If you’ve ever been surfing you may be familiar with the term, Maytag. If not, hopefully you’ve done laundry once or twice and can make the connection. To be Maytagged is to be tumbled about as if you were in a washing machine. You don’t know which direction is up and you feel utterly powerless to fight the ocean. When you find yourself being Maytagged, the best thing you can do is relax and let it happen. Save your energy,...

My article on lessons learned from doing user research in Asia is out in UX Magazine. Check it out for my overall impressions as well as tips and tricks for successful research campaigns in China, Japan, and...

Today I gave a presentation to the Innovation Learning Network entitled, Tooling Around. In this talk, I shared ten tips for building and using tools with innovation and design teams.

Today I gave a talk at Mozilla about my major learnings regarding doing user research in Asia. Take a look at my slides or watch the talk in action. Top 5 Lessons Learned – User Research in Asia View more presentations from Carissa Carter...

I’ve been experimenting with patterns a lot lately. Building off of the slew of hand drawings that I’ve got lying around, I took sections of some of my favorites, patterned them, and then printed them on fabric. Not yet sure what I’m doing with them, but the process has been satisfying so far. I think they’d make great bag...

I am super interested in the cross-applicability of science and design. As a geologist and a designer, I have always wanted to experiment with design techniques in the geosciences. I partnered with Dr. Christie Rowe at McGill University in Montreal. The students had an assignment to write a Geology-format paper on a controversial topic in tectonics. After writing their paper proposals, we moved them through a series of design synthesis and...

I spent January at my alma mater, Williams College, teaching a course on design during the school’s one-month Winter Study term. Sixteen fantastic students dove into design process for the first time and tackled challenges related to sustainability at Williams. They each presented their work publicly at the end of the month. Projects ranged from an interactive shadow wall to public architecture interventions to a laundry system redesign....

Every month or so we set up the salon at home. I’ve had about 9 years experience cutting Ty’s hair, and I enjoy it. Cutting hair is much like sculpture. There’s process and pattern, and with time, I’ve gotten better at my technique. I know which hairs to leave longer than others, and I not-so-secretly enjoy the power afforded to me by being the sculptor of the head. Here is a short stop motion capture of a haircut....

A friend of mine was interested in learning some exercises to boost her creativity. I have devised a few exercises that highlight and teach some of my favorite design processes. This assignment is about seeing patterns out of everyday life. Some patterns are obvious, others are found by looking closely at your surroundings and visually extracting, multiplying, copying. This is a quick and easy example showing how to create neat visual patterns...

On May 1, 2010 I was part of a panel at Williams College along with Susan Lyons, Susan Szenasy, and Beth Dickstein.  The topic was: “The Future of Design.”  I spoke about my take on design thinking.  It was an excellent visit to Williams and so great to be surrounded by super bright, interested students, Williams faculty, and of course the mind-blowingly cool other panelists.  My slides are  below. Open publication - Free...