What Women Make » Innovation

3 Female Design Students Who Shake The Kitchen Loose: Household Appliances of the Future

Chauncey Zalkin — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 17:34:20 +0000

Electrolux 2011 Competition Female Finalists

Every year Electrolux puts out a brief on one of today’s design challenges. Open to design students who dare to dream about ever-advancing household convenience, it’s fun to see the innovation that emerges. This year’s brief for “intelligent mobility” is explained here in this video:

“From a field of 1,300, the top 25 concepts have been chosen from designers based in 14 countries across the world. Australia, New Zealand and Poland are represented by three entries each whilst Canada, the Czech Republic, France, South Korea and the USA have two representatives each.”

Sadly, out of 25, there were only 3 women chosen. I can’t say this is the fault of Electrolux but maybe just a case of the number of qualified women who entered so let’s put the number aside and give a round of applause for the 3 women who have been named finalists (in no particular order):

(1)

Simona Hruskova (Czech Republic) created the EMS Cooker, a band that wraps around your wrist, uses your natural bodyheat, and is then used to heat food a hotplate or keep your coffee warm.

(2)

Elizabeth Reuter (USA) created a mobile kitchen which takes up almost no space and offers everything you need to prepare a meal.

(3)

Roseanne de Bruin (New Zealand) made a game out of blending a smoothie at home with the Smoobo Blender. Bounce this space age ball around and the kinetic energy gets the blades moving.

all images via electroluxdesignlab.com. See the rest of the finalists here.

Recipe for Business Opportunity: Include the Practitioners — Ethnography at work for Innovation

Chauncey Zalkin — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 14:29:25 +0000

Research companies, like everyone else, are questioning their value. Like everyone else, they are struggling to push beyond the boundaries of their current deliverables. In their case, information is too fluid to rely on one definitive report. At the same time, I imagine that ad agencies might wish they weren’t called ad agencies. It’s like naming your medical practice by the diagnosis. You can’t give away the ending in the title and know you’re doing the right thing for every client. Surgeons cut. Ad agencies make ads. And last but not least, design firms prioritize physiological and aesthetic relevance but they do take the time to understand people and groups. They engage in ethnography to get context and use mapping techniques to spur innovation even if their business model does not allow for completely open-ended non-prescriptive discovery.

There are only one or two innovation firms that I’ve come across in my search for a job home that are really ideal settings for ethnography. One of those is WhatIf; they use experts with long backward trajectories in various categories to solve problems. They also listen with purpose. But WhatIf isn’t hiring.

I was recently asked how I would approach bringing innovation for new product development to a traditional quantitative and qualitative research company with most of their DNA in brand and advertising research. Here are the initial thoughts I offered. Though I didn’t have enough time to develop them further, I thought I’d share them.

‘The Constellation’ I talk about in this blog post calls for a shift in approach

A Shift In Approach #1

Look beyond the super-users and early adopters trend and insights experts tend to seek out. Everyone with an Internet connection is an influencer. The single idea or authoritative voice has been replaced by a constellation of conversations, ideas and stories.

Influence is multilateral. Everyone is pinging around from fact to fact, story to story, idea to idea. Those facts and stories are disembodied most of the time. The antecedent is not always important.

The constellation of input is what we have to look at.

A Shift In Approach #2

We’re living in an age of ongoing experimentation. Reach across disciplines and cultural phenomena for answers. I did this naturally but was really taught to do it working at Crispin. You look to other categories not just for inspiration but for insight into cultural resonance.

Recipe – the Secret Sauce

Traditional Quant

Traditional Qual (as needed)

Ethnography (deeper open-ended cultural exploration) that includes designers and other ‘makers’. Find those with a pertinent process-knowledge base and bring them into your research in addition to the end-user you are trying to learn about (not only as the experts they are but as people to learn from, observe, and explore with.)

Triangulate as needed.

Tools & Tenets

Consider all social, economic and cultural factors that effect business and consumers (locally or globally or both):

Visit innovative hubs in emerging markets to look for fresh ideas

Listen to world’s greatest problem solvers and cross-reference findings with best thinking

Engage in innovation research praxis: trends and best practices + practical concerns of the business at hand + research into behaviour and emotion –> put into test scenarios.

In a Nutshell

Innovation starts with observation.

A diversity of well considered perspectives increases the depth and in turn, the value of the proposition.

It is vital to involve makers (designers, engineers, developers) – those versed in design thinking and iterative process – for richer analysis and problem-solving.

Drawing fresh ideas from related cultural phenomena further shapes thinking and brings ideas to life.

Stuff I Like to Do or Lead

Self-documentation / digital ethnography

Journaling, Videography, Brainstorming

Sketches, mock-ups, scenario building, co-creation

Map the Marketplace, Category, Competition, Trends

Shopalong

Develop an ‘app-along’

Workshops for Clients

Designer / Developer/ Engineer/Creator panels

Guided tours

Also Incorporate

Protyping – 3d ideation or narrative booklets and videos of findings and innovation exploration

So…

Trends

Observational Research

Workshops

To create best products, brands, services, business opportunities.

The End

I think I’m now off to do more What Women Make stuff and combine my anthropology and truth-seeking with Peter Crosby’s human geography landscapes. More later from Barcelona.

Great Presentations

Chauncey Zalkin — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 17:34:37 +0000

I’m putting together a proposal and doing some background research to buttress my proposition. Through yesterday’s research, I discovered some great ideas, which I’ll share in a minute, but first I’ll share a thought that occurred to me during the day:

Life used to be what you saw around you – the milkman, the neighbor, the car park, the airport, the plane, the landing strip, the drive, the hotel. We saw life in a direct plane outward from wherever we were. Now, life has become more like a land map, a blueprint or a satellite image – so many wires going this way and that, our life containing so much more than what our eye can take in – that we can no longer see our lives with the naked eye. This is such a huge transformation and so undeniably true and becoming truer by the day that I imagine it is becoming part of our psyche to flex a muscle that sees beyond the immediate environment. We think less ‘across the street’ and more ‘Hubble telescope’ because it’s the only way to get it all into one picture. We’re developing another quotidian dimension, a birds-eye instinct emerging. Another reason why we just can’t think or work linearly. Interesting, this thought helps my proposition a lot.

Now onto a few good ideas around the web:

I discovered Venessa Miemis:

“What are young adults thinking about money and value? How can we create new systems of wealth generation and abundance? What does the future hold for banks and other financial institutions in the wake of massive peer to peer exchange? This video was created as part of Venessa Miemis’ presentation at the SIBOS Conference in Amsterdam, 25 October 2010.”

I discovered Zaana Howard and loved her exercises:

Design thinking and knowledge management: brothers from different mothers

View more presentations from Zaana Howard.

I discovered a great and oh-so-satisfying article called At the Intersections of Design, Ethnography and Global Governance

…which spoke to my desire to merge deeper ethnography (spontaneous, creative, experimental ethnography and workshopping approaches to listening) with a designers ability to make incarnate the output of cultural insights that someone like me might synthesize but with words, not objects or actions. It do us all one better to take our thinking and filter it through design thinking – add analytical thinking, creativity, and cultural sensitivity together in the soup toward the purpose of dinner on the table.

Ethnographers, if you want to be a purist, aren’t really supposed to have much of a purpose outside understanding. At least not while they’re in action. That’s ethnography in its academic form which for argument’s sake, might just be a little too much self-talk (why I didn’t follow the academic route). That’s where this article makes so much sense to me in my search for a comrade in my desire to use ethnography for making things, services, communication, connectivity, the world – more interesting and more well-suited to apparent changes going on. Combining those who think in terms of design and those that think in order to understand and get at a wider truth can be a mighty powerful partnership.

Aditya Dev Sood, the article’s author, says: “socio-cultural knowledge and insight, acquired through ethnography and filtered through any array of disciplinary frameworks from the social science and humanities, while valuable and necessary, (in some prior experiment) was also (alone) proving insufficient. This was because cultural knowledge in terms of observed behavior and practice was being presented as observed fact, rather than dynamic operational opportunity (for me, why incremental application is great). To move from local knowledge to programmatic action was still a challenge, and this is where Design could play a critical role. Perhaps Design and Cultural Research and Public Policy really do fit together, as we had demonstrated to one another in our working group.”

He goes onto to answer the question of why ethnography and design haven’t always been natural partners (which I was wondering). He talks about ethnography once used for governance in discovering new lands (outdated, imperialistic) to eventually being relegated to academia, while design came out of the industrial revolution and was about adjusting to the industrialized mechanized world but now we’re reindividuating in our decentralized world – and that’s where ethnography steps back in. He goes on to create a great mental image of the loop of these two disciplines and how they can augment and further each others goals: “the sum of Design and Anthropology can be plotted as a line that courses back and forth without creating an area, a polygon, corresponding to new value” The article is fantastic, read it here. There is, as underpinning to his argument on joining ethnographers with designers, one non-essential logic that I disagree with personally, and that is those performing cultural exploration are shy and look backward, are not forward thinking, as opposed to designers who are people who think of what could be (hence the wobbling zig zag shape of their interaction). Maybe in academia, again, a purist making notes in the wild is only looking at what is, but personally, I’m propelled to look at cultural nuance specifically because of my inner futurist’s desire to see the edge of what could be (out there in kernel form).

Women in Sustainability Part I

Chauncey Zalkin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:01:08 +0000

*Work of textile designer Marit Fujiwara, graduate of Chelsea College of Art and Design via Behance

I asked a handful of thought leaders about the top women in sustainability. Answers came from marketing expert and author of “Don’t think Pink” (Andrea Learned), the award-winning social entrepreneur and innovation strategist who launched the Creative Graduate Prize and now New Frontiers (Melissa Sterry), and an agency CEO who left it all to better the world, giving inspiring TED talks and most recently launching a plan of action in the form of ifwerantheworld.com defn worth a look (Cindy Gallop) — Here’s what they said:

First, former head of BBH NY and internationally recognized creative superstar

Cindy Gallop

1) What is your definition of sustainability?

A virtuous circle.

2) Why does it matter?

Because everything should work that way.

3) Name 1-3 women on the forefront of changes in the way we approach business and innovation?

June Cohen, TED
Rosabeth Kanter, Harvard Business School
Ursula Burns, Xerox

4) Name one sustainable product or service that you’ve come across in your research.

SHE, a fabulous example of what I’ve recommended to founder Elizabeth Scharpf which she calls Ragonomics

Elizabeth Scharpf created ingenious sanitary napkins out of banana leaves for women in Africa

Find her at cindygallop.com

Next: U.K.-based social entrepreneur extraordinaire:

Melissa Sterry

1) What is your definition of sustainability?

My definition of sustainability is an approach which acknowledges and addresses both environmental and social challenges using informed, intelligent, innovative, interdisciplinary and inspired solutions. Truly sustainable concepts are developed when the interactions between humans and their environment are fully understood. While many goods and services are labelled ‘sustainable’, ‘green’ or ‘environmentally-friendly’, in reality few actually are, some are the result of deliberate greenwashing, others are the result of a lack of research and due diligence in the design process.

The best design solutions are built on the most robust research, not off the back of cliches and assumptions. But at a time when most investors are focused on ventures that can potentially provide a quick return, significant R&D will be compromised. Until such time as the international investing community acknowledges the fact that stable and ‘sustainable’ future markets will be built engaging pioneering and at times radically innovative ideas that have been carefully crafted to meet both society’s existing and future needs, the world’s most promising sustainable innovators will find the tide is against them.

2) Why does it matter?

It matters because if we don’t act now and act to the very best of our ability, our species may not walk this Earth by 2150. (read the rest of Melissa’s passionate and articulate answer after the jump.)

3) Name 1-3 women on the forefront of this issue?

Naming just one or two is difficult but three inspirational women from the UK are:

1.) Multidisciplinary scientist Dr. Rachel Armstrong , a senior research fellow at University College London exploring the potential of living architecture and self-repairing buildings with their own metabolisms

2.) Joanna Yarrow, one of the UK’s most senior green living experts and a presenter, broadcaster, journalist, writer and founder of sustainability consultancy Beyond Green.

Joanna Yarrow

3.) Servane Mouazan – founder of Ogunte – the UK’s foremost organization for women leading the Social Economy.

All three are working hard to develop a blueprint for a sustainable society – all thinkers and doers with the creativity, commitment and courage to throw out the rulebook and set out on a journey to find the new frontiers. Often facing adversity and opposition to their ideas, these three women innovate their way around the obstacles, no matter how overwhelming or great they may be.

4) An insight on the future and advice for the female creative entrepreneur.

My insight – the future isn’t going to be easy, whichever way you look at it, the challenges are enormous. My advice – never under-estimate the value of the role you have to play in creating a better future.

5) One sustainable product or service you love or that caught your eye

The Aptera epitomizes what sustainable innovation is all about. The Aptera is uber efficient – achieving 300 miles or more to the gallon through minimized air resistance and drag, as a result of having a bullet-shaped body and three wheels, not four. The vehicle has interior and exterior LED lighting and a solar assisted climate control system. The Aptera also features recycled materials and comes in both electric and hybrid versions, achieving a top speed of 90mph and 0-60 in around 10 seconds. While it’s the most sustainable vehicle coming to market in the foreseeable future, it’s founders have pledged to continuously improve the sustainability of the vehicle as more innovations become available to them. Beyond it’s environmental credentials the vehicle is iconically beautiful and a design classic destined for the history books. My only regret about The Aptera is I wont be able to drive one in the UK any time soon.

Find Melissa Sterry at About Me.

Next Expert in Female Insights and Marketing:

Andrea Learned

1) What is your definition of sustainability?

To pursue a state of life/work in ways that mean what you do now will flourish and develop without taking away the resources that others, in future generations, will need to do the same. I love the awareness raised by something Paul Hawken wrote – there is a difference between “growing” and “developing.” Developing/development is the sustainable approach.

2) Why does it matter?

It matters because we’ve hit a brick wall – the perfect storm of bad economy, huge environmental problems due to waste of resources, and an emerging more relational, less linear (all about me) way of thinking by citizens. People are starting to face the facts that endless growth and consumerism for the sake of it doesn’t really feed and nourish our daily lives – and greatly harms the environment. If it continues, we will actually leave hugely negative effects for our children and grandchildren to deal with. Now – that’s a realization to contend with!

3) Women on the forefront:

Eileen Fisher – Fisher and the women’s apparel company she launched in 1984 have been successfully (and fairly quietly) operating with a sustainable approach. The materials and supply chains used in manufacturing her clothing and the way the company treats employees and contributes more broadly to women’s empowerment has become what I’d call “best practices” long before “sustainable” or “socially responsible” were trendy terms.

Joyce LaValle – Some have heard or read about Ray C. Anderson, CEO of Interface Inc., and his evolution toward sustainability (he is now considered a pioneer in the “movement”). LaValle is the former Senior Vice President of that company and is credited for originally inspiring Anderson’s vision on the topic. She also co-founded the Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future, which should get more notice (in my opinion) because it brings sustainability thought leaders and best cases to light so conventional businesses might learn (and it is not just about and “for women”).

Kira Gould – By way of the interviews conducted and synthesized in Women in Green, the book she co-authored with Lance Hosey, Gould’s influence has been key in my personal move to study and promote the concepts of sustainable business development. She is an architect and the director of communications for McDonough + Partners (founded by another quite recognized sustainability pioneer/author, Bill McDonough).

4) An insight on the future and advice for the female creative entrepreneur

Businesses can do well and still “do good” with regard to people, planet and profit – the oft-mentioned socially responsible, “triple bottom line.” The future is already here in that consumers have become very savvy and are much more intentional/deliberate in their buying. Businesses, however, have been slow to catch on to that. So, entrepreneurs that authentically believe and commit to the journey toward more sustainable business practices – in materials, supply chain, human resources, community support, energy use and so on – will have a significant advantage. Women, in particular, have a natural tendency toward a more holistic perspective. “Just business” really doesn’t exist, because they naturally know there’s a lot more to it.

Find Andrea at http://www.learnedon.com/

Continuation of Melissa Sterry’s answer on ‘why it matters’:

Professor John Beddington – Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Government, summed up the situation when he said we are facing ‘The Perfect Storm’. Dr. Richard Leakey – one of the world’s foremost experts on mass extinction events, said of the environmental challenges facing humankind that it would be complacement to assume that humans are not on the ‘extinction list’. We are currently in the midst of a man-made worldwide mass extinction event, having already destroyed an estimated 1/3 of all biodiversity on Earth since 1970 (source WWF).

It took 65 million years for the planet to recover from the last mass extinction event, yet within one generation humans have put such strain on the world’s ecosystems that many are starting to collapse, some possibly beyond the point at which they could ever fully recover. Simultaneously the world’s natural resources are fast dwindling, as many in the west consume several times the level of resources that our planet can sustain – the average American citizen consumes so much that if everyone on the planet did the same it would take 5 Earth’s to supply the natural resources required to meet the level of consumption.

An estimated one in three in people on the planet live on or below the poverty line. The governments of developing world nations, such as China, understandably want to improve the living conditions for their citizens and those nations that can, are developing their infrastructures and economies to try and ensure that they eradicate poverty within one generation. Additionally, the world’s population is fast rising and, assuming no major multinational disaster occurs, such as the outbreak of a life-threatening pandemic for which there was no cure, or a super volcanic eruption, or an asteroid impact, we can expect to hit a global population of 10 billion or so by 2050. Somehow humankind has to make a lot less go a lot further, because if we cannot achieve this, in coming decades we will see suffering on a scale not yet witnessed in human history. Many of the basic commodities which we rely on to exit and which we take for granted are either running out or in increasingly short supply – there isn’t enough to go round. It’s life or death for humankind and for many other species at our mercy.

What Women Bring to the Table: Designers, Artists, Thinkers, & Inventors to Start the Week

Chauncey Zalkin — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:46:48 +0000

Ideas and Design on my radar right now. An eclectic bunch.

Cutaway vase by Polish designer Edyta Cieloch

Dr. Afsaneh Rabiei of Iran, awarded a CAREER award in 2003 by the National Science Foundation, is the inventor of a new tough metal foam material that will have a huge impact on life saving devices such as car bumpers. “inserting two pieces of her composite metal foam behind the bumper of a car traveling 28 mph, the impact would feel the same to passengers as impact traveling at only 5 mph”-LiveScience.com

Swedish designers Sofia Lagerkvist, Anna Lindgren and Charlotte von der Lancken make up “Front Design” on StylePark.com (and everywhere else!)

Capsters: Dutch designer Cindy Van Den Bremen invented an elastic flexible sports hijab that guards against harsh noises. The product, approved by an Imam and now with worldwide sales, addresses complex aesthetic, social, and religious issues where they intersect in the real world.

Lynn Jackson’s art on Mocoloco

Yin Xiuzhen. Portable City: Melbourne, 2009 from her “Portable Cities” series on Space & Culture.org

Frog Design’s blog posting on how James Cameron and Steve Jobs vision of the future might not be the best or most cutting edge citing articles by Annalee Newitz (below)

Dr. Annalee Newitz of Technosploitation and now of Gawker Media’s io9.com. An academic-cum-journalist, she writes kick ass cultural criticism like “When Are White People Going to Stop Making Movies Like Avatar” quoted on the Frog Design blog.

Frozen Lamp from Frozen series by Wieki Somers of Rotterdam. Also love her “mattress stone.”

Ethnography: Immersive, Dynamic, and Unscripted

Chauncey Zalkin — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 16:58:40 +0000

Image by Swedish Illustrator, Linn Olofsdotter

Some of you are curious about the foundation of what I do aside from my passion for innovation and writing about women who create. I’m an ethnographer. I was an ethnographer long before I even knew the term. When I ended up in advertising, I would get frustrated with highly regimented approaches to understanding consumers (people basically, consumers makes me think of lever pulling and manipulation which I am dead set against).

I have always approached insights and strategy/concept building with honest, open curiousity and interest – and I’d like to think a strong dose of savvy from weaving in and out of different social and cultural situations. I studied Cultural Studies and Semiotics in school and then attended the school of life where I set out to find the patterns and rhythms of New York City’s inhabitants. Then I went deeper. And I went broader as I worked with diverse clients with subtle nuances and micro-cultures that required abandoning all preconceptions. (and moved country. twice.)

The basic questions that make this work worthwhile are: What do people want and need? How can we make manifest products and services that will make lives better/easier/more pleasant/more connected? How can we bring ideas and the narrative of business’ social role to life in ways that matter and are sustainable? How can we add instead of take away, drain, deplete? And how can we surprise?

I gave a one day workshop hosted by a consulting firm in Barcelona called Brain Ventures. Antonio Monerris, the partner in the firm who approached me about the project, is just one of those people on this earth that keeps growing, evolving, learning, always with an open mind and an eye on the future. Among those present were representatives from Pan Rico (bread), Gallina Blanca (soups), and Chup Chups (candy). Here’s the gist of the presentation part.

Ethno One Day Workshop

View more documents from Chauncey Zalkin.

‘Ethno day’ can also work in two to three day workshops where we roll up our sleeves and go deep into your brand/product/service/business model – not just looking at the consumers but the folks that make up your company. That’s where the real work begins.

If’ you’d like to know more, contact me and check out the ‘about’ section. Here’s the slide show from the Ethno One Day Workshop. Enjoy!

Definition of a Designer-Maker + 11 Things To Love

Chauncey Zalkin — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 09:44:38 +0000

from ffffound, work of Roland Tiang Co

The apt definition of designer-maker given on the hidden art website is worth repeating here:

“Designer-Makers design and make their own unique work, on a small or large scale. Hidden Art promotes and supports designer-makers who design and make functional items in three main categories:

Designer-Makers who produce hand-made items. For example, a potter whose work does not involve mass production.
Designer-Makers who design and then in some or all instances sub-contract out the turning of the design into a product. They may oversee the making of the product, but they do not produce it themselves.
Designer-Makers most possibly with a degree in product design, who develop a new design or concept, and then look for a manufacturer to produce it. Their ultimate aim is to become a pure designer and they themselves do not ‘make’ their designs into tangible products.”

Marie Langaa - teapot cast from textile. Doorknob handle. Danish Crafts on DesignBoom

Here are some things that I’ve run across and twittered about but haven’t had time, preparing and presenting my ethnography seminar and now my trip tomorrow to London to confront the onslaught of design euphoria, to share — but as I make way for more, here I give you a “check it out” rundown of all I’ve starred over the past weeks.

Narrative Identities by Nadia Troeman, on dezeen.com. She’s created a color wheel identity and branding system that shifts and changes based on the culture of the student body. She’s a graduate student at Central Saint Martins.
A retrospective of the work of Croatian artist Sanja Ivekovi.
The Cardinal Club. Somehow eating in the private backyard of someone’s East Village apartment seems like the freshest idea. Not about a woman maker but, well, partly. Caitlin Zaino reports.
Supermarket Sarah, creative female entrepreneur. Like the Cardinal Club she’s opened up her home, a welcome respite from the maddening crowds of overwrought luxury stores and fast fashion stampedes. She moves between her Portobello Market stall and her home as Swiss Miss reports, “offering teas and cakes” to shoppers of her eclectic collection.
Repurpose. Weed through Margo‘s slapdash crafts page to find some real gems and inspiration. I can see someone re-imagining, for example, some of her work with china wreaths and swags.
Paula Wallace, president and co-founder of Savannah College of Art and Design, guestblogging for Fast Company.
A piece on the Women’s Monument in Memory. Female Victims of Political Repression, Santiago, Chile.
PIG 05049

Christien Meindertsma’s book of photographs shows the path of a pig from the day it is slaughtered to all of its disparate uses – and it is the first ever communication design entry to be a finalist at the INDEX:DESIGN awards.
Jean Madden’s beds for the homeless, Street Swags, won the Index:Design award. ‘design to improve life.’
Lisa Maria Grillos bike bags write up in the New York Times, a feature entitled Plan B about businesses after the pink slip, reminds me of when I was similarly featured in a Daily News article entitled “Meet New York’s Newest Entrepreneurs” after 9/11. My ‘dog hoodies’ and I pictured big on the front. While my hoodies were indeed cute, a big hit, and told the story of my 2003, it takes a lasting passion for a product and its trajectory from homemade to a full fledged large scale distribution channel to make it work. For me, hoodies weren’t my longtime passion but I had a fun run. Maris Grillos bike bags show keen insight into a problem and if she can and has the desire to grow big without compromise, she may have more than what the Times calls ‘accidental entrepreneurship’ on her hands.
Miranda July, filmmaker, writer, installation artist of sorts, and now… pillows!
-Chauncey Zalkin

18 Predictions For The Future To Live By Now

Chauncey Zalkin — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 10:24:01 +0000

The intelligent craftsperson is the visual world’s thought leader.
A challenge to the primacy of traditional currency – a resurgence and innovation in barter.
The most useful and most simple exchange of goods and service wins.
Learning how to continue to trade, create value and be compensated in the face of the creative commons shift. People will not pay for things they can get for free therefore creativity that is spreadable through the ether (music, movies) must find a new way to be supported, through networks of supporters. The contract will be implicit. Just not sure yet how.
Living life as a combination of your online identity and brand and your offline interactions, enriching both through the recording and refining of both to its bare essence of what matters most to us.
Consumers are empowered with increasing control over the shaping of the things they surround themselves with. Products we consume must be refined to their ultimate utility. The consumer is too savvy and stretched too thin to tolerate poor design and unnecessary steps in service. New creative challenges result in more innovation in design, higher mental processes up the ante, more inventions result and inventions that matter, that speak to our current concerns of climate, sustainability, environment, crowded spaces, creating more time for our hurried society to enjoy life.
Remember that sustain means creating something that allows us to stay on this planet longer, to enrich future cycles in the life of a thing, allow for continuous improvement, continued harmony.
As technology is further and further integrated into our mobile lives we will become untethered to our computers again and our interactions will exist in a third space, now forming.
As more exciting innovative materials are being created and light sources are redefined and evolved, the raw organic materials from metal to wood to vegetal fabrics will be prized and cherished and treated with respect. Nature the new ‘love mark’.
Finding ways for us to live for a common good instead of an increasingly alienating individualistic and ephemeral satisfaction. Individualism will be more and more about satisfying both social and common needs and finding time and space to recharge. Rampant selfishness and egoism is now subsiding.
The end of the traditional fashion magazine. A centralized authority defining what we should love, follow, wear, is falling to the wayside as more diverse voices share the stage and fashion moves so quickly as to be as unremarkable as yesterday’s lunch special.
Design is integrated into utility. Design means organization of principles. Ordering. Prioritizing. We will have to take the most time and care at this stage because competition is fierce. Homogeneity is a constant threat. And for the process to be invisible, it must be thoughtfully considered beforehand.
Simplicity is king but that doesn’t mean dull.
Scent and color become design elements.
Everything has a purpose but that purpose might be visceral, might be emotive. We have to listen to culture and hear the shifts.
We must stop saying ‘consumer’ and say ‘people’ ‘person’ ‘citizen’. As marketers and developers, we are on the same side. We must not work to ‘trick’ people into buying. We must respect their needs and serve up the best solution, the best most enjoyable experience or product.
Create whimsy. Create pleasure. Get people to think. Promote expansiveness. Promote progress. Promote sharing.
Time is a luxury. Time will be a currency. We will ‘pay’ in order to have more time.

An agency in Barcelona asked me what I thought about the future and this is how I answered in an email. It came off the cuff and still holds true for me more than a year later.

-Chauncey Zalkin

What Women Make » Innovation

3 Female Design Students Who Shake The Kitchen Loose: Household Appliances of the Future

Electrolux 2011 Competition Female Finalists

(1)

(2)

(3)

Related posts...

Recipe for Business Opportunity: Include the Practitioners — Ethnography at work for Innovation

‘The Constellation’ I talk about in this blog post calls for a shift in approach

A Shift In Approach #1

A Shift In Approach #2

Recipe – the Secret Sauce

Tools & Tenets

In a Nutshell

Stuff I Like to Do or Lead

Also Incorporate

Related posts...

Great Presentations

I discovered Venessa Miemis:

I discovered Zaana Howard and loved her exercises:

I discovered a great and oh-so-satisfying article called At the Intersections of Design, Ethnography and Global Governance

Related posts...

Women in Sustainability Part I

*Work of textile designer Marit Fujiwara, graduate of Chelsea College of Art and Design via Behance

Cindy Gallop

Melissa Sterry

Andrea Learned

Continuation of Melissa Sterry’s answer on ‘why it matters’:

Related posts...

What Women Bring to the Table: Designers, Artists, Thinkers, & Inventors to Start the Week

Related posts...

Ethnography: Immersive, Dynamic, and Unscripted

Image by Swedish Illustrator, Linn Olofsdotter

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