DesignAir
DesignAir was created for the 7-day Adobe + Amazon Creative Jam sprint with teammates Carly Chan & Sejun Park.
Prompt: Design a tablet app to provide a safe way for young students (age 13+) to #DiscoverDesign.
Tap through here to play!Process
We started by asking ourselves a list of unanswerable questions. What is design? What does it mean to #DiscoverDesign? How can we best communicate the heart of it all to students just getting started in design?
We reflected on our own design journeys and recognized the critical shift from trying to make beautiful things to viewing design as a genuine means of human connection. We narrowed our scope and considered how we could raise questions of accessibility and community engagement from the very beginning.
To appeal to our student age group, we decided to turn our app into a RPG! After choosing a nickname and character, users gain access to design-based mini-games, weekly challenges, and feedback from the community. Students can chat with real-life mentors and use the geocaching function to obtain practical experience by designing for local clients.
Sketches
Wireframe & Prototype
Visual style & assets
Opportunity area: Not everyone has access to digital creation tools.
Solution: Embed built-in tools on the app & offer subscriptions as rewards.
Opportunity area: Early design education rarely focuses on accessibility & thinking critically about one’s audience.
Solution: Prioritize games that center on designing for physical & mental accessibility.
Opportunity area: Youth often don’t believe their art belongs in the “real world.”
Solution: Bring opportunities to design for local initiatives or organizations.
Opportunity area: Some youth struggle to find artistic community.
Solution: Provide a virtual town square to leave & receive feedback.
Opportunity area: Mentorship is difficult to find/afford.
Solution: Build in a Meet a Mentor function where youth can ask for advice.
DesignAir strives to emphasize the philosophy that design is inherently human and compassionate: that design thinking heavily revolves around developing an understanding of the people that products and services are designed for.
It was created over the course of a single week for the Adobe + Amazon Design Creative Jam. I worked with teammates Carly Chan and Sejun Park to wireframe, design, and brand a fully-functioning prototype—it was our first time exploring UI/UX design, and we had so much fun!
In the end, after presenting our project to a panel of judges and 2000 audience members, we placed 5th out of 600+ participating teams. Thank you to Adobe for this opportunity!