See images from this event on Flickr.

Event Review by Frances Close

All Axis was the second in a sequence of events during the first annual Chicago Design Week. The cross-discussion of experience design took place at The McCormick Tribune Campus Center, Illinois Institute of Technology on May 18. Cheryl Towler Weese moderated the conversation and began by noting that there is a “shift within the industry from the designing of things to design thinking.” Each of the evening’s three speakers further reinforced this idea as they spoke of how experience design is crucial to their work.

Scott Wilson, founder of hybrid design studio Minimal, was the first speaker of the evening. He spoke of how Minimal is “often thought of as a classic industrial design firm” that actually does a range of things, including mechanical engineering to design strategy. Their all encompassing approach allows them to focus on making meaningful connections with their end users and think about products from a 360° standpoint.

Field research on user immersion is vital within Minimal’s process. Scott shared a case study done for Nike focused on the user experience of basketball players. By interviewing players and immersing themselves in their environment Minimal learned how basketball players interact with their gear. They found that they are often distracted due to looking over their shoulders and worrying about their bags, an insight that resulted in incorporating a lock into the bag Minimal was developing at the time.

The second speaker of the evening was Sal Cilella from Gravity Tank. He began by introducing an idea that resonates with many designers: “The best thing about being a designer is a blank piece of paper and a pen. And the most intimidating thing about being a designer is a blank piece of paper and a pen.” From here Sal spoke of how user experience is tied closely into everything we do. Whether it be the music choice within a commercial or the charge to create a website, ultimately we are being asked to “create experiences, not just things.”

A commercial for the Sony Wii was shared along with a short film on how Pixar tells a story. “Rather than writing with words, they write with drawings.” Gravity Tank uses a similar approach to generate ideas where the focus is on the benefits, not the features, the audience, not the object. The process of storyboarding is forefront and gets people out of their chairs and collaborating during the concept process. Since the story is so accessible, Gravity Tank uses storyboarding as a tool to brainstorm with clients. In developing a good story, Sal suggested three key steps to start with. First, develop a hero. Second, define the setting. And third, write the script. The goal is to propel the hero, or the target audience, through the story and find idea’s that fit his challenge, while never losing sight of the fact that the story comes first and the design second.

Dave Mason from SamataMason closed the event with a lighthearted presentation as he took the stage and asked “an examination on user experience? Am I in the right room?” He shared a “Dinosaurs and More Dinosaurs” book that he made as a child and contained short sheets throughout which revealed that he had been instinctively designing with user experience in mind from the beginning.

Dave discussed a series of situations where user experience is not always thought about in terms of secondary and tertiary users. One example was the fact that the interstate system was originally designed for military users, making the people who use it today incidental users. Another concept is that Facebook was designed for people to be used, not for people to use it. He stated that “design is an act of optimism” and it is not uncommon for designers to think that they can do a better job. His response to this idea is that “we need to back off from that” and focus on the fact that design is informed by knowledge and fueled by instinct and empathy. As an ending note, Dave mentioned that “everything designed is experience, and every design is user experience.”

The evening closed with a panel discussion.

Event Overview:
AIGA Chicago presents All Axis, an examination of design and user experience. Hear perspectives from leaders influencing industries ranging from consumer products, fashion, interaction design, film and architecture. Join us for what is sure to be a jammed packed evening of passionate discourse.

Event Moderator:

Cheryl Towler Weese, Studio Blue
Cheryl is founder and creative director of Studio Blue, a Chicago-based studio that works with museums, universities, and other organizations that serve the public. She began her design discipleship at age nine, when she learned to proofread galleys at her parents’ weekly newspaper. She attended college sporadically, preferring to work or study in a different country each year. This love of culture and language is integral to her design sensibility, and her projects often marry design thinking with the development of authentic visual language.

Cheryl's clients have included the Art Institute of Chicago, the Sam Fox School of Art and Design at Washington University, the Guggenheim Museum, and Syracuse University's College of Art and Design, among others. Her work has received medals from the Stiftung Buchkunst and the Carl Hertzog awards, and has been recognized by numerous design publications and competitions including AIGA, Eye, Graphis, ID, Novum, the Type Directors Club, and the Webbys. Her work is also included in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Denver Art Museum.

Cheryl has taught and lectured on design, juried and chaired numerous design competitions, and has served on the national board of the AIGA. She holds a BA in studio art from Wesleyan University, and an MFA from Yale.

Event Speakers:

Dave Mason, SamataMason
Dave Mason was born in England and raised in Canada. The experiences he gained during his time as a CJFL quarterback, while working in environments such as a women's prison, a forensic psychiatric hospital and a subatomic physics laboratory, and while coaching high school football naturally led him to form his own design firm immediately after graduating from Vancouver's Kwantlen College in 1982. A few years of friendly but relentless harassment from Greg Samata resulted in the 1995 founding of Chicago / Vancouver-based SamataMason Inc., a multi-disciplinary firm whose work has been consistently honored in hundreds of national and international competitions and publications. Dave has served as a guest speaker at numerous design industry events, conferences and schools, and has served as a juror for design competitions throughout North America and in Asia. A past-President of the BC Chapter of the Society of Graphic Designers of Canada, Dave has co-founded a number of other successful businesses including OpinionLab, Inc., the leader in web-based VoC (voice of customer) intelligence systems, Cusp Conference LLC, which produces an annual conference about 'the design of everything,' and documentary film producer NoisemakerFilms.

Scott Wilson, MINIMAL
In 2007, Scott Wilson founded Chicago-based MINIMAL, a studio whose diverse work spans industries ranging from technology, interaction and consumer products to fashion, furniture and environments. A former Global Creative Director at Nike, Wilson has lead design organizations such as IDEO, Thomson Consumer Electronics, Fortune Brands, and Motorola and created some of the most recognized consumer design icons.

Currently partnering with top Fortune 500 companies such as Google, Dell, Microsoft, Nike and Xbox  as well as exciting start-ups, MINIMAL is working on the some of the most anticipated new devices and experiences in the industry. Balancing consulting for design-centric brands with his intense passion for self-manufacturing and entrepreneurial ventures, Wilson is constantly looking for the next consumer connection. In January of 2010 he successfully incubated, developed, raised funding and launched a revolutionary new customization platform brand, Uncommon (www.GetUncommon.com), which took the existing industry giants by surprise.

One of the most respected hands-on designers in the industry, Wilson has the elusive ability to consistently deliver products to market that speak rationally and emotionally to the consumer, ultimately ensuring a higher probability of market success and endurance.

His work has been exhibited in museums and competitions including the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Triennial, MoMA, MCA and Chicago Athenaeum and has been recognized with over 50 international design awards in the last decade including ID Magazine’s Top 40, FastCompany’s Master of Design and TIME Magazine’s Style+Design 100.

Sal Cilella, Gravity Tank
An accomplished interaction designer with over 12 years of experience
guiding large global brands across a range of digital media (mobile,
web, kiosk, devices), Sal leads gravitytank’s Interaction Design group -
a cross-disciplinary team of interaction designers, storyboard artists,
animators and writers - and manages client projects.  He frequently
leads workshops and presents at industry events and universities, often
speaking about his primary design passion – using storytelling and the
narrative techniques of film to craft compelling experiences.  Sal has a
BA from Notre Dame, an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of
Chicago, and is an adjunct faculty member at both the School of the Art
institute of Chicago and IIT's Institute of Design. 

MORE DETAILS COMING SOON.