designswarm thoughts

Some great progress lately on the Good Night Lamp, go check out the new site with some more details and new fab images.

A reason for the update: yours truly might appear in the Annual design review of Surface magazine this fall. Yes, old media! I’m excited nonetheless.

Must be the weather. I’ve changed the blurb on my website for the first time since I started freelancing.

Before:

This is the online portfolio of Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino, freelance interaction designer. I am interested in the way service design ties product design and interaction design together to create meaningful experiences for people both in the virtual and tangible worlds.

After:

This is the online portfolio of Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino, industrial and interaction designer. She designs technology-enabled and socially-aware creative solutions to problems. From product design, service-based experiences, mobile-based interactions as well as play experiences, what binds her work is a holistic approach to problems, a keen interest in the user and collaborations with partners and clients from around the world. She now freelances in London, UK.

I like it, what do you think?

Update: ok here’s the final version in light of comments :)
This is the online portfolio of Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino, industrial and interaction designer. She designs technology-enabled and socially-aware creative solutions to problems. She takes a holistic approach to problems, a keen interest in the user and collaborates with partners and clients from around the world. She now freelances in London, UK.

I’ve had the pleasure in the past few years of working on a number of great projects with some fabulous people but The Hungries really does hold a special place in my heart. This is why I’m glad to say we‘ve finally launched the website and are looking into making these wonderful creatures more than just a prototype. Can’t say much more at the moment but go and check it out!

Quick update on something else that keeps me busy :)

I’m really happy to announce that Topoware will be part of Designboom’s “Handled with care” exhibition as part of the London Design Festival, hosted by designersblock in Shoreditch.

Additionally, it is being featured in the Stanford-based design magazine Ambidextrous 7: Food.
Download the article here (pdf)

Karola and I are looking into selling the china collection as of September, so stay tuned!

Update: Thanks to Mark from Experientia for featuring Topoware on core77.

Ben often says I speak “europanto”, that has its disadvantages too.

Got a lovely email from Barbara at Vonen highlighting the fact that I often make spelling mistakes in this blog (”its/it’s” in a sentence, etc.) I’d like to apologize to my readers for that. I never did learn English grammar properly (learnt it in an American school in Kuwait at age 5 for 2 years before moving back to Paris for 14 years and picking it up again in Saudi Arabia) and my mother tongue being French, I think it sometimes takes over some of my sentence structure and writing. Will try to do better…

Sorry about the lack of news, but I’m in the middle of the Hardcore Hardware Hacking weekend I’ve put together for tinker.it. Lots of fun! Wish you were here!

Unbelievable but true, I have now settled in London permanently. After an exciting month catching up with the Montreal crowd and working on “Looking for Design” I have come to appreciate immensely coming back to the cut-throat beat of this city. Montreal shares the same mellow beat as Amsterdam but for this girl, it simply won’t do. I’m too much of a procrastinator already :)

So now I have to figure out how to live in the greatest and most expensive city in the world while keeping myself sane with insane amounts of projects and work…hmm promising set of constraints.

So if you’re looking for a freelance interaction/smart-products/blogger/web2.0/strategic/ohmygawdshessohollistic/ designer, what a coincidence, i’m looking for work! :P

You can always contact me at alex care of designswarm and if you’re not interested, well forward it to someone who might! we all have friends ;)

(yes i’m authorised to work in the UK)

While I look for new opportunities, i’m keeping myself busy by being digital webmistress and agent to Karola Torkos (im diving into Drupal for this one at the moment, ouch), organising a super hardware hacking weekend for Tinker.it , trying to find a way to do a small production of Topoware and juggling with a mobile application idea i had a few months ago that could run well as an add-on to Dopplr users.

Not enough hours in the day.

Not surprisingly, answers to my call for feedback about design in Montreal haven’t been pouring in so it was greatly refreshing to hear from Mike Giles at Furnicreations. He was lovely enough to talk to me about some of the great and more difficult things about working as a designer in Montreal.

1. Thank you Mike for speaking with me, could you describe yourself and Furni’s work briefly?

Furni started about 4 years ago as a partnership between Devin Barrette and myself, I like to think that I have the ideas and Devin makes them a reality. Devin’s the one with formal cabinetmaking training, I’m just a student of the school of life. Over the past year and a half Furni has released two collections of limited edition, hand made, design driven home “accents” and slowly but surely is starting to get recognized on the international design circuit”

2. How long have you been working professionally in Montreal ?

Furni’s been around as a custom woodworking shop for about 4 years but we’ve only been offering “in-house” designs to the general public for about 18 months…..

3. Do you have any event or anecdote that is representative of your experience working in Montreal?

Working in Montreal is funny, we’ve got stores that carry our products in as far away places as Australia and Taiwan but only two stores in town who carry our designs….I guess Montreal is a tough cookie to crack.

4. Do you consider design to be well understood in Montreal?

I believe it’s well understood, there are tons of stylish restaurants, bars and boutique hotels but there is still only a small market of people who are actually buying design driven products.

5. In your opinion, what key designers have shaped the design scene in Montreal?

I apologize for my ignorance, but we spend so much time in the workshop that I am unable to follow much of Montreal design….. I’ve been exposed to some work by Doyon and Rivest and I also like the collective called “RITA” who are doing some really interesting stuff.

6. What is missing from the Montreal design scene?

Exposure and boutiques and people who are willing to spend money on design driven articles!!!

7. What would you say is the hardest thing about working in design in Montreal?
The fact that there are very few outlets for our work.

8. What would you say is the best thing about working in design in Montreal?

That I am inspired by it’s architecture and aesthetics everyday (just take a ride on the metro or go to Ile St-Helene!)

9. Where do the opportunities lie for the future of design in Montreal?

Things can only go up, I’ve been noticing small design articles in the local weekly’s over the past few months and great sites like Créativité Montréal seem to be popping up more frequently…

10. If you had the choice to work somewhere else, where would it be?

I just got back from a trip to England so London is on top of my list right now, of course New York is high ranking also, and I’ve always had a thing for San Francisco…..but the grass is always greener….

I’ll be speaking tonight at Montreal’s very own Pecha Kucha about my Good Night Lamp project, how it came about, where it’s at now, and why on earth it’s still not out there!

Update: Here are the slides from that night’s presentation. Enjoy!

In my spare time (ha!) I’ve been helping put together a Hardcore Hardware Hacking workshop. On the weekend of the 21-22 of July, 15 hardware hackers will get to have fun with Massimo Banzi and Matt Biddulph, who will do demos and hand out cool toys with which to hack! We’ll do an open presentation on the sunday of all the projects.

All details HERE.

Spread the word!

I had the pleasure of meeting very briefly Boris Anthony at Xtech in Paris. He’s an interaction designer working and living in Montreal and these days is organising the local edition of Pecha Kucha. I think he feels, like me that there must be more to design that what we are made to believe or to see.

I hope I get a chance to speak to him more about this soon. In anycase I’ll be there, presenting the Good Night Lamp project which is slowly but surely, being put together. Hope to see you there!

As I walked back from breakfast at Café Eldorado, (I could have sworn there was another nice breakfast place on Mont-Royal), I walked past Le Point-Vert on St-Laurent and figured I would start my search for everything design in Montreal by buying Design Lines a so called “Ultimate guide to design in the city”.

It was fascinated to see that by design, of course what they meant was (and this is on the front cover so i’m not exaggerating here) shops, bars, restaurants, galleries and architecture. Notice anything? They are talking about places, showrooms, not actual projects or content. I was curious as to why that was. Isn’t there anything interesting going on here?

Most of what I found were either buildings (more architecture, and let’s be clear I love that field, but is that all we have?) or, lots of furniture manufacturers / stores, shops that sell other people’s stuff (mostly italian design of course). Once in a while you’d notice “more recently, he’s opened his first office in London”, or “he now lives between New York and London”. Then all throughout the different articles, there would be a constant mention of international designers whose work would be on display: “from the five continents”.

The only highlight of this booklet was a slim 5 page article on “My space”, local designers describing their favorite spots in town. At last, local stuff! Who were they?

1. Stéphanie Cardinal of Huma design+architecture
2. Anouk Pennel & Raphael Daudelin for Studio Feed
3. Gilles Saucier for Saucier & Perrotte, architects
4. Erratum designers Frédéric Galliot & Vincent Hauspy (2 former classmates hurrah!)
5. Axel Morgenthaler , lighting designer ( a former guest for one of my undergrad thesis presentations)

So some of them were architects, some unfindable on Google and some I personally already met. Slim pickings considering how many people graduate from a “design course” each year. Makes you wonder, where do they all end up?

As I wandered back slowly downtown, pondering all of this, I thought I’d drop by the latest Montreal pride: it’s national library. Like Mitterand’s it has it’s problems. This one loses it’s windows apparently…so much for architecture.

Other than that it’s a lovely airy building with a hell of a lot of people wandering in it’s aisles. You’d swear people never heard of the internet ;)
I walked up 2 floors to their arts section to flip through some design books. Imagine my surprise when I realised that there wasn’t a design section! Architecture, Painting, Urban design, etc… no design, theory of design, industrial design, nothing!

I thought that was really a testament to how much has to be done still to educate the public to the value of design as a field, not some sticker you can put on anything and everything that looks pretty or is “hesselig” as the dutch would say.

Indeed a strange task i have chosen for the month.

So I’m back in Montreal after 3 years and nothing seems to have changed. I’d like to be proven wrong though. I am really amazed that whenever we speak of design here, what shows up is either related to urban design, architecture or interior design. Where is everything else? Certainly not listed on the pathetic site of the Institut de Design de Montreal which is getting more and more flash-y and less and less usable for anyone in the industry.

A quick overview of last month’s “portes ouvertes” of Montreal designers is a testament to this lack of variety:

- architecture and urban design firms (24)
- graphic design firms (10)
- interior design firms (4)
- product design (4)
- fashion design (2)
- museum installation design (1)

This is to say the least, pathetic.

No interactive projects, no photography, no wacky stuff, no multi-disciplinary labs, independent small time product designers. The Internet hello? Multi-media stuff, internet of things, mobile, anyone? Where are they hiding? Where is creativity being channeled? What are the hundreds of designers graduating every year doing now? Where are they showing their work? What are they working on? How is the design industry doing? What are the roadblocks? What is this thing people here call “design”?

Whenever anyone asks me “why don’t you work here”, well I usually answer “there’s no work and too much education to do”. Why does that always sound like I’m being a traitor? Why do I feel I’m wrong but have nothing to prove it?

So I thought I’d put my money where my mouth is and try to spend the next month meeting people I already know, reporting from the frontiers, walking around the city, looking for design. You will of course be able to read all about it here dear reader :) I might even make a special section for it! (woohoo an excuse to use the page function on my blog).

I’m dying to understand.

So I you know of anyone who would like to speak to me about this or you know of people I should go meet, places I should go see, PLEASE contact me!

Had a great time at Xtech on monday and basically tweaked my talk in light of the great things I had seen at Designmai. I talked about product design, how designers see objects and how that influences how the future “internet of things” will be designed.

So you can download the pdf of my slides here (2,1 MB). Enjoy!

Caved in to popular demand and have put it on Slideshare. You can still download it though : )

New: Vie the talk on blip.tv. Thanks Ian.

As I prepare my talk for next week’s Xtech in Paris, frantically trying to read the books that got delivered too late, I wonder about the people who do the conference circuit and have to give talks every other week. I think, from what I’ve seen and heard, that there are 2 types of speakers who work very differently on their talks:

1. The gardener: Matt is a good example of someone who starts off talking about a subject on a smaller scale and slowly adjusts it and adds content as time goes by.

2. The improviser: Bruce Sterling would be the prime example here of someone who masters their material extremely well. He flavors it differently picking up some things for a certain type of audience and shaping it to make it relevant to them. I’ve seen him speak twice and seen a number of videos of his talks and it’s always quite impressive.

So there, this is my first proper conference talk, and I am quite nervous, especially since i’m addressing the main subject of Ubicomp in a very different way. Hopefully I’ll try to string together the things that interest me the most about ubiquitous computing, the internet as a product designer and what this means for our cultural perception of the material world. More on that very soon I promise : )