IDEO Labs

Ready to make a difference over the weekend? Join us for two fun and intense days of making, as we craft, hack, and build human-centered design solutions to real world challenges, working alongside IDEO designers from various disciplines.

The theme for our Munich Make-a-thon is Good Morning, Good Evening, Good bye. We will tackle design challenges along a human life cycle and within a daily routine. It is up to the teams to define the specific challenges as well as the solutions. More details about the briefs will be released a few days prior to the event.

Due to a limited number of spaces and the need for a mix of system thinkers and skillful makers, you need to apply here to attend the Munich Make-a-thon. All your information will be treated confidentially. You will then receive an email from us to confirm your participation. If you do not get a spot, apologies if we can’t fit you in.
There is always a next time!

We will report back on the outcome of the Munich Make-a-thon here on IDEO Labs after the event. Please be aware: We believe in open source. Designs, prototypes, works created at the Make-a-thon, will be offered under Creative Commons license (CC BY 3.0).

When:
Friday, July 5th 2013, 1:30pm till late
Saturday, July 6th 2013, 10:00am till 8:00pm

Who:
Makers, designers, hackers, system thinkers, friends

Where:
IDEO Munich
Kellerstraße 27
81667 München

Agenda:
Friday, July 5th
1:30 Welcome and introduction
2:00 Talk: Design thinking at IDEO
2:15 Project team briefings
3:00 Talk: Design research
Participants break out into teams.
3:30 Project teams: Inspiration and design research
4:00 Talk: Prototyping and experimentation
4:15 Project teams: Brainstorming and prototyping
6:00 Project teams: share back
7:00 Studio dinner
8:00 Teams can wrap up or continue working
9:00 Studio closes

Saturday, July 6th
9:00 Breakfast
9:45 Making in project teams
12:30 Lunch and inspirational talk
2:00 Making and user testing
6:00 Final presentations

Inspirational talk: We are very happy to host Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino, interaction designer, entrepreneur and founder of the Good Night Lamp http://goodnightlamp.com/ as our inspirational speaker. Alexandra leads Designswarm, an ‘internet of things’ design studio, and co-founded Tinker London, the first distributor of the Arduino platform in the UK.

Twitter: Use the twitter hashtag #ideomake to discuss the event.

If you have any additional questions, or if for some reason you’ve signed up and can’t make it, please email us at munichmake@ideo.com

In January, Jerry O’Leary and I launched a Kickstarter campaign (currently <3 days to go) for the world’s thinnest watch, the CST-01. This is a watch we have worked on outside of project work while here at IDEO. On IDEO Labs, our aim is to share our process and give our readers an “under-the-hood” look at some of the things happening here at IDEO and, occasionally, beyond our walls. With that in mind, we wanted to recount the evolution of the design of the CST-01 from early CAD sketches to fully working “design validation units” made from real production parts.  Click through for the full story and our process images:

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At IDEO, “What if we…?” is a phrase you hear a lot. This “What if?” mindset, plus our love of playing around with new ideas, can lead to some fun experiments. A few months ago, for example, we used agar as a design medium to grow and biohack an electrical circuit.

It all started on a day when Matt Brown and I (Rodrigo Martinez) were both playing around with some sensors, resistors, batteries, and speakers. Matt was building a prototype for a new synthesizer, and I was sketching a biological circuit.

At some point we began discussing how we might make a living circuit.

“What do you mean living?” asked Matt.

“What if we grow a part of the circuit, you know, as in grow rather than buy?” I said.

For a while we discussed how the “living” dimensionality of the circuit would influence our own perception of the exercise and its implications. Yup, at that point we were over-thinking the whole thing.

Finally we just decided to make it.

We asked five designers at IDEO to submit a pattern they thought was interesting. Here is what they came up with:

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Happy 25th birthday, GIF! And WOW, you have come a long way in this quarter of a century. Since 1987, you have witnessed many historical events: you saw the birth of the Web, the rise and decline of Geocities, you survived the dot.com bubble, and, when Web 2.0 came and your time seemed to have ended, you resurrected with MySpace, and the ironic, politically incorrect memes spread by imageboards.

Your simplicity is your strength and everyone seems to love your lo-fi loops. Your repetition is a visual mantra, and your obsessiveness fits well with the attention deficit caused by information overload. GIF, we have been through a lot together and you are still among the best expressions of digital creativity out there.

In IDEO’s New York studio we recently hosted a holiday party for our clients. The studio designed a handful of experiences for the occasion under the topic “How To Survive the Holidays.” We subjected them to the “Holiday Cliché Elevator & Lightbox Entrance,” a “Tip Jar,” a “Card-sending Station,” and a “Quiet Room,” replete with a digital fireplace. We also gifted them a “Hangover Kit” to recover from an excess of holiday spirits.

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Hacking and building new ways for Chicagoans to eat, move, and learn.

Inspired by the IDEO Make-a-thon prototyped in the London studio, our Chicago studio launched the first IDEO Make-a-thon in the US as part of Chicago Ideas Week—a city-wide celebration of “sharing ideas, inspiring action, and igniting change to positively impact our world.”

Our goal: use design thinking and rapid prototyping to hack and build solutions to some of the big gnarly problems that Chicago faces around healthy food, urban cycling, and public education. In partnership with Feeding America, Alta Bicycle Share, and Chicago Public Schools, we chose three themes for our day-long maker fest: “Eat,” “Move,” and “Learn.” Together we created three multi-disciplinary Make teams, composed of IDEO designers, outside experts, and special guests. (more…)