February 2012
5 posts
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Philosophy Now - Published Sketchnote
I was recently contacted by Philosophy Now, a bi-monthly, non-academic publication with news, articles, and columns aimed at those with an interest in philosophy, to ask whether they could publish my sketchnote from Ray Tallis’ Aping Mankind talk at the RIGB.
They just sent me over a few copies of the magazine so I could see my work in glorious print. Some photos are below…
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Portobello Giving Project
I’ve taken on a number of commissions over the past few months but unfortunately they haven’t made it to the blog given the big move and the impending arrival!
David Barrie (who was involved with The People’s Supermarket) asked me to help with a proposal for the Portobello Giving Project, which is a social venture in which donors who live in an urban area donate money to and...
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Design of Understanding Review from Sjors Timmer →
Great write up from Sjors Timmer on the Design of Understanding.
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Design of Understanding @ St Bride
Last Friday, I had the pleasure of attending the Design of Understanding conference. Organised by Max Gadney and held at St Bride, it was as interesting and diverse as the previous year’s conference, which made a nice change from the usual UX conference scene.
My favourite speakers were Luis Rey’s talk on illustrating dinosaurs and his work with paleontologists to accurately...
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Thinking Fast & Slow @ RIGB
In celebration of Daniel Kahneman’s most recent book Thinking, Fast and Slow he gave a lecture at the RIGB last November. Unfortunately it’s only now I’ve been able to write this post. The book is now firmly on my to-read list and I’d encourage everyone to have a look. My sketchnote is below and you can see Eva-Lotta’s sketch on Flickr.
January 2012
3 posts
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The Serendipity Engine @ RIGB
In November 2011, I attended a talk at the RIGB titled The Serendipity Engine with Aleks Krotoski and Kat Jungnickel.
They describe the engine as the following (taken from the website): The Serendipity Engine is a physical manifestation of theoretical and technological interventions that can be used to enhance serendipity on the World Wide Web. It is a working machine that uses bike parts,...
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Does Neuromarketing Work? @ RIGB
Some time ago now, I attended an excellent talk at the RIGB on the topic of Does Neuromarketing Work? The debate was presented by the New Scientist and featured their deputy editor, Graham Lawton. Dr A. K. Pradeep of Neurofocus argued for neuromarketing and Dr Mike Page (whose job titles are too many to mention) argued against.
Overall, I felt that Dr Mike Page was the most convincing speaker,...
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A Little Update...
Some of you who read my blog regularly will know that it has been a little while between drinks - both metaphorically and physically. Not only did we buy our very first home, we’re also expecting a baby! If you’ve ever been through that first trimester, you’ll know that actually having the energy to do anything besides from dragging your sorry self to work is rather ambitious. So...
September 2011
2 posts
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The Food Illustrator
I managed to stumble on a Twitter account called The Food Illustrator late last year. While I post recipes I cook most days on Cooking This Week, The Food Illustrator was doing illustrations of everything he ate!
Way back in June, we went to the opening show at Arch 402 in Shoreditch which had all 365 days of artwork on display. It was quite amazing that someone had managed to be so committed to...
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dConstruct Sketchnotes, Brighton, 2011
My work were kind enough to send me to this year’s dConstruct, held at the Brighton Dome on the 2nd September. As usual, I sketchnoted and you can see the results in this blog post. Generally, I found the quality of the talks to be better than I expected. There was a couple I wasn’t a big fan of and a couple that I really loved - Don Norman, Frank Chimero.
In terms of sketchnoting, I...
July 2011
2 posts
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Sketchnote from Ray Tallis - Aping Mankind @ RI
If I haven’t said it before, then I’ll say it again, the RI — Royal Institute of Great Britain — in Mayfair is one of my favourite venues for talks - great venue, fantastic speakers and always thought provoking.
This week I went to a talk by Professor Raymond Tallis, who has recently written a book called Aping Mankind - Neuromania, Darwinitis and the Misrepresentation of...
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Sketchnote from Wim Crouwel @ Design Museum
A few weeks back, I attended a talk at the Design Musuem, as part of the Pioneers of Industrial Culture. The talk featured Wim Crouwel in conversation with the museum’s director, Deyan Sudjic.
I can only hope I am as witty and coherent when I reach Wim Crouwel’s age — 83 according to Wikipedia — He was such an insightful and engaging speaker. The talk and the exhibition...
June 2011
4 posts
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DIBI Conference 2011, Newcastle
Earlier this week I had the pleasure of attending this year’s DIBI Conference held in the Sage Gateshead, Newcastle. I’ll confess that the main reason I went was to see my husband speak at his first major conference event but it was a really enjoyable day and something different from the research / UX events that I normally attend.
Big thank you to Gavin Elliot for his wonderful...
14 tags
Diary Studies, Research Thing #1 @ Fortune Cookie
Last month on the 25th May, I had the pleasure of attending the very first Research Thing event at the Fortune Cookie offices. The first event was themed around Diary Studies and there was three speakers — Boon Chew, Lee McIvor (of Lightning UX fame) and Beth Duddy.
For those of you not familiar with User Experience techniques, a diary study is something that requires users, or observers...
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Le Gavroche, Mayfair - Tasting Menu
We ended up going to Le Gavroche again after Ella, who is one half of a couple of foodie mates, wanted to surprise Ross with a meal at a restaurant he’d not been to before. Meeting at the Connaught Bar for cocktails (tough life!), Ross arrived to find us waiting before we took a taxi onto the mysterious destination. To say that Ross was pleased with this turn of events was a bit of an...
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Loose Box, Mundaring
The Loose Box restaurant has to be one of the most unfortunately named restaurants I’ve ever had the pleasure of attending. When I mentioned to friends that I was going for a meal at this place, it brought sniggers all around. Oh well, at least it is memorable! As a treat for our parents, we took them both out a couple of days before our wedding to say thank you. Neither mine or Brad’s...
May 2011
13 posts
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Raffles Restaurant, Perth
There were a number of restaurants in Perth that I went to over our long wedding break which I didn’t end up taking photos at for one reason or another. They are worth a mention though, so I’m going to do a short post on each one. First up is Deco Restaurant at Raffles houses in a beautiful Art Deco building which I used to drive past with my parents almost every weekend.
(Photo...
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Viajante, Bethnal Green
I can’t quite believe how long it’s been since we visited Viajante. Way back in early March this year, we went with some friends for dinner. We had a drink in the bar, which was quite busy given the early hour. I opted for a Bermuda Porter (£8) which according to their menu was “a twist on a rum ration…Goslings rum, fresh lemon juice, sugar, shaken and given a hefty dose of...
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Lightning UX, Perspectives on Research
On the 5th April 2011, I attended Lightning UX: Perspectives on Research. Held at City University of London, it was sponsored by Flow Interactive, Foolproof, Loop11, Balsamiq and City University of London.
Lee Mcivor was kicked things off. He offered some pragmatic advice about doing more than just reading the books. We should do research with rigour, using quant and qualitative, evaluative and...
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Pentagram Blog My Angus Hyland Sketchnote →
Absolutely chuffed that Pentagram have featured my sketchnote on their blog. Yay!
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Angus Hyland - Symbol, Design Museum
Tonight I had the pleasure of attending the Symbol talk, by Angus Hyland (of Pentagram) at the Design Museum. Angus is a fantastic presenter and I really enjoyed the talk, although did get a little carried away doing my own versions of the logo in my sketchnote. The talk was in conjunction with Angus’s book, also called Symbol, which has just been released. Looks absolutely amazing and am...
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Same.as Reputation
Last Tuesday - 10th May - I attended the Same.as event on Reputation held at The Driver near King’s Cross. Featuring Heather Piwowar, Jason Priem and Gudmundur (“Mummi”) Thorisson, the event dealt with reputation in the context of academic research. You can see my sketchnotes below. Big thanks to the organisers!
I’m off to the Design Museum on Wednesday night to...
13 tags
Sharrow Bay, Penrith
I had looked at Sharrow Bay, when planning a trip to the Lake District with my parents a few years back. I’d ruled it out based on cost and the fact that fine dining isn’t really my Dad’s style - bless him.
For our wedding, Brad’s sister booked us a night in the George Hotel which is only a short drive from Sharrow Bay, so we booked in for a romantic dinner. It was the...
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Opera Tavern, Covent Garden
A friend mentioned awhile back that there was this new place in London which served the most amazing burgers. Brad certainly doesn’t need much convincing when good burgers are concerned, so we booked into the Opera Tavern for Sunday lunch on the weekend before Easter.
We were early to arrive, so we popped into the Hope & Greenwood shop on the corner of Catherine Street which is stocked...
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Pleasure & Pain at the Royal Institute
The Royal Institute of Great Britain is on it’s way to becoming my favourite venue for talks. The Pleasure & Pain talk last week was no exception. Two fantastic and incredibly knowledgeable speakers presented the information in an accessible manner (given they were both neuroscientists). I’m not sure my sketchnote does it justice.
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Boden Asks for Your Age...
I recently bought some clothes from Boden and noticed this little gem on their sign-up form. Underneath where they have the options to select your date of birth, they have a checkbox which says “Mind your own business, I’ll keep my date of birth to myself”. I thought it was a real nice touch, as there is nothing worse than a company making you disclose sensitive information...
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Shakespeare Country, Stratford-Upon-Avon
It seemed an absolute shame that we’d never been to Stratford-Upon-Avon, the home of one of Britain’s greatest treasures - William Shakespeare. Brad and I took a trip here in early March and so I thought I’d compile up my notes in case anyone else fancied a trip there.
Getting There
If you aren’t driving, then catching the train is your best option. There is a ticket...
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Church Street Townhouse, Stratford-Upon-Avon
As part of our mini-trip to Shakespeare country, Brad and I decided to have dinner at the hotel we were staying in, the Church Street Townhouse. Luckily they reserve tables for those staying with the hotel otherwise we would have been out of luck, even on a Thursday evening they were almost booked out.
We had a drink in the bar first, a very reasonably priced Champagne for me and one of the ales...
11 tags
Naru, Korean Restaurant, London - Second Visit
Brad and I were on our way back from another trip to the Royal Institute for their AI Series and decided we needed some food. Thankfully we were walking past Naru and having had a good experience before decided to get a bite to eat. Naru now enters hallowed halls of restaurants I’ve reviewed more than once.
I was always quite worried that Naru wouldn’t survive where it was, as it...
April 2011
13 posts
10 tags
Sketchnote of Bill Moggridge - Design Museum
Here is a recent sketchnote from Bill Moggridge’s talk at the Design Museum, given to publicise his new book Designing Media. He also had a few guests from Airside.
If I’m completely honest, I’m not sure I got a huge amount out of the talk. I was less interested in the pre-recorded interviews that he used to punctuate his responses than I was the dialogue between himself and...
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10 Things I Learnt About Being a Bride
As someone who planned two weddings, less than a month apart, on the opposite side of the world and in completely different weather conditions, I feel like I’ve earned the right to do a blog post about things I learnt about being a bride… So in the spirit of the other big wedding this week, here goes:
It’s not just about you two. I’m going out on a limb on this one....
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Hawksmoor, Seven Dials - Bar Burgers
It was a sad week. After more than four and a half years, it was my final week at Yahoo!. We’d often talked about having an extravagant lunch at Hawksmoor Seven Dials but had never really gotten around to it. On the final week there was no more excuses, so a group of us trundled off to Hawksmoor with the hope of nabbing a spot in the bar.
We were lucky, as they had space for all of us. So...
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Ultrabold, St Brides Foundation
Awhile back I attended the Design of Understanding at the St Bride Library. The conference focuses on how the design of ideas can make them more understandable. The conference organiser made a very good choice as St Bride is one of the world’s best printing and graphic arts library.
Unfortunately, the St Bride Foundation struggles to maintain funding and support, so I signed up to become a...
12 tags
Ed Emberley's Drawing Books
After attending the recent Sketch Club, I decided to purchase a few of Ed Emberley’s books based on Eva-Lotta’s recommendation. I’m pretty sure Ed needs to give a commission to Eva-Lotta as I’m sure I’m not the only one who has bought these books on her recommendation!
I bought the following books from Amazon:
Ed Emberley’s Drawing Book: Make a World (Ed...
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AI Series, Royal Institute of Great Britain
Earlier this year, I saw an event to be held at the Royal Institute of Great Britain which caught my eye. Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino was giving a lecture on Uncanny and Unloveable: The Future of Emotional Robots. As a user experience designer, I’m quite interested in emotions, while Brad, as a nerd, is quite interested in robots. So I booked tickets for us to go.
Alexandra’s talk...
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Ed's Easy Diner, Soho
Earlier this year, we were at a pub in Soho for a friend’s birthday and suddenly realised we should really get something for dinner. We scooted around to Byron but found it closing. We thought we’d settle for GBK but that too was closing their doors when we arrived. Desperate burger requirements call for desperate burger measures and we headed over to the ever reliable Ed’s Easy...
11 tags
Caravan, Exmouth Market - Second Visit
I happened to be in the Exmouth Market neighbourhood once lunch a few months back so I met the husband for lunch at Caravan to see whether the restaurant lived up to our previous visit. Given how many bars had come in go in this location prior to Caravan arriving, it was good to see it busy on a weekday lunch (Lots of prams!) and with the roastery appearing to be open.
Given how much I raved...
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UX London Sketchnotes - Day 2 & 3
Here are the sketchnotes that I did over the second and third day workshops at UX London 2011, held at the Cumberland Hotel… I decided to head home at a reasonable time tonight in order to get these uploaded. I would have loved to stay and chat with lots of lovely UX people but I was conferenced out.
Russ Unger - Guerrilla Research Methods
Joshua Porter - A/B Testing for UX Designers
...
25 tags
UX London Sketchnotes - Day 1
Here are the sketchnotes that I did today at UX London 2011, at the Cumberland Hotel… Apologies if you’ve seen them on Twitter, Flickr or elsewhere!
Alan Cooper - It’s All Us.
Louis Rosenfeld - The Redesign Must Die
Kim Goodwin - Making Personas Work Without Breaking the Bank
Oliver King - Difference between User Experience and Service Design
Kate Rutter - Strategy...
11 tags
Bar Boulud, Mandarin Oriental, Knightsbridge
On a cold winter’s night in January, not long after our second wedding in London, Brad and I made the trip to Bar Boulud in the Mandarin Oriental, London. I’d read about Bar Boulud’s amazing burgers and knew this would be very relevant to my new husband’s interests.
We managed to get an early booking for dinner without too much trouble and arrived a little on the early...
11 tags
Rockpool Restaurant, Sydney
Rockpool is the flagship restaurant of Australian Chef, Neil Perry, having occupied its position on one of the main streets of The Rocks area of Sydney since 1989. Although there are a number of Rockpool restaurants, they tend to be in the more casual Bar & Grill format. Brad’s school friends from Sydney know he’s a dedicated foodie these days, so they all pooled together to get us...
9 tags
Quay Restaurant, Sydney
Since we’ve been together, Brad and I tend not to get presents for each other for birthdays or Christmas. Instead, we normally go on a holiday together or to a nice restaurant. This Christmas, as we were in Sydney with Brad’s family, we decided to go to Quay Restaurant, as it was one of two Sydney restaurants that appeared in the San Pellegrino Top 50 Restaurants in the World. The...
March 2011
6 posts
8 tags
Aldo Zilli's Pizza range at Prezzo Restaurant
Last week, Brad and I were lucky enough to be invited to a launch event for Aldo Zilli’s new pizza range at Prezzo Restaurant, Haymarket. Not one to turn down a free pizza and drinks, we went along.
Despite there being 145 Prezzo’s around London, neither of us had ever been before as the restaurants aren’t located either neither where we work or where we live in East London....
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Little Lamb - Chinatown, London
On Brad’s actual 30th birthday, we went to Little Lamb in Chinatown. Both of us love steamboat restaurants and have fond memories of a whole street full of them in Beijing. Little Lamb is actually Mongolian but the premise is pretty much the same — Ingredients you cook yourself in a steaming broth.
Brad and I plumped for the three flavour pot which comes with the spicy, tonic and a...
11 tags
Byron Burger, Wardour Street Branch
My husband loves burgers so when I heard that Byron was opening in the old Intrepid Fox on Wardour Street, I thought we should definitely go. I ended up going with some of my colleagues first and it was as good as the reviews promised, so Brad and I organised to go one lunchtime. Unfortunately for us, the kitchen was busy and it took some time for them to take our order and deliver it. We were...
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Pearl Restaurant, Holborn
I was lucky enough to go with some work colleagues to Pearl Restaurant in Holborn. We’d been looking for something nearby that was nice and that could fit eight of us in at short notice. I’d been researching earlier that week for a blog post when I came across Pearl on Timeout and noticed they had a special deal (3 courses for £30), sadly no longer available. Now I have to apologise up...
10 tags
Knitting a Scarf
Awhile back, I did a course at the lovely Make Lounge in Islington. I made a great pair of wrist warmers which I’ve actually used. In my quest to be more interesting, one of the things on the list was to make something, so I thought it was high time I put the skills I’d learnt to use.
I was wondering along Broadway Market last week and thought I would take a look in Fabrications, a...
February 2011
6 posts
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Lunch at The Gunmaker's, Clerkenwell
The Gunmaker’s pub holds a special place in my heart. When I first arrived in London I was a young naive thing, fresh off the plane from Perth on my first overseas adventure. Sometime in 2004, I went on a pub lunch with my new colleagues at Investis and we ended up at said pub. Perusing the menu, I saw a pork pie. Now in Australia, pies mean small pastry contraptions, filled with mince beef...
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Russell Davies' Guide on How to be Interesting...
I’m always concerned I’m not very interesting. It must be that old confidence thing I mentioned a few blog posts ago. I was looking at friend’s events on Lanyrd* and stumbled onto an “Interesting” event and then Russell Davies’ blog… and this wonderful post…
Take at least one picture everyday. Post it to flickr. AW: I definitely upload pictures to...