Last Official Blog Post: Sadface! 11.25.09

I’d like to start off by saying that I had a wonderful quarter because I took some wonderful classes, including this one, and I’m really going to miss it. It was enjoyable, interesting, and challenging – in a good way. I think my favorite reading was probably way in the beginning – Norman’s “Emotional Design.” I loved reading about and discussing the reflective aspects of design, and (though we didn’t discuss it as much as I would have liked to) the idea of business versus art and culture.

Writing the Wikipedia paper was incredibly rewarding, especially after publishing it. It was great to research something I legitimately cared about, which made writing it almost enjoyable. The article’s been up there for almost 5 days no with no major edits, which is a great sign. I know I’ve joked about it in class before, but I really do think it might be featured article criteria with a little tweaking – I’m really proud of my work.

Building the egg carton was a project that was both challenging and rewarding. As my partner Megan said on her blog, it allowed us to apply some of the design theories and principles we’d been talking about to a physical project. Not to mention figuring out how to drop an egg from three or four stories is a pretty challenging endeavor!

Design Intelligence really helped me figure out what makes a good discussion. I’m still working on certain discussion skills (not talking all the time, mainly), but I am a chatterbox by nature, so that will take time! Now, however, I definitely pay attention to it more, and try and jump in only when I have something worthwhile to say, and when I’m not talking I listen – really listen – to what the other discussion members are saying. Again, there are things I’m working on, but thanks to the class I know what they are and what I have to do to get better.

I’ve also developed a much more discerning eye when it comes to my surroundings – in retail stores or cities or whatever, I’m constantly asking “Why was this designed this way?” I now notice small details that, prior to taking this class, I never would have picked up. I think it makes me a more informed citizen and consumer, something that certainly can’t hurt in today’s world.

 

 

SoulPancake Needs to Stop Being Psychic 11.24.09

Mmkay, remember this post from way back when? SoulPancake has done it again, posting information eerily relevant to in-class discussion topics! Today: If art is popular, does that mean it sucks?

I’m a huge fan of Film.com critic and columnist Eric Snider, not just because he counts both The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and Jaws among his Top 10 all-time faves, but for his regularly awesome editorial assaults (his Planet 51 review: Trapped in a black hole of suckiness) that jab at the entertainment industry, film critics, and of course, new movies. With (Untitled)—the new Jonathan Parker film lampooning contemporary art and starring Adam Goldberg and Marley Shelton—Snider likes what he calls the movie’s “smart, thoughtful deflating” of the creative ego and its prodding of slickster pretension in the art scene (and, by extension, society at large) that equates success with selling out.(Unititled) gets a solid B from Snider, and other reviewers are likewise thumbs-upping the movie—Roger Ebert calls it worthy of the best Woody Allen film, adding that the movie plunges fearlessly (but not brainlessly) into the world of art that is so cutting edge it has run out of edges. If you’re too indie to face up to that, or otherwise can’t get to the movies this week, at least check out Snider’s blog for his take on depression, Milla Jovovich, and the angry letters of his readers.

HEY LOOK I’M FAMOUS! 11.20.09

My Wikipedia article has officially been published! Let’s hope it stays up there.

Here’s the new lead-in section, to give you a taste:

Walt Disney Imagineering (also known as WDI or simply Imagineering) is the design and development arm of The Walt Disney Company, responsible for the creation and construction of Disney theme parks worldwide. Founded by Walt Disney in 1952 to oversee the production of Disneyland Park, it was originally known as WED Enterprises, from the initials Walter Elias Disney^[1].

The term Imagineering comes from Walt Disney’s blending of the words imagination and engineering, representing the skill set embodied by the employees of WDI. These employees, known as Imagineers, are renowned for their ability to blend creativity, expertise, and technological advancements like Audio-Animatronics to create “distinctive experiential storytelling” ^[2].

Imagineering is responsible for designing and building Disney theme parks, resorts, cruise ships, and other entertainment venues at all levels of project development. Imagineers possess a broad range of skills and talents, and thus over 140 different job titles fall under the banner of Imagineering, including illustrators, architects, engineers, lighting designers, show writers, graphic designers, and many more^[1]. Most Imagineers work from the company’s headquarters in Glendale, California, but are often deployed to satellite branches within the theme parks for long periods of time.

 

Architecture, Ahoy! 11.20.09

1. What are examples of architectural design that you consider to be epic failures?

Um, well, people who have the pleasure of being in seminar with me will probably see this coming, but:

I think the renovated Soldier Field is pretty ridiculous from a purely aesthetic point of view – while it certainly functions well as a stadium, it just looks weird. It really does look like a UFO landed in the middle of the old Soldier Field – not a look I’m particularly fond of.

In smaller terms, I think it is all too easy for doors to become architectural flaws – I bet we’ve all pushed on doors that needed to be pulled in order to open before. It’s entirely possibly to design a door that is both aesthetically pleasing and has clear mapping and affordances – Norman proved this in the reading “The Design of Everyday Things.”

2. Choose a building on Kalamazoo College’s campus and analyze its behavioral and visceral usability.

I think that the Upjohn Library Commons is a really well designed building in most (if not all) aspects. Not only is it a gorgeous new building, the layout makes sense and it works as a library. Things make sense in their current locations – for example, having circulation and a coffee shop on the first floor near the doors, the Reading Room on the second, and classrooms on the third. It’s big enough to hold lots of information and serve many functions, but not so big that it’s overwhelming and hard to navigate. What’s more, the building’s redbrick exterior blends nicely with the rest of the campus – I’ve seen new construction projects at colleges that just completely disregard the feel of the rest of the campus, and while the building might be a great example of contemporary architecture, it ends up clashing horribly with the other buildings.

3. What is the flaw in the current design process? How could this problem be fixed?

Architecture’s “Achilles Heel” (so to speak) lies in its lack of feedback. People can’t judge the success of a building until after it has been built and experienced. Some flaws could probably be avoided – like the general design of Soldier Field. Others are not as obvious until people start to use the building. Perhaps now with the amazing 3D and walkthrough technologies available, and the detailed 3D renderings on programs like Google Earth, people could create a virtual rendering of the building available to the public and generate some feedback based on that. It’s far from perfect, but might help a bit more than the utter lack of feedback available to architects now.

Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture 11.18.09

Introductory side note: This reading (by Arthur Asa Berger) has only augmented my desire to work as an Art Director or Copywriter in an ad agency. Why am I so attracted to such competitive fields? :/

Anyway! A particular paragraph jumped out at me right away, on page 5:

There are, as I pointed out earlier, a number of different forms and genres of advertising. Advertising pervades the American media and our lives – from the billboards on our highways to the print ads in the publications we read, the commercials on radio and television, and the designer logos on T-shirts and other kinds of clothes we wear. Advertising is also used by charities, labor unions, and organizations of all kinds to get their messages to the public. In consumer cultures, it seems fair to say that just about everyone is advertising, which creates a major problem – clutter. There are so many messages being sent to us that sometimes, as the result of information overload, we get them all mixed up.

So the goal for advertisers of any sort becomes creating an ad that will stand out from this avalanche of information – like the “Got Milk?” ads, or Bud Light’s “Real Men of Genius” series, which remains one of my favorite adveritising campaigns of all time. (Why is it that beer always seems to have the best commercials, anyway?)

(Please note I just giggled in the reading room of the library while watching that. Out loud. Yep.)

This passage comes from the beginning of the chapter and introduces many of Berger’s key points – like the importance and prevalence of the advertising industry in modern America. Other points include:

• Advertising is effective and the media is a powerful force in our culture. Not only does television reflect society, but it also shapes it, and ads often seep into our collective subconscious and influence our cultural attitudes and values. The fact that organizations continue to advertise and observations of human behavior show us that it does, indeed, work.
• Berger believes that TV commercials are the most powerful form of advertising and are part of what he dubs “teleculture,” which is now largely responsible for socializing young people.

Advertisers especially should have a psychological understanding of their work – otherwise their ideas will probably be totally irrelevant. However, it is also beneficial for the consumer to have a psychological knowledge of advertising as well, because that will make them more informed and allow them to sift through the massive amounts of information presented to them on a daily basis. It allows the consumer to not only discern good advertising from bad advertising (a skill most Americans possess anyway), but to understand why some ads are good while others fall short.

Fashion Design 11.14.09

People have been expressing themselves through their clothing for ages and ages – clothing serves as a tool for self-expression and communication. As I type this, I’m wearing yoga pants, a t-shirt, a sweatshirt, and Chuck Taylors with my hair up in a ponytail and a headband. It’s a pretty sloppy look, but it still communicates something to people – right now, that something is that I care more about comfort than I do about style.

sloppykins library work mode

I think it is human nature to want to be understood by others, and, being intelligent creatures, we’ll use whatever resources we have available to achieve that goal, including our clothing. This makes it functional not only in terms of covering our nakedness, but also as a form of communication. People make assumptions about and form conceptions of others based on what they are wearing. Even those who claim not to care about fashion send a message through their clothes, and the message is usually “I picked these because they’re clean and comfortable, not because they’re super-stylish.”

This drive to differentiate oneself from others might also explain why fashion is an ever-changing thing. Those who wish to be viewed as trendsetting and stylish will often wear designs that are new and different, something that makes them stand out from the crowd. A successful trend will then be adopted by others, meaning the original wearer must move on to a new style.

Fashion also evolves because of designers and celebrities (celebrities often influence designers as well – see Audrey Hepburn and Givenchy). Celebrities are often style chameleons and serve as inspiration for both designers and the general public because they are so high-profile and constantly in the public eye. Sadly, it is rare for a celebrity to choose her own clothes these days for fear of the fashion police, but a few brave pioneers remain, the stylishly eccentric Tilda Swinton among them.

Designers, as well, make sure that fashion is constantly evolving. Their careers depend on their ability to create something new – if designers created the same garments over and over again, what would be the point? Especially when it comes to couture labels like Chanel and Marc Jacobs, designers must create new, fresh garments to showcase, or else they have become irrelevant. Fashion is an extremely current product because it expresses the spirit of the times. It draws its inspiration from current events and thus, as the world and society change, so does fashion.

Designers of “ready-to-wear” garments have less leeway than the big fashion names, and should keep the following checklist in mind when designing for consumers:

• Quality – of fabric and workmanship
• Price – who are they marketing to and how much will this consumer be willing to pay?
• Relevance – is it relevant to today’s trends? Will it sell well? Will it be limited to one market (i.e., America or Asia)?
• Brand/style – who will buy this? Does it have a niche or market already built in?
• Fit and comfort

“Taste for Makers” 11.13.09

Taste for Makers – Paul Graham

Paul Graham’s thesis in this article:

Instead of treating beauty as an airy abstraction, to be either blathered about or avoided depending on how one feels about airy abstractions, let’s try considering it as a practical question: how do you make good stuff?

Graham supports his thesis with the following points:

• It’s a matter of pride, and a real pleasure, to get better at your job. But if your job is to design things, and there is no such thing as beauty, then there is no way to get better at your job. If taste is just personal preference, then everyone’s is already perfect: you like whatever you like, and that’s it.
• Good design is suggestive… In architecture and design, this principle means that a building or object should let you use it how you want: a good building, for example, will serve as a backdrop for whatever life people want to lead in it, instead of making them live as if they were executing a program written by the architect.
• When Bauhaus designers adopted Sullivan’s “form follows function,” what they meant was, form should follow function. And if function is hard enough, form is forced to follow it, because there is no effort to spare for error.
• Good design resembles nature. It’s not so much that resembling nature is intrinsically good as that nature has had a long time to work on the problem. It’s a good sign when your answer resembles nature’s.
• Great work usually seems to happen because someone sees something and thinks, I could do better than that. Giotto saw traditional Byzantine madonnas painted according to a formula that had satisfied everyone for centuries, and to him they looked wooden and unnatural. Copernicus was so troubled by a hack that all his contemporaries could tolerate that he felt there must be a better solution.

If I were to write an essay arguing against Graham’s idea, my thesis would be:

A design’s appeal and success is largely dependent on the subjective quality of taste.

Analysis of Downtown Kalamazoo 11.09.09

I think that Kalamazoo has really great “bones,” so to speak. It’s an area with a lot of potential – places like The Epic Center, the State Theatre, the Art Institute, the Civic Center, and Climb Kalamazoo can all serve as great generators. The Kalamazoo Mall (the pedestrianized stretch of Burdick Street), where Gazelle Sports is located, has some really great potential. I think that, in lieu of making that area more friendly to cars, it might even be beneficial to make it completely pedestrian. The entire Mall could serve as a generator in and of itself. It is very pedestrian friendly, and drivers will be willing to make a short trip to experience that area of Downtown. Some areas could definitely be more developed – Bronson Park has some great generators, why not put a nice little cafe of some sort closer to that area? Or an artsy home goods store by the Art Institute?

So Kalamazoo is on its way to becoming a destination city  – it tries to portray itself as such, and I think the potential is there, but for whatever reason, the city is sometimes quite empty, even the mall. Perhaps Gibbs’ suggestion of bringing in recognizable brands would help draw more traffic to the area.

I think the following three things could help improve Kalamazoo’s downtown area significantly:

1. Adding recognizable brands to the mall area – examples include Starbucks, Apple, Gap, Restoration Hardware, etc.
2. Expand the retail area past JUST the Mall – there are some antique shops scattered about the city, but the majority of the shopping is located in the Mall. It’s a nice two blocks, but people go through two blocks pretty quickly.
3. Completely overhaul the city layout for drivers! The excess of one way streets is incredibly confusing and probably deters shoppers from finding parking and spending time downtown.

The following excerpt from Lagerfield’s article on Gibbs (What Main Street Can Learn from the Mall) illustrates the importance of making a downtown area friendly to drivers as well as pedestrians:

In the past the neglect of commerce by planners and architects was compounded by an inability to cope with the automobile. The car has generally been treated as an enemy, with disastrous results for downtown commerce. During the 1960s and 1970s, for example, there was a great vogue in planning circles for banning cars from downtown streets and creating pedestrian malls. The experiment was disastrous. Many downtown malls have since been ripped up, and the streets rebuilt for automotive traffic.

…The city’s new master plan calls for a radical alteration of the traffic pattern. …Instead of flowing through town as quickly as water, traffic will slow to the speed of syrup. The idea is to transform this soulless thoroughfare into a vital city street.

As Gibbs sees it, Clematis Street is fighting the same problem that a lot of other American main streets are: it doesn’t have a purpose any more. During the 1920s it connected the train station, on the west end of town, with the ferry to Palm Beach, on the east end. But after two bridges, on either side of town, began funneling traffic around Clematis, its fate was sealed. The Woolworth’s, the McCrory’s, and the Sears, Roebuck all continued to prosper for a while, but business inevitably followed the cars.

Historians analyzing the decline of America’s towns and cities after the Second World War usually put most of the responsibility on the federal government’s head. The interstate highway system and federal mortgage subsidies for single-family homes spurred suburban growth, the argument goes, and doomed the downtowns. In Gibbs’s version of urban history, based on his travels, another force looms large: the highway bypass. As the number of cars on the road soared after the war, town merchants and residents sought relief from traffic-clogged streets. Their demands coincided with the interests of the state highway departments and traffic engineers, who wanted to keep building roads and whose highest professional goal was the unimpeded flow of cars. Routing highway traffic around the outskirts of town must have seemed the obvious thing to do. The downtowns thus unwittingly initiated their own march to a commercial grave.

The one way streets in the heart of downtown Kalamazoo probably act as a deterrent to shoppers, who may stick to the two way streets encircling the city. Why bother trying to navigate one way streets to find parking somewhere when you can just keep driving and you’ll eventually hit the strip malls of West Main? I don’t think the Mall should be demolished, because it has been more of a success than the ones created in the 60s and 70s. But I think that the streets of downtown need to really be rethought and overhauled – there are some one-way streets that are four lanes wide. Why not convert that into a two-way? I really don’t understand the point of one-way streets in the first place, and downtown Kalamazoo seems feature only one-way streets sometimes. If that were changed, I think the city would be pleasantly surprised by the increase in visitors and shoppers.

Egg Drop! 11.05.09

Megan and I met one afternoon equipped with straws, a plastic tomato container, Play-Doh, tape, scissors, and an egg to protect. I had only taken 20 straws from Jazzman’s because people were giving me some pretty strange looks, which ruled out my initial idea of creating a sphere to protect the egg. So we decided to somehow create a casing for the egg and suspend it within a pyramid of straws, which would then be attached to a Target-bag parachute by way of rubber bands. (Target bags were chosen for their relative strength compared to other plastic bags like Walgreens.)

Constructing it was actually pretty simple – Megan and I would say, “Well, let’s try this!” and then try it. We began by covering the egg in Play Doh, then cutting out two round halves of the tomato container and encasing the egg in there. Then we just started building a straw pyramid, reinforcing the sides and corners with more straws. The Target bag was attached with rubber bands to straw “antenna” we stuck to the top of the pyriamid . We didn’t actually test it much for fear of ruining it, but were pretty confident that the straws would absorb most of the impact, especially since it was reinforced on all sides. Suspending the egg allowed an extra layer of cushioning as well.

The parachute turned out to be our saving grace – it guided the egg’s drop down, kept it oriented in one direction, and created a much gentler landing. Here you see our egg (which we named Chuck, by the way) falling from the second story of Dewing. It was one of two eggs to survive a second-story fall as well as two three-story falls.

For Megan’s perspective on our “eggsellent” adventure (if you’ll pardon that hideously bad pun), check out her blog here!

Urban Design: A Comparison of Whyte and Gibbs 11.05.09

Gibbs’ main objective in designing a downtown area is to lose no opportunity to make a sale, whereas Whyte was more concerned with the overall feel and character of an area – which can certainly be driven by commerce, but commerce is not the end-all and be-all of an urban neighborhood. I tend to agree with Whyte more. Gibbs’ views are rather utilitarian and, while they have the potential to be effective, I think he is perhaps too focused on the retail aspect of things. Whyte talks about other elements of an urban area and how those can be effectively manipulated to create and environment where people are not only going to want to shop, but also eat and socialize. For Whyte, the entire area is the draw and the generator. He looks at the big picture by encompassing minor details, if that makes sense. Gibbs, on the other hand, focuses solely on one aspect – the retail aspect – and leaves it up to the town to supply the charm and quirk that distinguish it from a mall.

I think that the North Michigan Avenue/Loop/Streeterville area of Chicago is a really appealing area. Certainly, people go there to shop, but it’s also a destination. Partly because it’s a major metropolis and cultural hub, but there are certain neighborhoods in Chicago that people either avoid or only visit because they have to – I’m not sure which street it is exactly, but there’s a part of the Loop that has not been developed as much outside of the business realm, and after 8pm or so it becomes completely deserted. It’s really unnerving to walk through that area at night, because you’re in the middle of Chicago and no one’s there!

So what’s unappealing about that area of the Loop is the lack of amenities – the restaurants are all basically chains – McDonald’s, Subway, sandwich places, and of course Starbucks – that close comparatively early, maybe 10pm. It’s not very conducive to fostering anything other than a business vibe. Head toward the lake, the Art Institute, and Grant and Millennium Parks, and you’ll start to notice a difference. People enjoy being in this area. There are vibrant shops, both unique and chain restaurants, the Theatre district and CSO are nearby, and of course the aforementioned parks and museums. These all serve as a draw for people, creating a pretty steady crowd and thus a community feeling, even if that community includes tourists.

One of Chicago’s most attractive features is its “City Wall” -  I believe Chicago and New York are the only cities with such a feature. Basically, a City Wall is a row of buildings with no other buildings across the street, usually looking out over some kind of landmark – New York’s City Wall borders Central Park. Chicago’s borders Grant Park, creating a sense of openness that serves as a relief from the hustle and bustle taking place only a block or so away.

Arial view of Chicago’s City Wall:

This is  the best picture I could find of what it looks like walking alongside it… it’s my own picture from Lollapalooza 2009. Please ignore the fact that I’m creepin on Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio in it.

You can see the row of buildings on the right and greenery on the left – it’s pretty sweet.