Aureline Tu

Aureline Tu, a Carleton Alumni came today as a guest speaker. She talked about her work and process. She's young and successful as an industrial designer! Although she doesn't tell us about the amount of hard work it takes to be where she is today, I can tell you (as Bill Nye once told me) that there are no big breaks in life, just little ones so you have to keep going and work hard, always.

Victor Margolin: Design and the Risk of Change

Here are my notes for Victor Margolin's keynote lecture on Design and the Risk of Change. I found it interesting, and tried to scribble as much as I could, but the bottom line was that change is inevitable, and as it is a "risk" because these changes may involve unknown factors, today, it is (even more so important for) up to designers to step up to the plate and adapt their skillset to building a better society --rather than just designing products.

Things on backs on bikes

In Uganda, everyone rides a bicycle or motorbike. And then, they all come up with inventive/dangerous ways to carry more things than they should on their vehicles. Here's just a few, but believe me, nothing is too large or heavy to carry on the back of a bicycle.

En route to Amsterdam/Uganda (by air)

Flying to Uganda I first have to stop in Amsterdam (no complaints here). I requested a window seat, but then proceeded to sleep through most of the flight. I woke up near the Netherlands and from up above, there are so many little streams and rivers in this little country, they all run silvery smooth like mirrors. I was half-expecting to see the airplane itself reflected in one of them. The sky is in the ground!

Notes on Lecture by guest Tim Antoniuk

The notes are a mess, but the topic was, "Big design from small design centers, Hybridity and the creative economy" in which he talked a lot about design being a messy process and working with Drooglabs.

Ezio Manzini, Designing in (the state of) Crisis

My notes for a lecture by Ezio Manzini. He stresses three main points that in order to design in a crisis, there needs to be three types of innovation: technological (resilience), social (collaboration), and cultural (bringing new qualities), and goes on into how to design for all three. For him, he believes that design is a cultural activity to promote the meaning of things. 

Steve Portigal, Muscles vs Methods: Skillbuilding for designers and innovators

Steve Portigal came by and dropped us a few tips in his lecture about building good designerly skills to survive out there. Listed is his top seven.