Field Study

One nice little feature of Wander Weeks: while you wait for the...

Fri, 11 May 2012 16:08:08 -0400

One nice little feature of Wander Weeks: while you wait for the launch of Wander, you can share your Wander Weeks posts on Tumblr and Facebook. Tell the world where you’d rather be >

This week we launched Wander Weeks, a four week countdown/orientation to Wander. Each week we’ll...

Thu, 10 May 2012 15:01:08 -0400

This week we launched Wander Weeks, a four week countdown/orientation to Wander. Each week we’ll...

"Design everything on the assumption that people are not heartless or stupid but marvelously capable,..."

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 10:02:03 -0400

“Design everything on the assumption that people are not heartless or stupid but marvelously...

Interview: Proxart Magazine

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 10:01:17 -0400

This interview was done back in November ‘11 for Proxart Magazine. A few details have been...

This is big news for our team. Work hard, work fast, good things come, and back to it. I’m...

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 17:25:49 -0400

This is big news for our team. Work hard, work fast, good things come, and back to it. I’m...

Really enjoyed sharing some thoughts with the community at last...

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 09:26:00 -0400

Really enjoyed sharing some thoughts with the community at last night’s Design + Tech event. Eric Jacobsen and I soap-boxed for twenty or so minutes about working as a designer/developer team. Most of our slides are represented above, but I thought I’d pull in some of the main points that resonated with the audience based on their tweets from the night.

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“Empathy is the most important thing a designer can learn:”

This is something I believe designers often mistakenly refer to as ‘taste’. Being able to synthesize the personal tastes of a large group of people and express that is an act of empathy. Example: Detecting a shaky sense of American identity amidst a growing global culture, mashing that up with a renewed American entrepreneurialism and self-made-man ethic due to a struggling and unsure economy, and expressing that in the form of a bespoke leather wallet or hand-crafted all-American axe has much more to due with empathy than an Urban-Outfittrian mystical sense of taste. Good taste is personal; empathy is universal.

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“Sci Fiction = Better design (if you want to work with developers, read sci-fi)”

In all seriousness, it is a baseline for every developer I know. Sci-fi writing is probably the first creative industry to successfully combine real imaginative creative work with rigorous engineering and logic. A lot to learn from that process alone. And the stuff is just plain cool. If you want to build things for the web, become obsessed with the near future you are building toward.

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“You have to decide what to unlearn and what to focus on. You only have so much brain space”

The language I use is “cull” and “edit”, pulled from and excellent article in issue 1 of The Manual. Asses what you are filling your mind with and make a conscious decision to perma-delete the knowledge that doesn’t absolutely drive you to create (Pantone? paper weights and textures? print techniques? Flash?). Replace it with the ancillary skills that will allow you to execute (code? info architecture? UX? UI? anthropology?).

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“It’s really about doing stuff”

Self explanatory. At the end of the day, just produce tons of work, and make sure some of it is interesting. Put your side project at the front of your portfolio. That work says more about you than anything else.

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“Everything matters”

Respect every part of your work and the work of the people you work with. We put time into the details because they matter to us and to the people you collaborate with. Give props, show respect, 4 lif.

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“Love + Hatred = Passion”

People who have an unnatural hatred of things they view as ‘wrong’, and clear and intense love of what they view as ‘right’ — those are passionate people that you want to work with. Avoid fence-sitters.

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“Stop Talking Start Making”

In the Spirit of General Assembly’s recent campaign, stop talking, start making. Again, it’s about doing stuff. Nothing matters more than execution.

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Thanks to Google + Photoshop for several of the above images. We couldn’t have done it without you.

“To the first brave adventurers on Wander, welcome. To those still waiting to embark, we’re...

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 11:56:00 -0400

“To the first brave adventurers on Wander, welcome. To those still waiting to embark, we’re...

"The design instinct is about viewing the world around you as opportunities to add more..."

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 10:42:20 -0400

“The design instinct is about viewing the world around you as opportunities to add more...

“Are you a designer or developer (student or professional) looking for a partner in crime?...

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 10:00:05 -0400

“Are you a designer or developer (student or professional) looking for a partner in crime?...

I owe a lot of my career progress to my dad. He is a self made man in every sense, and since there...

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 13:50:00 -0400

I owe a lot of my career progress to my dad. He is a self made man in every sense, and since there...

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved,..."

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 10:00:06 -0400

““The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk,...

Über Content’s rebrand and site design was a project I was lucky to find. They rep an...

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 09:51:50 -0400

Über Content’s rebrand and site design was a project I was lucky to find. They rep an...

Our final SXSW shirt for Wander. If you happen to be down there...

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 14:41:18 -0500

Our final SXSW shirt for Wander. If you happen to be down there this week look for my co-founder Jeremy Fisher to snag one.

I’ve sent an exhaustive number of emails filled with...

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:00:05 -0500

I’ve sent an exhaustive number of emails filled with cryptic cobalt blue links to resources and suggested reading. I like to share, and I share what I can through Twitter, but I find myself wanting to come back to certain articles and books or wanting to recommend them again and again.

I decided some months ago to put together a personally canonical list using a slightly hacked version of Rob Giampietro and Andrew LeClair’s Otlet’s Shelf Theme. I finally got around to cleaning it up and fill it in with a workable set of introductory material. Overall it’s a much better experience for those I share it with and for my own research and inspiration purposes.

Follow Field Study Library for a steady but considered stream of useful links and book recommendations. Suggestions welcome!

"Work is most fulfilling when you’re at the comfortable, exciting edge of not quite knowing..."

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 13:11:03 -0500

““Work is most fulfilling when you’re at the comfortable, exciting edge of not...

Stop Talking. Start Making.

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 13:41:00 -0500

General Assembly is a community I am proud to be a part of. Their M.O. is enabling determined and...

Last call for tomorrow’s class Designing Your Design...

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 11:00:00 -0500

Last call for tomorrow’s class Designing Your Design Career. It’s going to be a great way to spend a Monday night, planning your future and making dreams come true. It’s going to be at 6:30pm in Soho and it will be all kinds of awesome. Hope to see you there!

(Illustration created with Ze Frank’s Scribbler - a generative illustration toy.)

"This growing desire among designers to bring their user focus, strategic vision, iterative..."

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:21:56 -0500

“This growing desire among designers to bring their user focus, strategic vision, iterative...

Log / Transition

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 10:04:57 -0500

I am was an agency-trained, senior-level, print/branding designer & I want to left to work at a...

At the urging of @SirPemberton, I had to do a quick...

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 20:17:00 -0500

At the urging of @SirPemberton, I had to do a quick Valentine’s version of the site. Well wishes for you and your loved ones.

After V-day I reverted back to the original design but you can still see the “Lover’s Edition” of the site at keenancummings.com/valentines.