Apr 10, 2019Designing better for people in disastersIntroducing Disaster Design Principles (and how we got to it) — TL;DR With the goal of using interaction design to improve people’s decision making in disaster situations, designers Amelia Koster, Brittany Williams and I created a library of disaster design principles. Municipalities are usually in charge of putting together preparation programs and responding when events arise. However, not all municipalities have the…UX7 min read
Nov 26, 2018Tell me about a food that makes you think of your grandparentsCards for Humanity: Finding connection through food and memory. — An act of care by Augusta Lutynski, Shamara Leonard, Mitra Mahmoodi, and Catherine Legros, Emily Carr University students. After studying and exploring the connections between colonialism, racism, and culture through food this semester, it was time to find our own way to change the narrative through food. “Food is a…Food6 min read
Apr 28, 2018Designing Cultural ProbesHow to get unique insights and exceptional engagement from research participants — In the context of a university Design Research and Methods class we learned co-creation and several research methodologies. The class revolved around environmental health and measuring the impacts of an environment’s influence on people’s behaviours. With a multi-disciplinary team (Industrial designers Cora Hall, Benjamin Mills, Gian Fernandes and Communication designer…UX4 min read
Jan 13, 2018Human Centered TranscriptionsWhen generative user testing guides a project — What started as a university project for ESL (English as a Second Language) students brought me to a larger design opportunity: Re-designing transcriptions. I recognized real-time transcription AI-software, like Google’s Cloud Speech API, are more accurate and cheaper than ever and the textual support provided by transcriptions can be an…Design5 min read
Oct 23, 2017Internship SeasonWhy and how to get a UX internship — This piece was originally written for my classmates at Emily Carr University. Here we are, 3rd year Interaction Design. This means you’re more than halfway through your degree. It also means this summer is most likely your last chance to get an internship at a (big) tech company. Why does that matter? Some jobs…Internships3 min read
Published in Prototypr·Jan 16, 2017Starting a startup as a designer (in Asia)Storytime — This is an adaptation of a talk I gave at the Montreal Dribbble Meetup a year ago. September 2014 My friend Tim and I left Montréal, our hometown, for an undetermined amount of time. Destination: Asia. More specifically, Bali, as we had heard it attracted digital nomads from around the world…Startup6 min read
Jan 11, 2017Hacking at M.I.T — Cover Design HistoryCase Study — I worked on Cover Design History during the CODEX Hackathon (books and publishing hackathon) while at the M.I.T. Media Lab in Cambridge. My small team consisted of university professors, one publisher, and front and back-end developers. As the only designer in my team, I had to create a brand identity…Hackathons6 min read
Jan 10, 2017Yelp Profile RedesignCase Study — I redesigned the Yelp user profile in 4 days as a challenge. No user or market research was performed for this project, I was instead encouraged to go with smart assumptions. I documented every step of this project below, from goal to final solution. 1. Design Goal Optimize user profiles to promote social…6 min read
