Environments that make sense.

Did you know that one in every eight people are neurodivergent? Around 50% of them don’t even know about it.  Neurodivergents tend to be high energy, out of the box thinkers and bold problem solvers, but when it comes to working in the typical modern workplace the challenges arise. 

The main problem these days is distractions, having immediate entertainment one click away, makes it even harder to focus and complete tasks effectively. Distractions lead to a loss of productivity, taking double the time it takes non neurodivergent people to complete activities. 

To mitigate distractions, we should not only improve graphic tools for learning performance, but also spaces that empower people to concentrate and focus.  Spaces with controlled sensory stimulation, where every user can decide the amount of stimulation in need, we need to remember that for some it’s easier to focus while having multisensory inputs as for others is way more challenging, giving the users the ability to choose will encourage them to find focus easier. 

Another important aspect in creating spaces for neurodivergent users is the wayfinding systems. Environments, digital and analog, need to make sense. Having easier and more intuitive ways of mapping areas or browse through a digital space, makes helps the user complete tasks in an easier and more successful way. 

GREAT MINDS THINK UNALIKE

Humans, we’re so many similar qualities between us; nevertheless, each and one of use has a unique skillset and set of neurological patterns which differentiate us from each other. As addressed on the last post, the term neurodiversity refers to diverse array of brains and minds which impacts the way we learn and process information. 

Some of the most common difficulties neurodivergent brains face include difficulty retaining information if it’s presented only in an auditory form, as well as a difficulty of processing written information quickly, and concentration while having multisensory inputs at the same time.  It is important to consider certain aspects while designing to reduce the risk of stress and overwhelming people, affecting their work, and learning performance. 

Simple tools we can implement are:

  • Avoiding big blocks of texts. It’s easier to grasp important information when you can get a quick snapshot of key concepts. 
  • Create learning content with visual and auditory aids. Having two inputs of information might reinforce memorizing information, just be careful you don’t add too many inputs or that they might become a distraction instead of an aid. 
  • Give clear and concise instructions. A huge part of designing for neurodiversity is making sure your user understands the instructions properly. This means, creating some extra space in your process in case the user needs to skip some steps without causing them to get stuck. 

Remember that great minds think unalike. This also means they learn and gather information differently, in fact most of us learn in multiple ways at different times, depending on our environment and the type of task we need to complete. 

Good Practices Vol.1

The issue of education being able to create conditions for peaceful attitudes in young people is on the agenda of Governments, educators and communities. Although good practices, good-willing thematic networks and institutional programmes exist at local, national and international levels, not enough is done to connect these initiatives and to develop a more structured, systemic approach to what actually works well, in which situation and why. There are some projects, supportet by the European Union, I’d like to share here:

– CITIZED: It addresses four categories of target groups: policy makers and other stakeholders participating in the policy making process at the different institutional levels, teachers’ training organisations, school teachers and schools as organisations. The project started in December 2020 and will last until November 2023.

The innovative approach is based on three main aspects:
1) Integration of existing elements and development of “missing elements” that will facilitate policy implementation.
2) Process innovation by bringing the issue of teachers training for democratic citizenship competences in a multi-stakeholder transnational debate involving policy makers, teacher training institutions, teachers and families and reviewing international good practices in view of its potential transferability;
3) Co-creation of innovative instruments and approaches to contextualise existing models.


– PEACE GAMES: The Peace Games consortium aims to contribute to the development of citizenship, democratic and social competences by using the full potential of creativity through game-based learning in formal and informal learning. Creativity stands at the core of this project as it is considered both as a way to acquire civic and social key competences, and as a competence to acquire and develop in itself via the use and the development of “self-made” games oriented toward Peace Education. Co-founded by the Erasmus+ Programme, Peace Games aims at diffusing these competences in learners and at helping teachers to make good educational use of games. This is organised through the identification, assessment and support to the use of relevant games (online or in face-to-face) oriented to civic competences, intercultural communication and conflict transformation already existing and provide guidelines and advices for the development of new “self-made” games relevant for particular contexts.

Children playing the world peace game together

– PERFECT: The Project has the ambition to propose and experiment a holistic method to develop key transversal competences (cultural awareness and expression, citizenship, multilingual, digital, entrepreneurship, personal, social and learning) through a transnational experience of developing a cultural product (a piece of theatre, a musical, an exhibition including students’ performance, a multimedia work, etc.) including historic research, literature and art history, music, performing arts and digital skills. Teachers of different disciplines will concur to the design and development of these projects/products involving two classes in each partner school. Therefore, the core set of activities will be implemented within, around and between the partner schools with the methodological and management support of the other partners (European Networks like FREREF, OBESSU, IPA, the IIHL with its hosted Education Inspiring Peace Lab, the Ministry of Education of Malta).

Source: http://eiplab.eu/

How can I affect this situation as a designer?

In general, this topic is ideal for illuminating it from different sides and disciplines. After a short socio-demographic introduction, I will devote myself to the design aspect of this topic. How can I as a designer tackle the problem already described and contribute to a positive change with my skills/mindset?

One of the most famous techniques or tools of Designer is “Design thinking”. It is concerned with solving problems through design. The idea being that the future output of the process will provide a better answer than the one already available or if nothing is available – something entirely new. It is an unconstrained methodology where it is possible that the designer (or design team) will work on many possible solutions at once. It enables designers to consider the problem in many different ways and speculate on both the past and future of the problem too. This is in contrast to the scientific method of problem solving which requires a highly-defined problem which focuses on delivering a single solution.
So design has moved more into the problem solving space. It’s not like designers weren’t solving problems before, but this was limited to “design problems”. Design problems are problems one would traditionally call a designer to solve: graphic design, interface design, interaction design, industrial design, architectural design. I don’t want to over-generalize, but the focus had been on solving problems around form, esthetics, interaction, space. Design thinking created an opening for designers to move from the more esthetically focused space to the problem solving space. Designer solve problems in a certain way and that way could now be transported to other fields of problem solving.

The famous double diamond shows the a general technique of adressing issues.

So whatever the outcome might be, I’m aware that there can be various solutions – analogue and digital – for this problem. This research is the start of a maybe even bigger project. So I’ll try to articulate a vision. An answer to the question: “Why am I working on this topic?” My response would be:


I want to find a way to strengthen the awareness of younger people to politics and their democratic environment.


But let’s focus again on the research. What are similar projects that already worked on that topic? You can read about that in my next blog post.

Source: https://medium.com/design-leadership-notebook/design-is-more-than-problem-solving-7e290535927c

Whats the actual status of awareness of younger people?

The renowned institute for opinion polls “Gallup” conducted a detailed survey among about 1000 young people (< 30 years) on behalf of the State Secretary for Youth Claudia Plakolm (ÖVP). The results were interesting and are summarised below.

It should be emphasised that this study aimed at a broad cross-section of the population. This means that demographic diversity and balance were taken into account among the respondents of this study. Although 56% of the 14 to 30 age group are interested in political life, only 16% are very interested, a figure that clearly has room for improvement.

  • The internet is clearly the first place to go for political information; TV and social media follow at a certain distance. The value for TV is surprising here, since TV consumption in this age group has been declining for years in favour of streaming offers; however, the use of TV counters may also have been subsumed here. Daily newspapers clearly lag behind TV, but still achieve a usage share of 39%.
  • In the area of social media, Instagram dominates very clearly ahead of Facebook and YouTube; TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat are, as expected, in the youngest group.
    TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat are, as expected, very significant in the youngest group aged 14 to 19. To what extent do such media, which are primarily used for
    entertainment, are actually used for political information.
  • Not surprisingly, people consider their own parents to be the most credible source of political information. Statistically, TV, daily newspapers, school/teachers, radio and friends follow at a certain distance. The internet is already lagging behind somewhat here, with social media and influencers at the bottom. This shows that despite intensive use of social media in this age group, people are aware of the credibility problems of these media (44% of users consider them to be less or not credible).

In my opinion, the following three graphs are the most interesting ones. It shows which topics are the most famous ones for people under 30, which channels are used to consume information about politics and which ones are the most credible ones:


How is the credibility of these sources assessed?

How should the focus of policy change in the future?


Quelle: https://www.bundeskanzleramt.gv.at/bundeskanzleramt/nachrichten-der-bundesregierung/2022/11/demokratiemonitoring-zeigt-interesse-der-jugend-an-politik.html , am 24.1.2023

Precedent study of Northern Playground

In this post I will study how Northern Playground, a small clothing company, makes their production and business as little un-sustainable as possible. They belive no clothing company can be fully sustainable, but of course they can be better or worse. This is how they try to be better:

“Sustainable materials do not exist. Period.” This is how the text starts if you make two simple clicks (Menu > Environment) on the webpage of Northern Playground. This is surprisingly honest when we have gotten used to green labels with “Conscious” written all over on fast fashion giant H&M and many more. Northern Playground is a Norwegian company who is trying to change the textile industry in a way that has real impact.

One click on the menu button and Products and Environment is the equal size.

In the beginning of the company’s life Jo Egil Tobiassen, the brain behind it, thought sustainability was complicated, he tells E24. However, after educating himself he found that it isn’t “how” we produce clothing that is the main issue, it is “how much.” But if his company wants to have a real impact, they also need to grow. This is a real paradox for small, “sustaiable” brands. Tobiassen explains that one way they are doing this is avoiding sale and avoiding middle men. This way the earn more on fewer articles on clothing. (https://e24.no/det-groenne-skiftet/i/8Qkd4r/klesgrunderen-som-vil-at-du-skal-kjoepe-mindre-vil-vokse-mer)

Reducing clothing consumption

Lifetime service: Repairs are made easy by providing knowledge and tools to repair the garment yourself or it can be executed for free by the company. Northern Playground also takes care of recycling when the garment is truly worn out. Producing in only wool makes recycling much easier as this is a highly recyclable material. (https://www.northernplayground.no/en/lifetime-service)

Their business model includes the users: Northern Playground was tired of the guessing game most companies do when deciding on product design and the amount to produce. This leads to massive overproduction, and never-used garments ends at landfills. Northern Playground have developed a big user group who they get feedback from in the design, testing and decision phase. (https://www.northernplayground.no/en/content/our-model)

A clothing company requesting environmental tax: In addition to having put a self-imposed environmental tax on themself (to spend on repairing etc.) Northern Playground is also working part politically to request for an environment tax to be put in place in Norway. (https://www.northernplayground.no/en/content/letter-to-the-government-4https://www.northernplayground.no/en/content/environmental-tax)

Slow fashion: Producing classic designs who lasts a long time and not releasing a new collection just because a new session arrived keeps the new for bying new things all the time down. Of course this is easier for a company producing wool garments to be used as basics. However, Northern Playground is actively working for owning garments who can serve multiple purposes to become a more accepted standard. (https://www.northernplayground.no/en/content/we-dont-need-collections)

In addition Northern Playground has an open communication about overconsumption as a problem, avoids discounts and design for high quality as a priority over low prices.

Reducing their footprint

Norther Playground of course design for reducing the enviornmental impact from each garment in other ways than ensuring a long lifetime for each garment. They also:

– produce partially (very) locally in Oslo, partially in Europe (at the only manufacturer in the world who fulfills Greenpeace’s environmental standards
– only use (partially organic) natural materials
– use recyclable packaging and no plastic
– ensure a sustainable culture among employees
– believes in and acts with transparency
(https://www.northernplayground.no/en/environment)

“Flying machines heavier than air are impossible!”

This remarkable phrase, which I put in the title, was said by Lord Kelvin in 1895, the eminent physicist, then president of the Royal Society. By the way, the unit of measurement “Kelvin” is named after him. This statement was made just eight years before Orville Wright made the first controlled airplane flight. Already by 1904 there was a more advanced model of the plane, capable of performing maneuvers. A year later there was a third “modification”, this model could stay in the air for about thirty minutes.

Just a year ago, we only laughed at AI and neural networks, finding their attempts to look “natural” funny. Siri was “born” only 12 years ago. The first iPhone was released in 2007. GSM was born in 1992, just 30 years ago. We never know how far technology can go or what to expect from it. In this article I would like to remember some inventions that were once met with hostility, but found their place in the world in the future.

Is it spinning or not?
Copernicus was a scientist of the early 16th century, the author of the heliocentric system of the world, which marked the beginning of the first scientific revolution. Scientists before Copernicus believed that the Earth was the center of the universe, and the world was divided into sublunary and supralunary. That was until Copernicus published his major work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, in 1543, outlining and justifying the heliocentric system of the world. The Polish astronomer assumed that the Sun was at the center of the universe and that the Earth was only one of the planets moving around the Sun. Copernicus also stated that the firmament in which we observe the stars every day does not revolve around the Earth, as previously thought, but is at rest. With his research, the scientist shattered the foundations of traditional worldviews, which caused resentment and misunderstanding among ordinary people. His doctrine was officially condemned 73 years after publication, and only in time did astronomers recognize that Copernicus, and his “colleague” Galileo Galilei, were right. The Earth does revolve. By the way, many people mistakenly believe that Copernicus was burned for his bold statement, but this is not true. The scientist died at the age of 70 from a stroke.

The Age of Steam or Sail?
Another telling story that not all great discoveries were welcomed with open arms is the invention of the steamer. In 1800, American engineer Robert Fulton began experiments to create a steam engine and modernize sailboats. As is not difficult to guess, the scientist’s proposal was met with a hostile reception.

“Mr. Fulton’s proposal to install a steam engine on seagoing vessels is sheer nonsense. A steam engine cannot replace sails.” – Fleet Commissioner François Le Moyne.

Despite the disapproval of colleagues and the public, Fulton still embodied his idea to life, and in 1803 created a steam ship 20 meters long. It was tested on the River Seine, where it reached a speed of three knots against the current. But successful tests did not help the scientist to convince people of the necessity of his invention. Napoleon Bonaparte did not believe in the success of the project either. It is worth noting that ten years later the emperor changed his mind. On Fulton’s models were built several steamboats, including a warship with 44 cannons. But his inventor never caught it.

Space and journalists.
The era of rocket technology did not begin so long ago, and its history was not so easy in the beginning either. In 1909, Robert Goddard proposed a project to create a multistage rocket. The scientist agitated that once the fuel from the tanks was completely consumed, the stages would be discarded, thus reducing the mass that needed to be accelerated to higher speeds. When the scientist talked about his project, many thought the scientist’s words were fantasies. In his column, the editor of the Technology News section of The New York Times even ridiculed the scientist and his idea. But no one knows the journalist’s name now, and Robert Goddard has gone down in world history. The scientist created a liquid fuel rocket, which was tested in 1926. The first prototype rocket was only about 20 centimeters, which took off in just two and a half seconds to a height of about 12 meters and flew 56 meters. Goddard’s designs were used to build dozens of real rockets in the future. The New York Times, by the way, then took it back and apologized for their article.

So, in conclusion, I would like to emphasize again that none of us can tell which technology will be successful and which will remain in the dustbin of history. Sometimes technologies that cause skepticism turn out to be vital after a couple of decades, and sometimes loud and promising inventions are soon forgotten. But that’s a topic for another article…

References:

Misra, R. (2015, December 16). The greatest newspaper correction ever written (49 years too late). Gizmodo. https://gizmodo.com/the-greatest-newspaper-correction-ever-written-49-year-1491590487

Hartenberg, R. S. (1998, July 20). Robert Fulton | Biography, Inventions, & Facts. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Robert-Fulton-American-inventor

Westman, R. S. (1998, July 20). Nicolaus Copernicus | Biography, Facts, Nationality, Discoveries, Accomplishments, & Theory. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nicolaus-Copernicus

The Wright Brothers and the Invention of the Airplane. (2021, April 25). ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/airplanes-flight-history-1991789

Hochdruck – Holzschnitt

Wie bereits erwähnt, wird das Holzschnittverfahren zum Hochdruck gezählt. Das bedeutet, dass aus der dünnen Holz- oder Linolplatte reliefartige Teile herausgeschnitten werden. Dadurch bleiben dann einige erhabene Teile auf der Platte, welche dann die zu druckenden Stellen darstellen.

Ursprung

Man kann die Ursprünge des Holzschnitts, sowie des Druckens gesamt, in China finden. Als Vorstufen zu diesem Druckverfahren können geschnittene oder geformte Stempel und Siegel genannt werden. Ein 868 datiertes chinesisches Holzschnittbuch lässt darauf deuten, dass bereits zuvor die Technik definiert und weiterentwickelt wurde, da das Buch ein hohes technisches Wissen aufweist. Einer der ältesten asiatischen Holzschnitte stammt aus einem Tempel in Korea, welcher auf 751 datiert werden kann. 

chinesischer Holzschnitt, 868 n. Chr. (British Museum, London)

In Europa etablierte sich die Technik erst wesentlich später. Durch die Papierproduktion in Papiermühlen im deutschsprachigen Raum um 1390 wurde der Grundstein für diese Drucktechnik geschaffen. China wird hier ebenso als Vorreiter der Papierproduktion mit einem Start 105 n. Chr. gezählt. In Europa entwickelte sich es 1144 in Valencia, Spanien und verbreitete sich in den Folgejahren.  

Dadurch konnte ein ausdifferenziertes Holzschnittverfahren etabliert werden, bei welchem Zeichner:innen Entwürfe direkt auf der Holzplatte anfertigten, welche weiters von Formschneider:innen geschnitten und von Briefmaler:innen gedruckt und koloriert wurden. 

Vorwiegend wurden Einblattdrucke mit Abbildungen von Heiligen sowie Spielkarten bedruckt. Meist stand Birnenholz, für feine Abbildungen hartes Holz wie Buchsbaum oder für großflächige Werke weiches Lindenholz in Verwendung. Vor der Erfindung des Buchdrucks wurde der Holzschnitt verwendet, um gesamte Bücher herzustellen. Nach der Erfindung standen der künstlerische Aspekt und die Erschaffung detaillierter Bilder, die den Text unterstützen sollten, im Fokus. Immer weiter entwickelte sich der künstlerische Zugang zu der technisch-ausdifferenzierten Technik. Schon in der zweiten Hälfte des 15. Jahrhunderts konnte eine Tendenz zu schraffurartigen und realistischen Bildern erkannt werden, welche durch den Künstler Albrecht Dürer immer mehr an Ansehen gewann. Durch die Entwicklung des photographischen Klischeedrucks wurde die Drucktechnik weitgehend als unökonomisch eingestuft. Inzwischen wird er vorwiegend in kleinen Auflagen für experimentellere, künstlerische Einsatzgebiete verwendet. 

»Rhinocerus« von Albrecht Dürer, Holzschnitt, 1515

Technik

Auswahl der Holzart 

Generell kann jede Holzart für die Anfertigung des Holzschnittes verwendet werden. Für feine Abbildungen empfiehlt sich Ahorn-, Apfel-, Birnen-, Nuss- oder Kirschenholz, da diese eine gleichmäßige Struktur aufweisen und somit präzise Linien abgebildet werden können. Pappel-, Gabun- oder Fichtenholz eignen sich vor allem für großflächige Arbeiten. Für experimentelle Arbeiten werden auch rissige oder verwitterte Hölzer verwendet, da diese durch ihre Maserung besonders lebendige Drucke erzeugen. 

Schnittwerkzeuge 

Eingesetzt werden Stichel mit Holzgriff die generell zur Bearbeitung für Holz dienen. Ebenso werden der Geißfuß, welcher ein messerartiges Gerät mit V-förmiger Schneide ist, und das Hohleisen, welches in verschiedener Ausführung gerade, gebogene und gekröpfte Formen darstellen kann, verwendet. Ebenso werden inzwischen maschinelle Werkzeuge verwendet, um den Prozess zu vereinfachen. 

Druckfarben

Man unterscheidet zwischen wasser- und fettbasierten Druckfarben. Durch die Verwendung von wasserbasierten Farben wie Aquarell kann eine Farbmischung erzeugt werden. Mit ölhaltigen Farben können präzisere Überlagerungen erstellt werden. Zu Beginn wir mit einer Rolle eine dünne Farbschicht aufgetragen worauf anschließend das Papier gelegt wird. Im letzten Schritt wird durch den Druck einer Presse der Schnitt auf das Papier übertragen. 

»Homemade Treehouse« von Gesine Janzen, wood block print, 2002

Quellen:

Chinesischer Holzschnitt. In: 

https://www.druckstelle.info/de/holzschnitt_china.htm#oben

Holzschnitt. In: 

https://www.druckstelle.info/de/holzschnitt.aspx

Papiergeschichte. In:

https://wv.papierindustrie.nrw/papierfakten/papiergeschichte

Holzschnitt Technik. In: 

https://holzschnitt-feldmeier.de/holzschnitt.html

Was ist ein Holzschnitt? In: 

https://fineartmultiple.de/glossar-der-druckgrafik-und-editionen/was-ist-ein-holzschnitt/

Eine kleine Geschichte des Holzschnitts. In: 

https://www.kunststiftung-sachsen-anhalt.de/eine-kleine-geschichte-des-holzschnitts/

Animierte Infografiken

Was ist eine animierte Infografik?

Eine animierte Infografik ist ein Weg, Informationen mit einer Kombination aus Bildern, Illustrationen, Tabellen, Diagrammen, Text und anderen animierten Elementen zu visualisieren.

Über die letzten fünf Jahre haben sich Infografiken zu einem stark genutzten Mittel entwickelt, um komplexe Informationen leicht verdaulich zu gestalten. Aber das, was einmal eine hauptsächlich statische Form des Contents war, hat sich dramatisch weiterentwickelt und beinhaltet mittlerweile Animation und animierte Elemente, die dabei helfen, Ideen noch leichter verständlich und spannender zu machen.

GIF-animierte Infografiken

Auf die Beliebtheit der statischen Infografiken folgte der Aufstieg des animierten GIFs. Die Stärke animierter Infografiken liegt darin, dass sie bestimmte Fakten und Zahlen hervorheben, wodurch deine Infografik noch verständlicher wird.

Das Beste an GIFs ist, dass sie nicht schwer zu erstellen sind. Man muss sich nicht mit komplizierten Programmen wie Adobe Premiere Pro oder After Effects auskenne und kann sie sogar in Bildbearbeitungsprogrammen wie Photoshop erstellen.

Die Kraft der visualisierten Daten

Die nächste Entwicklung der interaktiven Infografiken ist bereits abzusehen. Es wird erwartet, dass das Ausmaß, mach dem Menschen selbst entscheiden, welche Infos sie sich zuerst anschauen, weiter wächst. Aber das wird an der grundlegenden Mission der Infografiken – nämlich das Komplexe genießbar zu machen – nichts ändern. Egal ob es sich um eine statische Infografik, ein GIF oder ein Video handelt, alle Versionen machen die komplizierten Ideen dieser Welt verständlicher.

Genau wie Infografiken haben sich auch ihre Betrachter weiterentwickelt. Die Menschen sind heutzutage daran gewöhnt, dass ihnen komplexe Informationen auf einfache, visuelle Form näher gebracht werden. Und sie werden in Zukunft immer mehr über die Geschwindigkeit, in der sie Informationen empfangen, bestimmen können.

Why design outerwear?

In this post I will clarify and define my own motivations going into this project. It will be useful for me by checking with this post during the process to see if I am true to my own passions and wishes. As mentioned in the previous blog post I wish to research if designing “yet another clothing piece” can ever be called ethical and sustainable. This is because I have a personal wish to design outerwear that is flexible in use, comfortable and seen as something fun instead of something dreadful.

Since I was little I have been fascinated with clothing and how it affects us. When choosing a direction of study, I chose to not study fashion/textile because I could not see a way I could get into that industry with my ethics and sustainable responsibility. Now I find myself constantly “gliding towards” wanting to get into the designing and production of clothing, but being conflicted by the sustainable matter.

I have two main issues to address if I want to get into the clothing industry:
– how can I design clothing with a clear conscience regarding the climate crisis?
– how can I, as an industrial/interaction designer, contribute in the “fashion world” without a fashion degree?

I need an answer or at least an indication of something positive in these questions before I get into the actual designing of clothing. These questions will therefore be focused on by me in first phase of this project. To find answers I will look into similar phenomenons to see if I can draw any parallel lines.

Eventually I can also look into more specific ways to design clothing in more sustainable ways and how I as a non-fashion designer can help in these aspects.