Designers are trained to embrace chaos and complexity, to hold multiple and often competing ideas in their heads at one time, to be flexible and nimble in the face of changing constraints, and most importantly, to visualize concepts, systems and services that don’t yet exist. Designers tell stories about how the future ought to be. — Jon Kolko

Design is the ability to be able to zoom-out and see a macro-vision of the system, and maybe even the system within the system. It’s like focussing on everything at once, gazing into chaos and let your eyes wander to catch the patterns that will start poping up. Design is the practice of problem-solving and creating new alternatives for existing requests/demands/needs/issues. So designing something and being system agnostic, or culture agnostic can be problematic because it can a) lead you and your team to failure after a long hard bumpy road and can be expensive, or b) dispose of an entire process of design that was disconnected of the actual system, ecosystem, environment where it will naturally be.

There aren’t any rules that can be followed as rules are made to be bent and broken. Below I suggest 7 principles.

The 7 principles of responsible design:

1. Tame your inner critic
2. Make something early on
3. Understand the big picture
4. Visualize the system
5. Know the risks involved
6. Come up with the solution (even if not very “edgy” or “different”, or “new” or “hip”)
7. Connect with the network (Things belong together and are inter-connected)

These are the principles I try to follow. I do not hold the ultimate truth. This works for me. I know this sounds like a disclaimer I will end it right away.

Employers are demanding a workforce that can engage with complicated, ill-formed problems. Executives want individual contributors that can embrace volatility and unpredictability, while crafting narratives of the future. Brands are realizing success when they try to empathize with—rather than understand—their customers. This—not the production of beautiful things—is what designers do best, and it is the value they bring to organizations. Producing stunning creative output it only a tiny part of what it means to be a designer, yet aesthetics continue to be the only part that we herald as valuable. But it’s these other skills—empathizing, systems thinking, storytelling—that describe a successful career in design. — Jon Kolko

Thinking.

To think one needs space. You cannot start thinking about thinking or it will not happen. Just think. Action happens when the mind is directed to it, as opposed to when the mind is directed in observing it. The systems are hard to see because not only are they invisible, but they are omnipresent and to be able to function efficiently we trained our minds to take them for granted, erase their presence and make their impact as common sense “Nothin’ we can do” as possible. We use our minds to create a comfortable situation that allows us to focus on smaller details that can generate our revenue. It’s a survival fact. In order to survive, many of us must work. To be able to focus on work, our mind blurs out the massive complicated chaotic chaos that is our world so we can zoom-in and finish what we started. It is the tilt-shift view. But when hired as a designer, we are often finding ourselves gazing into the vast complicated chaos with a slightly uncomfortable feeling of dizziness and vertigo and we try mapping it. As accurately as possible. So we can begin to understand the impact of our design on it and from it. And we practice this action, we look like we are thinking.

Drawing knowledge.

The ability to sketch and communicate a simple thought, or concept, or poem, or an idea is in itself and art form. Designers aren’t often allowed to be artists. When I was studying in Paris 14 years ago (OMG! 14 years ago!) at a wonderful little independent art school training people to become designers (applied-arts), we were drawing all day long. We weren’t allowed to use a computer, we had to do everything by hand, and we had to train our hand to imitate the precision a computer could execute. We all found this ridiculous and annoying. I wasn’t very good at imitating the computer. I preferred embracing the irregularities and the imperfections of drawing, as to me that seemed more authentic to what the world resembles. But of course, as a future designer, they had to train us for perfection. And we suffered deeply from it. Perfection is banal. Better asymmetry and irregularity.

“Leaving something incomplete makes it interesting and gives one the feeling that there is room for growth.” — Kenko

So sketch. Sketch like no one is watching. And continue to practice the act of sketching. Because the most important thing is not the aesthetic of your sketch, it is in its power to communicate the idea you want to come across. Which brings us to my last thought: Consciousness and awareness is everything a designer should aim for. Once we are aware, we cannot be anything but responsible and make things that possess a core meaning, purpose and life of its own.

Photo by: Sandrine Castellan

Yes! It is out! Finally! The Terra Modis Dress is a wearable art piece made in collaboration with Valérie Dumaine, Montreal’s hottest designer. The image is taken by NASA and shows the Antarctic melting. Here you have a comparison of the same image, 30 years ago! We will produce this dress based on Pre.Order only. So if you want one, you know what to do.

Beauty that aims to raise awareness. A piece that speaks for itself. Global Warming melting away thousands of years old ice. And captured by science. Worn by you. Thank you Open Data.

Photo by:  Sylvain Blais

You can Pre.Order this beauty on Slowfactory.com and we also made this cute top.

Greenland brings together the vision and designs of Valérie Dumaine with the innovative concepts and open-culture philosophy of Creative Commons advocate Celine Semaan founder of Slowfactory.com. These two limited edition items feature stunningNasa Hubble images of the world’s largest island showing the Artic ice melting considerably as an effect of Global Warming.

Change [...] everything.

I have been thinking about writing this post for quite some time. I wanted to wait until it all gets official, so that I can make one post to tell it all. But I got impatient. I am not going to blow it by revealing what needs to remain confidential for now. But I want to say that I have decided to change gears in my career.
My short involvement with a local startup: basically I got fired (for the first time in my career) after a week of work and right after I had given the main design direction; made me think.

I cried. Of course. However it made me realize that it is a blessing in disguised. I did not fit there. We did not share the same values. I am a misfit. I am an idealist. I want to make the world a better place, and I mean it. I have way too much soul. Way too many ideas and drive to try to fit in anymore. I don’t fit in. Since then I have been taking a new lead in my work: I do not design interfaces any longer. Bye-bye screens. The only screens I’m going to design are the screens behind my next two ventures. [That I will soon reveal, I promise].

Misfits are what makes this world amazing

I will not stop designing. I will begin to focus only on designing systems. Offline systems. Like the Health System, or the Education System. Systems that were left out of the Big Web Movement, and now Mobile First. Mobile Eventually, is more like it. My past work in Montreal has opened my eyes on this forgotten world that we take for granted: the physical world. By physical, I do not mean “getting physical” nor do I mean “Material Girl”. I mean the city, the government, the systems that were designed hundred of years ago that would need a bit of TLC since they are starting to decompose. Less paper, less bureaucrates more efficiency. Kind of like applying Web as a Culture onto everything.

How can we use technology to facilitate the change in our society?

This is the kind of question I want to spend my time thinking about, rather than the one I got so bored with, that is still mainly the centre of all screen based design projects: “How can we get more clicks? How can we get more user-engagement?”

Responsible Design

Not responsive, but responsible. What is responsible design? Is it using design thinking in order to improve people’s lives? By improving people’s lives do we mean getting them more glued to their wonderful blue-lighted screens?
Or do we really mean finding solutions to get people more engaged with one another and their environment?
I’ll leave this as an open question. As this is what I now am thinking about. More soon. I promise.

Yesterday at 6PM I gave a workshop (UX 101) at General Assembly and it made my day. I had sprained my anckle and had had very confronting conversation about the use of design thinking during the day. I was so very delighted with the class! It was packed! All were very good vibes. I’m looking forward for future classes.

For the many students who asked me for references, please find below some good leads

Adaptive Path

Ux Mag

Jakob Nielsen

Jeffrey Zeldman

A List Apart

A Book Apart

An Event Apart

Jared M. Spool

Design Thinking

We are now living in Brooklyn, New York. And I am grateful to the Universe to have brought me back here, where I belong.

A sea of opportunity, of dreams and ideas, of people running around, looking their best, and despite what everyone says, smile and are sweet to each other. I hear “Hola, Guapa” every morning when I leave the house from random strangers, and the Bodega man says “You’re welcome sweetie”.

Thank you.

Hyper-aware and excited. Embracing change and amazed to see where this *new* road will take me.

The time to stop and to contemplate.

This year was the year of many firsts for me.

I started the year giving birth to my first daughter Sila Grey born on January 1st at 7:15 AM. First time in my life to be a mother. I’m sure someone said it before, or you have read it somewhere, and yes its cheesy, but its real: I have changed and grown and learned so much from this roller coaster experience called being a parent. I have made peace with a lot of things, and have gained some kind of wisdom and balls.

In this post I needed to archive the series of firsts I discovered in 2012.

A Designer of Many Trades

First time launching my own line of fashion accessories called Slowfactory, we print NASA images on silk scarves.
I now made it into the fashion world just by following an idea and making it real in this world. From user experience designer, I now stubbled upon fashion design collaborating with many awesome people along the way. First time owning a business in fashion, first time I direct fashion photography, first time I hire designers to help create my brand, first time on FAB and first time co-creating a dress!

We used this image

To create this

This is a sneak peek, the dress is still in production. In the photo is Valérie Dumaine herself taking a selfie to send me by email.

This dress will be sold as early as January 2013, its a co-creation with brilliant Montreal based designer Valérie Dumaine. A friendship turned into a fun collaboration making this wonderful silk dress hand made in Montreal, designed to raise awareness on the planet we live in. The image is under Creative Commons and comes from of course, my main inspiration lately, NASA Goddard’s flickr account.

To Pre-Order the dress, email me

Writing Books for the Open Web

First time I am Editor in Chief on a collaborative open book project, Webmakers the Book. You can participate and write a chapter too.

Together we are writing a book about Webmakers.

Webmakers the book.

The web is becoming the world’s second language, and a vital 21st century skill. Digital literacy today is as important as reading, writing, and arithmetic. How will we help each other acquire the skills needed to understand, shape, and actively participate in that world—instead of just passively consuming it? We need to create more webmakers— people who create the open building blocks of the web.

This book gathers ideas and resources for Webmakers. Launched at the 2012 Mozilla Festival, we’re now collecting and curating the best content about Webmakers.

This book is being built on PressBooks — an open source book-making tool that embraces the Webmaker spirit.

Create this book with us!

Send us an email with content ideas, questions, or to become a contributor.

You can also sign up on our mailing list to get early access to new chapters usually on Mondays, and comments to help authors tweak their content. Each final chapter will be published to the public on every Thursdays. By signing up to our mailing list to get a free ebook version when the book is done.

The print version will be out in 2013. Pre Order the print version 35$/book. 50% of revenue (after printing and shipping costs) will go to the Mozilla Foundation, 50% will support the cost of putting this project together.

Editor-in-Chief: Celine Semaan Vernon (Celinecelines)
First Assistant Editor: Christine Prefontaine
Book Making/PressBooks Guy: Hugh McGuire

[Pre-Order the Print Book -- code]

Here is what we are looking for:

Our goal is to collect 12 (or more) additional chapters before March 2013.

Each chapter will be released for comments each Monday to those who have signed up for early access on our mailing list. Authors will benefit from our community of reader-makers and collaborators who can contribute with comments, edits and feedback.

Each Thursday we will publicly release chapters to the world.

We are seeking chapters and content that talk about the following issues / needs:

Why / What / Where is a Webmaker?
How to Create More Webmakers
How Webmakers Change the World
Why Are Webmakers the Future?
Webmakers in the Physical World
Recognition Through Webmaker Badges

Writers and participants will get an account on Pressbooks where they can log in and either write their chapter from scratch, or copy/paste from existing content they have written online.

On March 2013 (estimate!) we will be releasing a first printed (physical) version of the Webmakers book available for pre-order here.

Looking forward in collaborating with you!

As 2012 ends and 2013 begins, in this “entre-deux” of years, eras, cycles and emotions I wish you all the best, health and kindness in this upcoming year. I might see a bunch of you in New York as this is where the year takes me. We are moving (back) to Brooklyn as of January 2013. Very excited to embrace serendipity and change and the unknown with love.

Open Theatre is platform for exploration where the stage is invisible.

These classes aim to bring together professionals and amateur from all backgrounds who wish to explore, develop, express different emotions, thoughts, actions and ideas. The classes will focus on giving participants acting training as well as improvisation skills through practice using technology (sound recordings of performances, the use of video as a mean to create an environment where participants will be invited to play).

Below is The Open Theatre movement description.

The Open Theater was an experimental theatre group active from 1963 to 1973.

It was founded in New York City by a group of former students of acting teacher Nola Chilton, and joined shortly thereafter by director Joseph Chaikin, formerly of The Living Theatre, and Peter Feldman. The group’s intent was to continue Chilton’s exploration of a “post-method”, post-absurd acting technique, by way of a collaborative and wide-ranging process that included exploration of political, artistic, and social issues, which were felt to be critical to the success of avant-garde theatre. The company, developing work through an improvisational process drawn from Chilton and Viola Spolin, created well-known exercises, such as “sound and movement” and “transformations”, and originated radical forms and techniques that anticipated or were contemporaneous with Jerzy Grotowski’s “poor theater” in Poland.[1] According to playwright Megan Terry the notion of a minimalist aesthetic was fueled by the company’s quest to achieve narrative insight and political accountability through the body of the actor:

During the sixties we were concerned with stripping away. Chaikin and the Open Theater actors worked to reveal the actor’s imagination as projected by the actor’s presence. We showed that full, exciting theatrical productions could be done with nothing but actors and two benches or four chairs or only a bare stage. It was not only a matter of economics, it was essential to demonstrate the profound power of the actor’s imagination and the actor’s ability to create place, i.e., scenery through the power of belief via total technique, and through the use of transformation not only of character but of time and place.[2]

Photo courtesy of LIFE magazine (Israël 1948).

So a little bit about our collaboration…

Raïa Haïdar is a French-Lebanese actor who has been working in film, theatre and television for two decades. Her approach evolved from classical acting to exploring other practices such as coaching actors, directing plays and art direction.

Céline Semaan Vernon (aka celinecelines) is a Lebanese-Canadian experience designer who explores technology as a means to create narratives and storytelling that can broaden perceptions, locations and tastes.

Together they joined forces to create Open Theatre — mixing classical acting methods, open media and the use of technology in order to bring participants to explore the practice of acting and performance.

Open Theatre Lesson Plan: Classical Acting Classes.

First Class:

Starts with a personal presentation of each participants, who they are, their acting experiences, motivations and artistic expectations.
Conductors will choose or select directions to take according to the participants desires and needs.

Warm up

Every class will start with a 20 min warm up:
Body relaxation, voice exercise, space awareness and collective improvisation based on physical sense and emotions (ex: being underwater, feeling hot, walking in the desert, waiting, laughing, crying, falling etc…)

Group Improvisation

Slowly the silent warm-up improvisation will develop into language… First improvisation non lingual (ex: animal, nature like) and then according to class progress the language will lead to a prepared group improvisation.(20 min).
Themes and improvisations exercises will develop around the Multimedia conductor leading to a final presentation.

Solo Improvisation/work/project

First class will ask participant to improvise a psychological situation in silent.
in order to work on the cinematographic acting, capacity to transmit an emotion a situation without using words.
this can develop into use of words ( ex: a phone conversation, writing a letter, preparing a speech) (5 min per participants)

Duo Improvisation/work/ project

Same as solo project but using 2 participant working on communication and dialogue developing the abilities to listen to the other and feed improvisation.
(ex: fight between two, a separation…) (10 min each)
Can also be worked as a “Trio Improvisation/work/ project”
Themes and improvisations exercises will develop around the Multimedia conductor leading to a final presentation.
According to participants personal multimedia project, this time is used for solo or duo/trio projects.

A list of exercises and performance like works will be added to each class.

Performance and Technology.

• The use video projection as a background for creating dialogue and new narratives
• The use of recordings to create soundscapes as a mean to explore one’s inner dialogue
• The use of photography as a mean to document and portray different characters
• The use of silence and body awareness and movements as a mean to explore space
• Collaboration (online / offline) as mean to develop improv skills, sharability and the maintenance of networks
• The body as a tool to be mastered and perfected
• Food and rituals as a discovery of cultures and traditions
• The use of responsive technologies and wearable sensors as a mean to explore other realities in a hyperconnected world

Ideas of play.

• Foods of a particular country, with projections of landscape and people from the chosen country and a series of improvs using the objects and food (documented and published online)
• Microphone worn as broches recording the participants and the sound is then used in another manner, outside its original context
• Karaoke cinema where participants are invited to improvise and create the dialogue of given movie clips or remixes
• Chatroulette performance where participants are invited to create a short situation

What is Karaoke Cinema?

Karaoke Cinema means creating dialogues, voice-over and soundtrack over remixed movies in a context of a performance played live with different participants.

For this Karaoke Cinema I plan to select video clips of many famous people or historical figures; for example dictators who have been ousted by their people and let participants voice-over them giving speeches and give the speech they want.

It can be poetry, messages of peace, whatever comes to mind to the participant.The performance will be documented and eventually shared.

Are you interest? You happen to be in Montreal? Register Here!

One day at a time.

Regret nothing. Not the cruel novels you read
to the end just to find out who killed the cook.
Not the insipid movies that made you cry in the dark,
in spite of your intelligence, your sophistication.
Not the lover you left quivering in a hotel parking lot,
the one you beat to the punchline, the door, or the one
who left you in your red dress and shoes, the ones
that crimped your toes, don’t regret those.
Not the nights you called god names and cursed
your mother, sunk like a dog in the livingroom couch,b
chewing your nails and crushed by loneliness.
You were meant to inhale those smoky nights
over a bottle of flat beer, to sweep stuck onion rings
across the dirty restaurant floor, to wear the frayed
coat with its loose buttons, its pockets full of struck matches.
You’ve walked those streets a thousand times and still
you end up here. Regret none of it, not one
of the wasted days you wanted to know nothing,
when the lights from the carnival rides
were the only stars you believed in, loving them
for their uselessness, not wanting to be saved.
You’ve traveled this far on the back of every mistake,
ridden in dark-eyed and morose but calm as a house
after the TV set has been pitched out the upstairs
window. Harmless as a broken ax. Emptied
of expectation. Relax. Don’t bother remembering any of it.
Let’s stop here, under the lit sign
on the corner, and watch all the people walk by.

Slides of my Iterati talk yesterday.

I believe in always finding ways to do something you love.
After working as a professional Interaction Designer for many years (freelance and in large agencies in New York and Montréal) the transition to starting and running my own business provided me with lots of valuable insights into things that previously annoyed me about clients.

Designing a product, designing a brand, an e-commerce experience, packaging, designing customer support, shipping the products, shooting campaigns are all the new hats I am wearing and some for the first time.

Each new perspective gained by being part of each stage of the big cycle of production made me a better designer on parallel projects and helped me understand better both the client, and the business goals.

As an experienced designer I thought it was a simple design challenge to create my online store; turns out that when it’s your own baby you care more and in a different ways, leading me to learn some fundamental things about my craft.

• real-life can be counter intuitive: breaking pre-conceived interaction design rules is good
• risk is humbling: critics and feedback make your product better
• who cares about your ego?
• the user experience designer is not designing the user’s experience

Slowfactory is an online shop selling limited edition fashion swag made within many series of collaborations with different people I admire in the fashion world.
The first collection is in collaboration with Pattern Recognition artist and friend Zohar. This idea of printing Hubble images from Nasa Goddard’s Flickr account came to me a few years ago.

imagine this image printed on a silk scarf #hermes style flickr.com/photos/gsfc/65… “wear the beauty of the univers”

— celinecelines (@celinecelines) December 16, 2011

So I twitted the idea. And went back to a wireframe or a design and continued my work. A few months / years went by, and I had never forgotten about it.

I love Les carrés d’Hermès. I try to collect them. I consider them as art pieces. Each one tells a particular story, and they are all made in collaboration with other artists. I love that about Hermès. The scarves are made in small quantities and are considered collectables.

The first Collection Slowfactory will present in its online boutique / gallery is a series of scarves made from Nasa Hubble images. The license on the images is under Creative Commons CC-By and since I am a Creative Commoner to the soul, I always wanted to create a wearable experience.

In fashion there are no copy rights, only trade marks (and most of the time on the logos) that is why fashion houses make bags with tiles of their logos. People buy the brand. The concept (and philosophy) of sharing, mixing and remixing ideas, styles thus creating trends and culture are what makes fashion so progressive. These ideas are what makes Creative Commons and all open related-cultures so innovative. This is where I stand, in the collaboration and remixing / building upon of culture, participating and inspiring / sharing the experience with my peers.

Hubble Captured on Silk collection

For this first collection Slowfactory produced 77 silk scarves all signed and numbered. They will be on sale at the end of the summer, just in time for the fall.

When I was a child my dream was to be an astronaut and to float in space in contemplation of all the beauty and the immense mysterious space that we cannot see. Imagining space became a way to ground me. For people who know me in real life, I am very high energy and hyper active person. So meditating has become an essential part of my balance and peace of mind. Meditation is a way to allow your brain to have a nap as it contemplates beauty.

View from the ISS at Night from Knate Myers on Vimeo.

Each scarf comes with a special thought.