Using the Charrette Process

It is not often that one gets to see through a project, from the very start to end, in only an hour and 50 minutes. In this week’s studio, we did just that.

After brainstorming vehicles and specific demographics for those using these vehicles, we were told to design and present a smart vehicle interface of some sort. In the middle of the project, we were told to shuffle ourselves into new groups and try to tackle designing someone else’s ideas for their vehicle and demographics.

In my first group, we created an interface for a student biker. First, we brainstormed what a student might want out of a smart bike interface. After narrowing down our ideas, we decided the interface would allow the student to input what they planned to do and where they would go that day. The interface would include a navigation system that would show the best routes and organization for the day. For example, if a student inputted they would need to get coffee, buy a book from the school’s bookstore, and get to class at Kane Hall by 2 pm, the interface would first show the closest, highest rated, and cheapest options to get coffee. The student could then pick the place they wanted to pick up their coffee and the interface would instruct them that the most time-efficient route would be to bike to the bookstore, then get coffee on the way to class. We realized too that bicyclists often need to find a nearby place to lock their bikes, and so the navigation system would show them this as well. Additional ideas were showing the student the most bike friendly or most scenic routes.

In my second group, we created an interface for the Seattle duck tours with tourists in mind. The interface would allow riders to vote on what they wanted to see, show them nearby restaurants, allow them to make reservations or order take-out, and give them more options for noise making than just the quackers given to them (for example a goose honk).

For both of these projects, the main question was what would this user want out of a smart interface? A student’s needs will be different from that of a tourist, however, both users are human and need to eat and drink, and so there were overlapping needs as well. Since this was just a quick process, we did not have time to research user needs, however, I would be interested to see how well we did without this research available.

I really liked the quick thinking involved in this kind of project. Due to the stress of time, there were no lulls in the design or brainstorming processes and it forced everyone to become involved. I could really see using this Charrette process for initial brainstorming. It would be a great way to jump start a project and then be able to go back after coming up with a rough idea of what you are trying to produce and see how user research and production capabilities change the project and make it into a real, usable product.