The Human Factor: Design Thinking

This intro­duc­to­ry class helped me under­stand the phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al human fac­tors that need to be con­sid­ered with every design project — from ergonom­ics and usabil­i­ty to light­ing and col­or. Com­ing from a graph­ic design back­ground, the phys­i­cal fac­tors were espe­cial­ly new to me. I learned how to find and use anthro­po­met­ric data as well as dimen­sions for inte­ri­or spaces to com­plete sev­er­al dif­fer­ent projects. These projects helped pre­pare me for the more pro­found design prob­lems I would come across in lat­er class­es. Read More

Logo and Identity Design

Commonwealth Emergency Physicians Logo

Com­mon­wealth Emer­gency Physi­cians is a mod­er­ate-sized com­mu­ni­ty hos­pi­tal locat­ed in north­ern Vir­ginia. The com­pa­ny want­ed to project a pro­fes­sion­al, mod­ern image that also con­veys excel­lence, time­li­ness, car­ing, and pro­gres­sive think­ing. When I asked the group if there were any logo designs in their field they real­ly liked, I found out they favored the logos that expressed time­li­ness, such as a min­ute­man and an hour­glass. These logos tend­ed to be very tra­di­tion­al. I decid­ed to push the con­cept of an hour­glass to the next lev­el and tie it more into med­i­cine by form­ing an hour­glass shape with a stetho­scope. This form took on a very mod­ern look and was able to project a dou­ble mean­ing.

---

Coca-Cola Park Logo

This logo was designed for a new base­ball sta­di­um in Allen­town, PA. Coca-Cola want­ed a few vari­a­tions on the logo for dif­fer­ent appli­ca­tions. This includ­ed a pri­ma­ry logo, a lock­up with the team logo and a ver­sion for sig­nage. The ver­sion for sig­nage is meant to be pro­duced on green glass, rem­i­nis­cent of the glass used in old Coca-Cola bot­tles and still used today in many Coca-Cola com­mem­o­ra­tive items.

EcoLabs

While research­ing sus­tain­abil­i­ty graph­ics for my M.A. Final Project, I came across Eco­Labs and the con­cept of eco-lit­er­a­cy. Eco­Labs is a not for prof­it net­work of design­ers and visu­al artists who cre­ate mate­ri­als, projects and pro­grams that sup­port eco­log­i­cal lit­er­a­cy. The aim of the orga­ni­za­tion is to nur­ture whole sys­tems think­ing, fos­ter eco­log­i­cal lit­er­a­cy, and cre­ate an alter­na­tive cul­tur­al vision that will dri­ve trans­for­ma­tion­al change to meet the goals of a ful­ly sus­tain­able soci­ety.

“Eco­log­i­cal lit­er­a­cy — the under­stand­ing of the prin­ci­ples of orga­ni­za­tion that ecosys­tems have evolved to sus­tain the web of life — is the first step on the road to sus­tain­abil­i­ty. The sec­ond step is the move towards ecode­sign. We need to apply our eco­log­i­cal knowl­edge to the fun­da­men­tal redesign of our tech­nolo­gies and social insti­tu­tions, so as to bridge the cur­rent gap between human design and the eco­log­i­cal sus­tain­able sys­tems of nature.”

– Fritjof Capra (2003)

It’s Not Easy Being Green

It’s Not Easy Being Green is a project by two design­ers trav­el­ing around the world in 184 days. The project was ini­ti­at­ed by Aart van Bezooyen and Paula Raché, a Dutch-Ger­man design cou­ple liv­ing and work­ing in Ham­burg, Ger­many. Over the course of six months they are offer­ing inspir­ing lec­tures and mate­ri­als work­shops to explore the prac­tice of sus­tain­abil­i­ty by meet­ing, dis­cussing and work­ing with local cre­atives. Read More

Creative Capacity of Social Business Models — Core77

This arti­cle shows exam­ples of inno­v­a­tive busi­ness mod­els that com­bine cre­ativ­i­ty and social respon­si­bil­i­ty:
Cre­ative Capac­i­ty of Social Busi­ness Mod­els.