“There’s an Alfred North Whitehead quote that he said: “Sometimes I give a student an A or B instead of a C or a D because they’ll earn it 20 years from now.” A good teacher will lodge education in a student’s mind that may not bear fruit for 10, 15 years.” - Quote by Hollis Robin
Read More“It’s only through this exposure that you can learn how wrong most of your intuitions are and preconceptions are. I can tell it to them till they are blue in the face to not let themselves be guided by what seems obvious to them. But until they’ve confronted what they think is obvious to something entirely different, then it’s not clear.” - Esther Duflo
Read MoreI wanted to wrestle because I discovered that my dad was a wrestler. My dad is a bit of a black box, so when I learned that he wrestled, I joined the wrestling team. There’s probably some psychological explanation for my decision. My hunch is that I wanted to connect with my dad (especially after I quit baseball). But, this isn’t about why I started to wrestle, it’s about quitting.
Read MoreI confided in a dear friend and fellow designer recently about how I get a weird feeling in my stomach when a potential client emails or calls me. I’m never excited. I compare it to how I felt playing baseball as a teenager. The older I got, the more I dreaded playing baseball. Before games, I would pray for a rain out. I didn’t enjoy the game and it didn’t help that I was terribly afraid of getting hit by a pitch, or a line drive. For my teammates, it all seemed to come naturally. For me, I would have rather stayed home and played Final Fantasy IV.
Read MoreThere are lots of reasons why the Segway failed. Many people have written about it extensively. I liked what Alain Bertaud shared in his “Conversations with Tyler” interview. He compares scooters to the Segway and reveals how the former fits his needs much better than the latter. It’s a case of user-centered design. The scooters meet user needs, while the Segway is still looking for a problem to solve.
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My latest new hobby is to run on the treadmill while listening to the podcast Conversations with Tyler. The activity is both physically and mentally refreshing. Cowen’s podcast lets me be a fly on the wall during his interviews with brilliant people from diverse backdrops and disciplines. Most of the time, I have no idea what they’re talking about, but I think the exposure is valuable nonetheless.
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It's the beginning of the year (early January 2020); I have a sinking feeling in my stomach. I have this notion that after taking an extensive Christmas break (two weeks), I need to occupy every second of my workday with billable activities. How else will the mortgage get paid? Uneasiness rose this morning as I wrote a monthly update for Trischler Design Co. Was I using up time that won't produce an economic return? It was serendipitous timing then that I decided to start reading an interview with Jenny Odell in the latest issue of Offscreen. She's the author of a book called How To Do Nothing.
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2019 was a great year. Here are a few highlights.
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Research is hard. That’s what I’m learning as I simultaneously teach a lecture about design research and take a class about design research this semester (fall 2019) at the University of Cincinnati, DAAP. Why is research so hard? Because even though there are hundreds of six-step research (and design) models out there, the path to success is anything but linear.
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The folks at Lads Entertainment group asked Trischler Design Co. to design a new website for their flagship restaurant, The Littlefield. We first worked with Lads on the visual identities for Branch and Night Drop, their most recent restaurants. Unlike that project, The Littlefield website project did not involve an identity update. The purpose was to build a website that the staff can easily update and also to make it accessible to a wide range of guests (generation Z to silents). Their previous website was both challenging to update and confusing to navigate.
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Technologies like the internet disrupt industries through the decentralization of information. Is the same true for religious institutions? That is a question I had in mind when I began my first assignment in Research Methods at the University of Cincinnati’s MDes program at DAAP. We were tasked with interviewing several members from different generations of our family about a topic of our choice so that we may discover associations across the participants. My subject was Catholicism (my family’s faith tradition) and how it has or has not been influenced by technologies across different generations.
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How can I ask my students to do something (write a code of ethics) that I hadn't done myself? That question led me to my first take on a code of ethics that is written below. I decided to keep my set simple. It's three points. They're each inspired by Jesus' temptations by the Devil in the desert. Before you discount that source, think about it. It doesn't matter whether or not you believe in the carpenter.
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Cincyflags’ purpose was to design a flag for every neighborhood in Cincinnati. All 52 flags were revealed and displayed on Friday, September 27th, at Findlay Market. Each flag is open source and available for locals to use them as they wish. Learn more about your neighborhood’s flag at cincyflags.com.
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Ethics. That was the resounding theme of The Design of Business | The Business of Design conference at MIT this past weekend. It was also what attracted me to the event (beyond rubbing shoulders with my favorite living creatives).
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Breakthrough Cincinnati is one of my favorite local non-profits. Beyond their incredible work with teenagers, I love that they're willing to spend time upfront on discovery processes before jumping hastily into design. We began our partnership two years ago with a workshop, and each year, we try different approaches to finding inspiration for design and communications. This year, we began by interviewing donors to better understand what inspires them to invest.
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For the first installment of Process Out Loud, I interviewed my friend Emily Hill. Emily recently earned her Ph.D. from the University of Aberdeen, where she wrote her dissertation on perils of marketing as it relates to the Church. Emily and I often find ourselves in conversations related to theology, branding, marketing, research, and design. I felt the desire to share the ideas of our discussions because, as you will read, most people are totally unaware of how brands influence them. Likewise, designers, like me, are often unaware of the influence we have on others through the brands we create. While I'm still left with questions after chatting with Emily, I think those questions will influence my approach to design and branding for the better. I hope you enjoy our conversation.
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This month, Katie Parker, a fellow DAAP professor, asked me to share with her Professional Practices class what it's like running an independent design business. I took the opportunity to share the practical, non-sexy, advice I wish someone gave me before I started my business.
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Whether you consider yourself religious or not, you’re likely familiar with these words from the Gospel of John in the Bible. It's a form of the creation story. Beyond religious belief, I consider this a description of the design process because I believe that words drive design. More specifically, words drive effective design.
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Trischler Design Co. calls The Northside Depot home. While I’ll often work from my house, it’s helpful to have a separation between my house and work, by setting up at the Depot. I also get to work alongside talented creatives and thinkers who on multiple occasions, have helped me over hurdles on projects. Another perk is that the space is absolutely beautiful and much more professional for meetings and workshops than my house. All that to say, it’s a cool spot with great people, and I want more people to know about it.
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We've been working with MMC, a company focused on disrupting complacent sales and marketing practices, since February 2019. We collaborated with the MMC in-house team, along with consultation by VSA Partners, to launch phase one of mmcweb.com treated with the refreshed messaging and design.
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