathan Ive

In a rare chance to understand this generations most influential designers the following interview reveals Jonathan Ive's views on design an the future of Apple.


Time Article: Apple Designer...Talks...

Shoe Design 1850 and 2014

Well heeled feet over the years.

Half-boots (ankle boots) were popular for men from the 1830s right up to the Depression in the 1930s. Most were made of leather, though softer materials were popular for informal wear. The elastic-sided boot was patented in 1837 by J. Sparkes Hall of 308 Regent Street, London, as a result of experiments made with India rubber cloth. The elasticated side gussets eliminated the need for laces and button fastenings. Instead, the boots could simply be pulled on with the help of the fabric loop positioned at the back of the ankle. Victoria and Albert Museum

Nike's new Kobe Bryant shoe makes use of a new manufacturing technology that reduces the cost of making its Flyknit shoes compared to their traditional methods. What is the chance that the savings will result in an affordably price shoe? Businessweek Article: Nike's Flyknit the Swoosh of the Future?

Audio:The Convergence of Digital and Industrial Design

As the digital and physical interfaces converge, often described as the "internet of things", makes real ideals made popular in cartoons decades ago. How will this all play out for designers and their training in the years to come.

The Digital Life Discussion

Urban Planning: Protected Intersections For Bicyclists

Designing an intersection to better protect cyclist. This proposal for the George Mason University 2014 Cameron Rian Hays Outside the Box Competition presents a vision for a safe, clear intersection design that improves conditions for all users. Proper design of refuge islands, crossing position and signal timing can create a safe intersection that people of all ages and abilities would feel safe in.

on .

Design Historian: Pat Kirkham's Lecture on Charles and Ray Eames

The distinguished historian Pat Kirkham spoke at the National Building Museum on the enduring legacy of Charles and Ray Eames.

Program: Portraits in Design

Architecture and Design Film Festival

The Film Festival of Architecture and Design will be in Los Angeles,
Chicago and New York in 2014. Check the link below to find out when.
Architecture and Design Film Festival Website

Exhibition: Black Dress: Ten Contemporary Fashion Designers

Pratt Institute Exhibition: Black Dress Press Release

Metropolis Article: Key Black Fashion Designers

Design Planning: Consumers in 2030?

How does a waterless washing machine sound or a mirror that can provide you health information as you shave? A group imagined the future based on historical analysis consumer trends from the 1950's to the present, to model those trends forward to 2030, see their insights....

historical analysis of consumer trends from the mid-1950s to the present, modelling these trends forwards to 2030. - See more at: http://www.forumforthefuture.org/project/which-consumers-2030/overview#sthash.6eKUDNmJ.dpuf

historical analysis of consumer trends from the mid-1950s to the present, modelling these trends forwards to 2030. - See more at: http://www.forumforthefuture.org/project/which-consumers-2030/overview#sthash.6eKUDNmJ.dpuf

historical analysis of consumer trends from the mid-1950s to the present, modelling these trends forwards to 2030. - See more at: http://www.forumforthefuture.org/project/which-consumers-2030/overview#sthash.6eKUDNmJ.dpuf

Forum for the Future Report

Tenth Year Anniversary of Social Media Gaint, Facebook

In February 2004 Mark Zuckerburg launched thefacebook.com hoping to connect college students, little did he know the site would be part of the wave to help to connect the world.

Washington Post Article: Social Media

World Design Capitol 2014: Cape Town, South Africa

Cape Town's reign as World Design Capitol for 2014 focuses on the problem-solving potential of design: an approach that's more gritty than pretty. As South Africa celebrates 20 years of independence, the city has adopted a design-for-social change agenda.

Video: Live Design. Transform Life

ICSID IDA

WDC Cape Town Website

Communication Design: A Better Boarding Pass

The opportunity to improve the users experience is a powerful example of how a designer can add value to an industry.

Designer Peter Smart tackled rethinking the boarding pass with much success. If it will be adopted would be a reflection on what is important to the airlines the system or the customer?

Peter Smart's Case Study on Redesigning the Boarding Pass

Architect David Adjaye: Geography, Culture and Place

David Adjaye INDABA 2013 Presentation

Social Design: Designers Bringing Design to Rural Places

Fast Company Article: The Heart of Hale County

Auburn University's Rural Studio program, is blazing a new trail in thinking about what today might be called social design--pushing architects to figure out how to use their talents to serve a greater good.

The Revolution was Digitized: 30 Years of the Mac Computer

The 30th anniversary of the introduction of the Mackintosh computer, which would be the world’s first mass-market personal computer that had a graphical user interface and a mouse, is being celebrate this weekend.



Apples in-house video: Thirty Years of Mac

NYtimes Article: ...A Lost Converstion with Steve Jobs

Type Design Partnership Dissolves

The talented team of  Hoefler and Frere-Jones are now in a legal battle that will surely alter their influential partnership.  The company's body of almost 800 fonts includes the architecture-inspired Gotham and the eponymous Hoefler Text, a font developed for Apple to demonstrate advanced type technologies.

Article: The Beatles Of The Type World, Are Breaking Up

Article: Typography Partners Part ways....

AIGA Profile:Jonathan Hoefler and Tobias Fere-Jones

Digital Design: Changing Government and Culture

Ben Terrett, head of design at the Government Digital Service, Cabinet Office for United Kingdom, touches on a few key ideas he learned in changing the governments website.

Video interview: Ben Terrett

Design INDABA 2013 Presentation: Changing Culture Through Digital Design

Film: If You Build It

Designer/activists Emily Pilloton and Matthew Miller take Design Thinking to North Carolina community and produces life shifting results. If You Build It is a documentary about their experience teaching ten students the power of design and what a community-focused effort can do to the moral of the area.

Film Screening Schedule

Design Thinking at Stanford University

Stanford's D. School is show results in terms of products solving real world problems.

NY Times Article: Solving Problems for Real World





Other examples: Link to NY Times Article