Design Sojourn

It is time for a long overdue update on my Spaces for Ideas Project. This time I like to share with you the brand that I am building for this product. I have always been a strong supporter of branding and this time around it is no different. Understanding the value of branding, motivated me to create a log that could communicate instantly what Spaces for Ideas was all about.

I started out speaking to a few graphic designers and branding houses, but due to cost issues and not having full clarity what I wanted, I decided to put the money into my product and carved out some time to really thinking about this brand. If I did not know what I wanted, budget was likely going to be wasted. However as I got deeper into it, I realized I was enjoying the process, and decided to take it all the way to the end.

So without further adieu please have a look at my brand development process after the jump. (Warning picture heavy, but image size managed). Oh by the way, I’m no typographer, so I would love to hear your feedback and ways I can improve the final design.

I started out with an objective of creating both a brand name and a brand icon. I saw naming and logo creation, as a combined activity as there was a chance that the name itself could become a logo. As with all of my design development activities, I often approach it from a commercial angle by establishing a marketing tagline or elevator pitch as part of my design brief. This gives me a good idea of what this logo or product has to stand for. (Top right)

I also like to anchor some basic descriptor keywords in my brief to further flesh out the design direction for the brand. I wanted Spaces for Ideas to be simple, clean, minimal (reflecting the product’s industrial design) and not look like the typical web 2.0 “chicklet”. I also wanted it to have, what I like to call, the “Fedex Arrow Effect”. This logo had to represent what the product stood for in a clever and but almost cheeky way. Before I forget, I also had to consider my functional constraints. This logo also has to be able to be de-bossed as well as fit the usual range marketing collaterals like name cards, with compliments slips etc.

After settling with “Spaces for Ideas” as a brand name I started to look at how the logo icon can succinctly represent that brand name. As you can see, some of my initial ideas stylizing how the sketchbook worked.

I took the most obvious route with this logo design. I needed to somehow represent a “space” with an icon. Easier said than done. A space is essentially that, a void filled with air. Taking up the challenge, I explored some ideas, where I cut up some font lines and used a human’s ability of “closure” to fill in the blanks. I soon settled on a concept that uses the interplay between positive and negative space.

I quickly mocked up the concept in Illustrator to see how it would look like in a controlled manner. I did like the paint lines very much, but this is not a design that is going to work de-bossed.

I realize, after playing around in Illustrator for a bit, I was stuck at a dead end. Also illustrator was not a program for me to design easily in, so back to the drawing board or sketchbook for that matter.

I continued to explore the meaning of “Space” with known representations like mountains and hills. Unfortunately all the concepts still lack the impact I desired.

Hey an empty box is a “space” to put stuff in right? I seriously considered using perspective lines to mark out a “space” before an object is drawn into it.

More box inspired concepts, this time with the words to represent lines. Ugly.

Even more boxes. I’m really struggling here!

I even experimented to cutting words horizontally in half. People only read the top half of the words anyway. Still this concept did not give me that Fedex effect I wanted.

I need to break out of this box thing. So I started to brainstorm other representations. A good one that I liked was how empty space was created between a bookshelf. (Bottom left) So Space is created between things. However, if I articulated a bookshelf as my logo would be just amateur work as it has little relation to my product. However liking the bookshelf concept very much, I parked the idea in the back of my mind and continued to explore.

As you can see, I’m still struggling to break away from boxes. I thought these box hole concepts might do the trick, but a box icon was a pretty common thing to find in logos. (I did some online research on the number of logos that had a box in it, and it was a lot!) Overall it’s still not good enough.

I finally realize that it might be near impossible to create a logo icon to represent “space”. So I went back to the tried and proven: Typography logos. That is when it hit me; the Bookshelf concept combined with typography produced a word with each letters representing a book.

I knew I finally got it. As with most solutions in design, you just know when you got it.

I wrapped up the concept phase by creating a definitive sketch of the design. This is something I also always do, as it catalogues one clear sketch to represent the concept or idea. Always as a precaution, it is also always a good idea to list the keywords from your design brief to make sure that the final logo matches your design objectives.

Time to select some fonts with the help of my keywords in my design brief. Also, I like to quickly thank a number of you who recommended font sites to visit on my Twitter stream.

I continued the refinement by picking a font and explored some placements. Slotting text in between other text has potential readability issues. So I really need to make sure I refine this direction well.

I selected the best potential arrangements and applied them 3 fonts that I short-listed.

So late one night, at 2.55am, I jumped out of bed with a solution to what I think is the best arrangement. This final layout (above) naturally aligns to how people read. “Spaces” is read left to right, and then “for ideas” read from top to bottom. If you notice, I went with a much cleaner font, even though I like to the first one I used that had “spaces” on each character. I felt that made the font look too busy and complicated.

All in all, I really enjoyed this brand creation process, and I hope you did to. I find it interesting, how much I could apply some of my Industrial Design methodologies, such as looking for insights to the natural behavior and expectations of people, to this logo exercise. I think understanding your process and the application of methodologies are key to success of any design, not just a logo design. Finally, as mentioned in the beginning of this post, look forward to hearing your comments and feedback.

Here we are finally, pictures of my first prototype for the Spaces for Ideas sketchbook! But before I get ahead of myself, let me pick up from where I left of in the last post Spaces for Ideas: The Beginning.

If I know you clever reader, you would have realized 2 things about the first post. First, the post was fairly generic and second I did not really set out a concept direction I wanted to go for at the end of the post. The reason was because I wanted to build up a background story around my thought process.

So as a recap here are some of the key elements I think the ideal sketchbook should have.

1. A sketchbook that highlights the work and not itself
2. Well constructed and affordable
3. No spines getting in the way of cross page sketching
4. Just the right size but with enough space or room to play with
5. “Boundary-less” pages
6. Flexible enough to do what you will
7. Decent quality paper that takes all non-wet mediums like ink, pencil or markers.
8. Appeals to everyone, not just designers

Unfortunately, I’ve learnt very early in my career that if you threw everything you wanted into a product you just end up with a mess. Thus my quiet objective in our discussion in the first post was to really prioritize which elements were important and in what combinations should they be built in.

I decided that the first of my 7 sketchbook solutions (yes 7!) would focus on creating a sketchbook around point 4-6. After a lot of thinking, sketching, and working in an iterative manner, the “expandable” sketchbook concept was born. What really amazed me about my process was this concept eventually inspired the name for the entire brand collection: Spaces for Ideas.

So now, lets take a look at my first prototype, which was incidentally an EPIC FAIL! Heh-heh. Hmm maybe I should have built a better quick mockup? Make many mistakes, but make them early!

This A6 sized book is ah…way too thick. It contains 20 pages of good quality 100gsm bright white, lightly textured paper that is quite nice to write on. Furthermore the book’s A6 size in proportion to the thickness makes it feel more like a pocket dictionary or bible. Grab your nearest one and you will know what I mean. It is a beast!

Here is the trick of this concept; the A6 sketchbook unfolds out into a generous A3 page. The sketchbook’s binding solution was a bitch to work out, as the folded A3 sheet becomes a thick wad that is about 6-7 times thicker than a single sheet. So the 20 folded pages inflates itself into something like a 120 page sketchbook. While my Binder is not much of an origami expert (the page unfolded upside down), he managed to figure out how to stuff those thick wads of paper into a book!

Here is where the biggest problem lies. The 20 sheets of folded A3 paper creates a large “hump” under the first unfolded sheet. This really spoils the drawing/writing experience.

Well that’s all from me for this update on Spaces for Ideas. I think you can easily see from this prototype that there are a lot of obvious problems that needs to be solved. Therefore almost immediately after studying it, I went ahead to brief the Binder on what to refine. Luckily, they will happy to make me another prototype.

Just as a teaser, I actually have the final prototype right here in front of me and it is looking great. There is still a lot to do, so please bear with me? I will share the next update after I work out a few more issues like branding and logistics. As usual I look forward to your comments and please do keep in touch?

Edit 2: Check out the next installment of this project, Spaces for Ideas: The Brand.

After using my Moleskine for almost a year, I realized what I thought was the world’s best sketchbook was not even close.

The cover often bends out of shape, the spine makes my pages shift like a deck of cards, and it contains pages so incredibly thin that pretty much everything goes through it. While no sketchbook is perfect, I believe my fairly harsh critique was influenced by price and marketing/branding of a Moleskine. In other words, I expected something better considering how much I paid for it!

This got me thinking: “Yes, while no sketchbook is perfect, just what did I not like about the Moleskine or even sketchbooks in general”?

I thought about all the problems I had with sketchbooks, and after that made a list of key points of what I thought my dream sketchbook would be like. And like a typical designer, I knew from that moment I could design one that was better. I hope!

1. A sketchbook that highlights the work and not itself
2. Well constructed and affordable
3. No spines getting in the way of cross page sketching
4. Just the right size but with enough space or room to play with
5. “Boundary-less” pages
6. Flexible enough to do what you will
7. Decent quality paper that takes all non-wet mediums like ink, pencil or markers.
8. Appeals to everyone, not just designers

I started, like I do with all design problems, sketching out my ideas and possible solutions.

At the same time I worked my sketches, I went out to do research as well as contacted a Printer/Bookbinder. I also knew I had a new “language” I needed to learn, and the Printer was a great help! I also went out to bookstores and art shops (even Muji) and bought a number of sketchbooks that had elements of the look or construction I wanted in my design.

I finally settled on a couple of directions, and practicing what I preach, I quickly built a mockup (top left in the picture above) over a weekend. I actually took a video of it, but I’m not sure if showing it will give you the right impression of the design as it was really rough. But for personal consumption, any quick and rough mockup the better as it got me going and better understanding the problem.

Frequent visits to the Printer/Bookbinder really helped, as she showed me the ropes, taught me the “language” they used and the in’s and out’s of bookbinding. I’ve only scratched the surface, but I’ve learnt a lot. In design it is always good to be really close to where the product is made. I’ve changed the design so many times after learning about the manufacturing constraints and seeing so many other options I could use (see a samples above). In fact many things I thought I knew about printing and bookbinding were actually myths.

Finally, after a lot of exploration, testing, discussion and brainstorming with fellow designers, friends and family: “Spaces for Ideas” was born! While we are talking about sketchbooks here, “thinking big” pushed me to envisioned Spaces for Ideas far beyond just sketchbooks. I won’t share everything here today, but I like to say that I’m really inspired by this brand name as it’s very apt don’t you think? I’ve even bought www.spacesforideas.com!

Well do stay tuned, as I’ll be in touch with a blog post of the actual prototype of the design I’ve decided to develop in the next week or so. I’m sure you can pick up clues in this post, but I would like to keep it as a surprise for you for next time. Meanwhile, do leave me your thoughts and feedback, as I love to hear what you think?

Edit 1: The next installment of Spaces for Ideas: The First Prototype is up! Check it out here.

Edit 2: Check out the third installment of this project, Spaces for Ideas: The Brand.

Quite often, I get emails from designers giving me information of their great products for sale. While reading these emails, I often wonder, how nice if my Design Sojourn readers could also get an opportunity to buy such great products?

Now you don’t have to wait any longer!

I like to introduce you to a whole new experience at Design Sojourn: Curated Shopping. Also known as curated consumption, this essentially means every month I will hand pick 1 great product and put it up on sale here at Design Sojourn.

In other words, as your creative director and curator, I will source only the best designed products available and recommend it for your consumption pleasure. Not only that, these products would first be personally tested and played with, and if it is up to expectations, it will receive the Design Sojourn mark of approval.

I will judge a product based on a few simple categories: design quality, concept idea, and most important of all, value for money. I always believe, well designed products should not cost a bomb!

To celebrate the launch of this new Shopping experience, we are offering free shipping world wide for our very first product: The SD Card Mp3 Player.

Designed by Sumajin, this Headphones with a built in Mp3 player is hip, fashionable and easy to use. Furthermore, this wireless experience would probably beat out most of those other wired Mp3 players strapped inconveniently to your arm, waist or chest.

But wait there’s more!

The products featured in our Design Sojourn’s Curated Shopping experience will only be available for a limited time (often for a period of 1 month) as they are either limited edition runs or sold at a value that is hard to beat and/or maintained.

For more information on this product and shipping and handling information, check out our Curated Shopping experience page. If you have any questions do not hesitate to ask, otherwise do enjoy!

Domus Magazine has recently launched a signature edition offshoot called Domus d’Autore. This first issue, entrusted to Editor-Architect Rem Koolhaas, was designed to allow readers to listen “…to the voice of those who know how to look beyond current confines and have the strength to direct and influence our way of perceiving the city and the spaces beyond it.”

As usual the magazine focuses mainly on Architecture, but Imomus has highlighted one of Rems theories that can have an interesting application in Industrial Design.

“post-occupancy design” — the stuff that happens to design after it’s left the designer’s workshop (and architecture after it’s left the studio) is the real test of its quality and character. Occupancy and use shouldn’t see the designer and the architect melting away. They should stick around, take notes, and take photos. The processes of time and decay can be beautiful. The way people use stuff and adapt it can be instructive.

Very well put. Furthermore my regular readers would recognize “Post-Occupancy Design” as similar to, amongst other things, what I have been exploring in my Un-p3 Project (Yes it is till happening!). I wanted to create, through the use of materials, an object that reflects this process of “time and decay” and how it can be beautiful, something that I think iPod/iPhone owners lament angrily over when they are clean polishing their shiny screens or chrome backs.

But is this another trend coming full circle?

It is funny. Our shiny PSP/Mp3 Player/Mobile Phone/Laptop products of today seem to prioritize looks over product engineering fundamentals of case-part protection from the environment, long term usability and product life deterioration. Even more surprising, is the fact that these are portable products. Perhaps that is why the protection accessories market is big business? But hey, would you want to use the heavily textured, dark grey plastic Palm PDA of ages past?

Well, my curiosity is piped, and I’m off to get the Magazine…

It has been a good number of months since the I’ve last updated my readers on the status of this project. Firstly though I like to apologize to a few of this project’s supporters for this delay but I have not been idle and was working on it during my spare time. I really was waiting for this time to finally give you an update.

Most of you astute readers would have already noticed that The Un-p3 Project is currently being exhibited at the Dandelion Industrial Design Exhibition. Unfortunately due to the entry criteria, that exhibition is really only for “show”. Therefore I thought to continue and expand upon the “tell” part here at Design Sojourn. This will be a great opportunity for you to ask any additional questions or make comments of any kind. Also I get a chance to explain how I went from the Haptic concept, and came up with the Wave one.

The Un-p3 Haptic concept: For more information see links below

If you missed the original conceptual thinking of this project that I am self-developing in the role of a design producer do take a look at Part 1 and Part 2 first for some background information, especially on the above Haptic concept.

I have to admit that it has been difficult realizing this project and even at this stage we are not totally done. After speaking to more designers about the Haptic Concept, the deeper complexities of my objective of this product’s creation process became more evident. So I wondered, perhaps unsatisfied with the current use of wood, that perhaps I should open my thoughts to consider other forms of craft manufacturing type techniques? But there is this problem going the craft route.

You see the when we look at craft vs manufacturing scale below they are actually polar opposites of each other:

The Haptic concept tends to fall on the more craft end of things, and I would rate the Wave concept as in between the two.

Craft manufacturing tends to focus on one off products or small production runs often hand made, but as a result often suffers from tolerencing and perhaps reliability issues. Mass manufacturing strives on standardization and volume, thus the products will have good fit but you need to sell in the numbers. As the project’s experiment was about exploring the use of craft based manufacturing juxtaposed with an electronic product, we need both small volumes, attention to detail, but still have good part fit.

One day while speaking to some friends working on their design project, I had a “euraka” moment. Why not use a Rapid prototype machine? Not only does it allow me some freedom in design (well almost, the RP machine still has restrictions) but it also allows fairly good tolerancing and part fit that is perfect for building electronic products.

So as I got started and studied the creation process via the Rapid Prototyping Machine, I decided very quickly that I had to designed this concept so that it would be difficult to be reproduced via mass-manufacturing. Undercuts, flat edges, thin walls, narrow gaps, living hinges and surface texture were tricks that came into play below.

The Un-p3 Project: Wave Concept

So there you go, the Wave concept. I have to say though it was a very interesting experience as after more than 10 years working on Industrial Design programs, certain manufacturing “givens” like part line placement or designing for draft have been ingrained in my creative creation process. In creating this Wave concept, it required me to spend a few days re-thinking and re-framing what I know about design for manufacturing before I could even set my mind free. I hope you enjoy reading about this project as much as I did creating it.

So if you had a choice on which direction would appeal to you, if I made a limited edition run of 20 pieces which would it be? Perhaps I may do a 10-10 split? Regardless please do have your say and I look forward to all your comments.

I’ve always considered myself resourceful and entrepreneurial even though I have always been an employee. I’ve always wondered about that? Why is that I don’t see the need to leave my day job to be an Entrepreneur? In reality this post is not about justifying my place in life, but the fact that what people consider as the traditional characteristics of an Entrepreneur is no longer relevant in today’s economy that has the Internet as a medium of information transfer.

Thinking carefully on this issue, I’ve realize that Entrepreneurship is really about a mindset more than anything else, and a successful entrepreneur is more about the definition of what success is. Honestly there is no difference between selling your company to Google for 100 Million and selling 100 pieces of your beautifully hand crafted mobile phone pouches.

Let us now consider my usual slightly deviant, “of the beaten path” view points on this matter.

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Edit: Re-formatted the layout of some text and images.

Yep. There is no point me blogging about doing good industrial design or design theory if at the end of the day I don’t walk the talk and produce something to show, right? Well after starting, stopping, re-starting, hacking and spin drying my ideas, I have finally succeeded in creating sample prototypes of my Un-p3 Mp3 player! Can you say that five times in your head?

Please do check it out after the jump and please leave me all your hard hitting ego killing feedback? No hang on, my ego is fragile so please be gentle? Heh-heh.

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Just kidding! I’m always a big fan of discussing the different methods you can use to monetize your webpage. However there is no use talking about Google Adsense or Affiliate programs if you can’t see the big picture of how things actually work.

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Or the article formally known as Industrial Design 104: Materials and Manufacturing

I did mention before last year and the beginning of this, I had given up on creating my own unique Mp3 (iPod Beater?) player because I could not create a design that was uniquely different than the tons of Mp3 player products in the market. However the idea of this product still floated in the back of my mind. Fortunately, with my recent exposure towards re-newable organic materials and its manufacturing processes, I have been inspired enough to restart this project!

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