Scott Berkun Profile picture
Aug 21, 2019 14 tweets 7 min read Read on X
1. A new #design hero for me is Chuck Harrison, one of the first black designers, and executives (1961), in American corporate history. He spent much of his career at Sears, and designed 100s of well known objects, some of which you probably know.
2. He redesigned the View-master from a bland, clumsy device, to something kids and adults loved to hold and use.
3. He developed the idea to make garbage cans out of plastic (much quieter when the garbagemen emptied them at 5am), and they stackable, easy to ship and store.
4. To convince ppl his design was better, he devised a test. "we froze the can at -40 degrees for days, put a 50lb bag of sand in it, and threw it off a 5 story building." It didn't break - It bounced! Marketing replicated this in their advertising - but from a helicopter.
5. He thought carefully about user experience and affordances - "easy for the owner to remove [the lid] but hard for dogs or raccoons" - plus a sloped lid for rain runoff and hand grips at the bottom. Ideas used in Sears' advertising.
6. He grew up in Arizona in the 1940s, which he says "may have been more racist Mississippi" - and poverty was an issue too - his high school basketball team was so poor they didn't have uniforms - his coach wrote player numbers on t-shirts.
7. He struggled entering college because of dyslexia. He studied econ. until a councilor suggested art. His grades improved & he considered interior/industrial design. He was told "he'd be a good painter" but quipped "if I told my father that he'd make me paint the garage"
8. He went to @SAIC_Design in Chicago as the only black student. "...in the arts, racism seemed less intense... sharing information didn't represent power so classmates were helpful" He learned from supportive professional designers too.

(student project for a playground)
@SAIC_Design 9. He served in the army, learning cartography/mapmaking and photography. After two years he reached out to his professors about graduate school, but they didn't have a program - they created one for him.
@SAIC_Design 10. Henry Glass (professor) helped him early in his career. "Henry was a godsend... someone looking over my shoulder... I learned it wasn't only expressing a concept, but how to successfully get it to the marketplace" - This holistic design view would be a hallmark of his work.
@SAIC_Design Much like Dieter Ram's 10 principles, Harrison had a clear and honest philosophy about how things should be designed
@SAIC_Design 11. Many of these quotes and photos are from Harrison's own memoir and portfolio - A Life's Design. He wrote as well as he designed (he died in 2018) and if you liked this thread please check it out.

amazon.com/Lifes-Design-I…
@SAIC_Design There's also a thoughtful obituary from the NYTimes about his life and work. nytimes.com/2018/12/05/obi… #designmtw #design #inspiration
@SAIC_Design "If I were to share one thought with the #design community of today and tomorrow it would be to remember that your purpose — your gift to the world — is to provide straightforward solutions to real problems for living, breathing human beings." - Charles Harrison

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Scott Berkun

Scott Berkun Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @berkun

Sep 25
1. The main idea of Why Design Is Hard is that designers in organizations need to reframe the way we think about our work.

We have many valid complaints - but we have misplaced faith that complaining changes anything for anyone.

#designishard #ux #design Image
2. In a recent poll it was clear that the hard part of design work is RELATIONAL. It's not about our talents or skills.

We are in denial: we want to believe our creative ideas and smart opinions can conquer all. That's not how people in organizations behave. Image
3. Design, as a verb, requires power. If you are not the decision maker, you are an ADVISOR. You give advice and suggestions.

The DECIDER is actually the person who determines what the final design that ships is or is not. This is often a VP, a director or a team leader. Image
Read 6 tweets
Sep 15, 2021
Study decisions, not just ideas. It's decisions and the people who make them that define how ideas are evaluated.

If you only care about ideas you'll stay mystified and angry about why "the best" idea never gets chosen.

Study decisions. Learn how to influence them.
I've read many books on decision making but this one had the most powerful impact on me.

For the approach he takes alone, studying front line workers making life and death decisions, it's a worthy read.

Sources of Power, Gary Klein
Have you ever kept a decision journal? Here's how it works.

When you have a big decision:

1. Write down your thoughts about your options.
2. And your rationale for deciding.
3. Then decide.
4. Experience the outcome.
5. Review 1 & 2 - what can you learn now? write it down
Read 4 tweets
Jul 22, 2021
1. We have 5 basic senses - then why don't designers and experiences use all of them?

It's always fun to step back and ask this question, which often leads down the path to SMELL-O-VISION. Image
2. It sounds like a joke but Smell-O-Vision was one of many attempted innovations to improve the movie theater experience.

Like many attempted innovations, many approaches were tried. Some tried to pump in scents into the theaters, but the timing was a problem. Image
3. Others tried a simpler approach, using "scratch and sniff" cards - Instructions would appear on the screen telling you when to use which one. Clever. Image
Read 7 tweets
Jun 16, 2021
1. All of the ideas in How Design Makes The World are encapsulated in these four questions every product team should ask regularly. #design #ux #designmtw
2. Many projects have requirements, schedules and cool ideas, but forget to focus on improving something specific for real people. Or get lost along the way.

Good teams refresh the real goals often, like a lighthouse.
3. We're all prone to forgetting our biases and designing for ourselves.

If we don't go out of our way to study our customer's real needs, and how they differ from our own, we will fail them and possibly not even know until it's too late.
Read 7 tweets
May 13, 2021
1. Have you been frustrated by how little your coworkers understand about the value of what you do?

If you're a UX designer, you're an expert. But there's a trap in how this expertise is taught that works against you.

This thread explains what to do about it.
2. Design books/courses are design-centric, but the world isn't. Orgs are business, tech or mission centric. Collision-warning!

"I have to explain my value? And work uphill for respect?"

Yes. The sheer numbers make this likely! But do not despair.
3. We imagine our coworkers should *already know* about design. But how could that possibly happen? Who would have taught them?

We're trained with the presumption non-designers should magically know things - but is that how we approach designing products for people?
Read 11 tweets
Apr 27, 2021
If requirements define the problem, how can a designer succeed if the problems they are supposed to solve are poorly defined or the wrong ones?
If the person writing requirements knows nothing about good design, why would anyone expect good design to be a possible outcome?

It's like someone who has never cooked writing a recipe.
Requirements:

- car that goes 1000mph
- lasts 1000 years
- cures cancer
- creates world peace
- makes selfish people generous for 10mile radius
- easy to use
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(