Category: Design

  • Work Hard, Be Grateful: The DDC Road Show

    On Friday night I got to go to the Draplin Design Co Road Show, as Aaron Draplin graced the city of Winnipeg with his presence. Best known for Field Notes and a boat-load of killer logo designs (particularly of the thick-lined variety), the Portland local shared a ton of great stories and insights about making…

  • Norman doors and designing for humans

    Here’s one of my favourite comics from The Far Side. This comic’s clever because even the most “gifted” of us know what it feels like to be humiliated by a simple door. Doors offer fascinating examples of interaction design. Most doors go completely unnoticed, precisely because of their good design. Over hundreds of years of…

  • Less

    We love Unlimited. Unlimited refills. Bottomless fries. Unlimited downloads. All the time, any time. Unlimited is a huge selling feature, but that doesn’t always make it more valuable (Chris Anderson wrote about this in Free). Another way to add value is to make it more limited. NetworkEffect.io reminds users of the brevity of our time…

  • The Ears of Technology

    I remember my surprise and excitement when I first heard about the “voice of Siri” (. The fact that a real person’s voice was behind the technology made Siri feel more human and authentic (and it’s pretty crazy to see the “Siri voice” being projected by a real person). But for all the excitement about…

  • What your logo can do for you

    I LOVE a great logo. When all the threads of a company’s values, mission and culture are woven together and distilled into a symbol comprised of a few simple lines or shapes, I get far too excited (which is why I can watch videos like Airbnb’s symbol release over and over again). But for all…

  • Who are you designing for?

    Despite our best attempts to be client or user-focused, often the answer is simply, “me”. Sure, we want the client to be happy (though they don’t know much about good design), and the users to have a good time (though most are stuck in Internet Explorer X), but first and foremost, we’re designing for ourselves.…

  • The Promise of Advertising

    I watched an interesting School of Life video the other day that struck me because it touched on a nagging doubt that plagues me as a marketing guy. The thought that I’m pouring all my creative juices into helping convince people to buy more stuff. Is buying more stuff really what anyone needs? Is this…

  • It’s Never Finished

    There’s that moment in summer, when you’re just finished mowing the lawn, trimming the edges, cleaning up all the clippings. You put the mower away and look over your yard, the smell of fresh-cut grass filling your senses. And for just a moment, you feel the satisfaction of completion. Aaaah….. Then a moment later you…

  • Humble Design

    Do designers really know best? A common trap for developers and designers is to build idealistic software and websites while disregarding feedback and input from everyone else. Because no one’s as enlightened as you, right? We sing Steve Jobs’ mantra, “people don’t know what they want until you show it to them,” convinced that our…

  • Designers Prune

    “Yes” is easy. “All of the above” is simple. “Just one more thing” is one thing too many. “No” is difficult. “A, not B” takes thought and guts. Faced with unlimited information but limited attention, infinite opportunity but finite energy, knowing what needs to be removed is as important as knowing what needs to be…