Speaker Elliot Jay Stocks at the Interlink Conference. Photo by Steve Mynett

An edited version of the following article was published on DesignEdgeCanada.com on June 7, 2011:

Walking into the Interlink Conference felt a bit like witnessing two worlds collide. Half the audience was the hardcore designer set, with their retro haircuts and designer eyewear, the other half developers, with their nerdy t-shirts and techno-gadgets. Or was it the designers with the tees and toys and the nerds with the hipster fashion? The crowded auditorium at Capilano University was a sea of glowing Apple logos, and the line between designer and developer was so blurry it didn’t seem to matter anymore. In fact, perhaps that was the point. All of the more that 300 attendees and 15 speakers that came to Interlink Conference June 2 to 4 were there to share and learn from each other about how to make the web a better place and help people make their lives better.

Being the first ever edition of this conference format, rookie organizer Shawn Johnston opened the day by sharing his vision for Interlink, explaining that his intention was a “peer-to-peer discussion both among the attendees and between speakers and workshop leaders and the audience”.

The topic of inspiration sometimes seems ubiquitous at design conferences, but web industry veteran Denise Jacobs kicked off the conference by sharing practical tips for embedding this often elusive muse into a creative process “on demand”. Jacobs countered basic ides like ignoring our inner critic or giving ourselves permission to produce bad ideas with examples of strategies, habits and tools a web designer can use in the daily pursuit of creativity and inspiration.

“It doesn’t matter how much you like some ideas, as they may not like you back.” explained Portland’s popular and well-spoken design guru Frank Chimero. Stunning the audience by declaring he’d scrapped his planned presentation, instead talking about his personal journey, and the frustrations and revelations he encountered in his design practice. Using the metaphor of the painter stepping back from the canvas to evaluate the process itself, Chimero discussed the difference between the “how” of design (the techniques and tools we use) and the “why” (the choices we make). Chimero presented an argument that it was where these overlap that real design happens. Referencing the continuing rapid changes on the web, Chimero challenged the audience to consider that designers “don’t actually solve problems, they produce design responses” with a myriad of possibilities for most design challenges. “If we solved design problems, there would be only one Twitter client app.” joked Chimero to chuckles from the audience. “There’s a different between good work and valuable work, and we don’t have to choose.” Chimero continued “But valuable is how you get to good. The point is to make stuff to help us live better.”

The first of many UK designers was Elliot Jay Stocks, who used humour to challenge the audience to move past established Web 2.0 aesthetics with a straight-talking rant about “cheesy effects” and illogical choices so commonly made by web designers. Refreshing was Stocks’ contention that it was the obligation of serious web designers to learn the fundamentals of traditional graphic design and apply it online. “Bogged down by web design?” asked Stocks cheekily, “Then go do some print design—it’s so liberating.”

“Good design does not necessarily mean good experience”, argued New York-based designer Whitney Hess, as she explained her user experience philosophy and introduced the audience to a set of ten design principles anyone could apply in their own practice. The foundation of Hess’ approach was the notion that “user experience is the establishment of a philosophy about how to treat people,” echoing Frank Chimero’s earlier sentiment that good web design is about making people’s lives better, not just creating pretty graphics or cool effects. Through creative use of striking photography and a charming presentation style, Hess inspired many in the audience to frantically jot notes, a sure sign of a compelling conference presentation, and more than a few attendees posted tweets about how they planned to initiate a set of design principles themselves.

Still reeling from Hess’ inspirational talk, the audience next met UK-based mobile interface designer Sarah Parmenter, a straight-talking (and striking) Virgo perfectionist who claims she started designing iOS apps “because she likes surrounding herself with aesthetic things.” From the benefits of an application definition statement to a series of examples and techniques, her glossy presentation included practical tips and tricks for any web designer wanting to make the leap to designing interfaces for mobile devices—something she claims is inevitable for anyone in the web design field these days. Parmenter also emphasized the importance of respecting the user experience, a theme woven throughout the entire conference.

The most technical presentation of the day, Yahoo designer (and one of only two Canadian speakers) Jonathan Snook walked the audience through an overview of the evolution of CSS and demonstrated a series of useful techniques and tips. While not everyone in the auditorium were as engaged by this code-heavy presentation, Snook’s talk reminded all that using technologies such as HTML, CSS and JQuery is an important part of being successful as a web designer—and not nearly as daunting or awkward as in years past.

“At less than 15 years old, our industry is still young—it hasn’t even had sex yet.” began DIBI Conference producer and English web designer Gavin Elliot. He certainly got the attention of those in the auditorium, but it didn’t get much better unfortunately. His presentation, called “A Better Process” was billed as an intro to web design process which we could put into action to make our own work better than ever. “We don’t build websites, we build systems” was the most memorable statement in his slick presentation, while the core of Elliot’s talk lacked much practical or applicable learning suitable for this well-informed audience.

The final conference presentation was by yet another Brit, this time web designer Simon Collison. His presentation was arguably the most academic, rooted in the fundamentals of visual language as he discussed applying a more analytical approach to content and structure and how they affect the choices we make as designers. “The influx of type choices online requires us to think smarter about type design choices” argued Collison, echoing the sentiments of Ethan Dunham and others. His contention that static web design, versus adaptive or responsive web layout resonated with numerous attendees who could be overheard discussing ways to make their own interface designs more flexible.

Still buzzing from a jam-packed day of conference presentations, attendees returned to Capilano University on Saturday for hands on workshops by industry experts. Simon Collison continued his theme of the importance of visual language with his “Analytical Design” workshop, explaining some of the science and meaning behind the decisions we make and offering ideas and methods for improving design process. Canadian Steve Fisher, who argued that there isn’t any fundamental difference between UX and design, gave attendees practical tips on how to spend more time examining the reasons and motivations behind the functions and interfaces we create. “I’m in the process of blowing out at least 30% of my process because I think it has been lying to myself, stakeholders and other team members.” Fisher explained. “Things like static wireframes essentially lie.” Wrapping up the workshops was a pragmatic, no-hype introduction to HTML5 by Manchester-based developer and Opera Web Evangelist Patrick Lauke. ”HTML5 is a huge topic.” says Lauke, “People use it to refer to “really cool shit” for everything that is out there.” explaining that HTML5 is still basically a proposition under development, but in the final stages of review for W3C recommendation. “What people think of as HTML5 is most often javascript or CSS3.” explained Lauke. Attendees were treated to an overview of this new specification along with some useful training in new syntax/semantics, improved form interactivity, and the “flash-killer” features like native support in browsers for video, audio and canvas.

Aside from a few comments about the inconvenience of the venue location in North Vancouver, and the mayhem of the Stanley Cup playoffs (go Canucks!) interfering with some social activities, Interlink successfully delivered on its promise of bringing thought leaders together from all over the world to spark discussion and debate regarding the evolving and constantly changing face of the web. One group of attendees chatting over drinks on Saturday night discussed a longing to see more real-world project case studies and panel discussions next year. ”Apart from a few hard to follow and slightly obscure talks, I was thoroughly impressed with the level of quality of the discussions.” offered Calgary-based designer and developer Matt Trienis. ”Lately, I’ve been feeling like I need to step up my game, and Interlink really confirms that.” said Vancouver web designer Catherine Winters.

Congratulations to Shawn Johnston and his volunteers for hosting the first of what will surely be many more successful Interlink Conferences.

Photos from the conference can be on Flickr.

The Interlink Conference started with designers dodging balls

The following article was published on DesignEdgeCanada.com on June 2, 2011:

Web design veteran Shawn Johnston was frustrated by a lack of local forums for progressive conversation and collaboration aimed at propelling the web from a new industry into a mature and self aware craft. His response to this angst was the Interlink Conference, which launched this week with a dodgeball game. That’s right, dozens of the best and brightest in the field of web design and development from around the world kicked off what Johnston calls “an adult conference for serious adults” by throwing rubber balls at each other’s heads.

Taking place June 2 through 4 at Capilano University  in North Vancouver, the Interlink Conference website promised “discussions to inspire the web we imagine”. But aren’t there already a bunch of conferences with a similar mandate?

“SXSW was a disaster for me,” said Steve Megitt, a web designer from Toronto. “To me most conferences like SXSW or HOW feel more like hero worship with designers on stage showing off portfolio work more than a real learning or dialogue and debate opportunity.” This sentiment was echoed by others at the conference who felt that many large conferences have evolved into big parties better suited to industry juniors than anything suitable for a seasoned professionals seeking new connections and paradigms.

“My body is sore all over from dodgeball last night,” said designer Dan Rubin who kicked off the workshops on a rainy Thursday morning with a presentation about hands-on prototyping and user testing. The primary takeaway of this case study-based presentation seemed to be a focus on designing for user goals before company goals as an approach. In another popular workshop, Washington DC-based designer Samantha Warren lead a group through her approach to working successfully (and efficiently) with web clients. “She presented really well and gave awesome advice & tools” said recent interactive design grad Stephan Rosger. One notable example of this was Warren’s “style tile” approach of rapidly creating multiple examples of colour options, patterns, button styles, navigation treatments, and typographic possibilities on a single browser page. Inspired by swatch boards commonly used by architectural and interior designers, these early conceptual style tiles allow a client to consider and approve early expressions of mood, tone and style for their website design before much time has been invested in a particular interface design, essentially eliminating the need for multiple design mockups.

In another classroom across the beautiful Capilano University campus among the trees, a packed room of eager webbys hung on every word from Brooklyn-based designer Meagan Fisher. Attendees to Fisher’s workshop were treated to a peek into a master’s CSS toolkit, showing the power and capabilities of CSS beyond common simple effects. Fisher, who famously argues that web designers should literally ditch Photoshop (gasp), demonstrated in real time how to design rapid prototypes directly inside a web browser, where changes can happen quickly and evolve to better suit user needs or project parameters as they come into focus. Her argument is that not only is it faster with some practice, but leaves your developer with a solid framework for production without needing to slice and dice pixels.

As the gloomy rain gave way to a beautiful Vancouver sunset, webfont expert Ethan Dunham  closed the day with a workshop called Web Font Revolution. Dunham, who is the man behind
FontSquirrel.com and FontSpring.com, presented a three-hour crash course on the history of webfonts and demonstrated that web designers have essentially run out of excuses for bad type online, with nearly 100% support for webfonts and the technology to deliver and create them. Even so, he explained why it is continues to be a challenge to render fonts well in Windows, and encouraged attendees to join him in pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and demanding greater simplification of the current fractured licensing landscape. Shocking to many in the audience was Dunham’s disdain for fonts-as-service providers such as Fonts.com and Typekit. “Users should be trusted and offered webfonts the way desktop fonts have always been sold” argues Dunham. Dunham concluded with a challenge to the audience to take the time to learn the art and rules of beautiful typesetting and apply them to the web better than has been the recent norm.

“My goal with Interlink was to connect peers to peers rather than teachers sharing their wisdom with a room full of students.” says Shawn Johnston, “No craft is ever mastered.
We are all students.” Perhaps this youthful perspective is what motivated Johnston to kick off the conference with a game of dodgeball. Will the main conference day of presentations truly break down this teacher/student paradigm? We’ll see in the coming days. But the theme seems to have been embodied in the first day of this new conference with ideas and techniques delivered like a dodgeball thump to the head. Only in this game, everyone goes home a winner.

For more on the Interlink Conference.

WHERE

Start over. That’s the mantra of this fitness and nutrition company, and what we did for KINETIX Living (click here to view old website). Starting with their ubiquitous old brand based on “living”, something long ago usurped by the likes of Martha Stewart, Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig and others, we needed to create considerable distance from them.

The new brand needed to bury the old, soft, lighthearted and inauthentic and rise up with a bold, gritty and genuine voice that implies sports and athletics, and better represent the idea that this is a credible program for people who are serious about making real physical and life changes.

Speaking of people making real physical changes, for those of you who know us, you also know we are really into our food (foodists.ca). Over the years, our bodies haven’t exactly been exempt from the effects of our epicurean passions, so we found ourselves smack in the middle of the target audience and prime candidates for a complete immersion into the brand. Fortuitous really, since immersion into the brand is a key part of our process.

With a complete revamp of the business model coming in a short six months, the brand was just the beginning. We were also needed to translate the company’s new vision to an enterprise class web application and iPhone app.

IDEAS

Our goals were lofty, but not unobtainable:

1. Position KINETIX as the most cutting edge / current health & fitness company out there
2. Tighten the brand and related elements and create a great platform
3. Develop and convey our story in an emotionally connecting way, driving love and inspiration of the brand
4. Connect with our current and future community
5. Be ahead of the ‘wellness’ industry to enable us to grow into THE health & fitness brand

How’d we do it? Well, we started with research, then more research. In fact, the entire studio enrolled in the KINETIX program to get first hand insights into the company and the program. We literally lived, ate and breathed KINETIX. The other key was assembling a team for the software and mobile application development with Thirdi Software and Atimi Software. A finely developed process and tools for source control, issue tracking software, and project management were critical.

A new brand essence emerged from our Discovery process: Rebel. Ignite. Commit. The idea behind this was simply that this company was going to rise up from their status quo, burn down any paradigms in their way, and commit to a new way of doing things—this is exactly what they wanted of their clients. This gave way to the development of the new logo and brand filter, through which we would weigh all new work to ensure it was on brand. Additionally the Kx icon served as the inspiration for a new system of symbols used throughout the KINETIX program.

In tandem with the brand development, work was well underway on content and information strategy for the website and iPhone app. Working with this was no ordinary website either: Once a user was signed in, data was seamlessly synced to their iPhone or other device (and back), allowing them to track their fitness and nutrition, communicate with a coach and reference handy meal and restaurant information. The iPhone app is essentially a ‘coach in your pocket’, taking you through each day’s exercise routine step-by-step.

WORK

When the client applauded after we revealed the brand work, we knew we were on the right path. If success of the project was measured by Starbucks and YUM! Brands joining the program rollout, or when the iPhone app was approved and posted to Apple’s App Store in days instead of the weeks that is the norm, then we achieved our goals. However, nothing is quite as salient as when we hear things like:

“Industrial Brand and their partners are a tsunami of talent, passion and creativity. Beauty is skin deep however and IB goes beyond just the look of a brand to unearth the core values and key strategic positioning that will help a company differentiate itself in a crowded marketplace. IB is flexible and creative in their problem solving and didn’t flinch at helping us launch a new brand, new website and new digital app in a crushingly brief time line. Speaking from both the strategic goals and visual brand consistency that we required, IB delivered on all fronts.”—Lou Maxon, VP Brand Experience and Design, KINETIX

Launch website: kxme.com

We just finished a new identity and marketing campaign for a development project called District South Main for our client Amacon. The first teaser advertisements just hit the streets and the initial website has launched and is now accepting early registration. Check out www.southmaindistrict.com to learn more.

WHERE

If you haven’t ventured up Burnaby Mountain in a while you might be surprised to see how incredibly it has changed. UniverCity is the award-winning , sustainable and master-planned residential neighbourhood adjacent to Simon Fraser University. Since its inception a decade ago, it has become an international beacon for urban planners searching for an example of long-term sustainable community planning.

Our task was to examine the UniverCity name and evolve the identity then create a new website and other materials to appeal to all levels of community residents, developers, investors and government.

IDEAS

Following a number of workshop sessions on defining the communication goals and messages for the Trust, we developed a complete Brand Essence for UniverCity. This became the establishing work to lead us to naming options and, within a mandate to preserve as much of the equity of the original identity, establish a new and more vibrant colour palate and a completely revised wordmark.

WORK

We developed graphic standards and integrated the new brand look into all printed communication materials, and a new website. Additionally, we devised several unique direct marketing initiatives to get the attention of the development community, and get developers the tools they need to start talking about UniverCity in their own sales materials in a consistent manner. To respect the sustainable mandate of the community, all printed materials were printed on recycled, carbon neutral stock and printed at Hemlock Printers, one of the most environmentally-friendly forward printers in Canada.

The new site had to appeal to all target users on different levels and integrate marketing and sales tools such as image libraries for real estate developers. Areas of functionality such as open forums that in the past had caused problems were removed in favour of top-down blog-like content and information delivery. A simple to use CMS back-end has revitalized the administrative staff’s enthusiasm for posting, and has even had an impact on the communication avenues now available to them.

Initial feedback on the identity overall has been very well received by all. New wayfinding and more vibrant signage has dramatically improved navigation through the area and the overall look and appeal of street-level signs and banners. Feedback from the development community on waste-saving development calls-for-proposals and attention-getting, breakthrough marketing has helped the Trust immensely and solidified their leading position.

“The SFU Community Trust has been working with Industrial Brand for the past two years and we have found them to be an accomplished and highly professional firm that has shown a strong commitment to our organization’s needs. We have found Industrial Brand staff to be responsive and willing to think broadly and creatively about the projects we have engaged them with, and have found their outcomes to be consistently above our expectations.” - Jonathan Tinney, Director of Community Development, UniverCity

Launch site: www.univercity.ca

WHERE

Held every two years, Graphex is a national design competition put on by the Canadian design industry’s governing body. As such, the design of their materials, and in this case, the website, better be darn good. We had other mandates of course: the site had to be easily updatable; indexable by search engines; multi-lingual; appeal to designers and reflect the design theme of the ‘tournament ladder’. In essence though, the true purpose of the site was to encourage designers from across Canada to submit entries for GDC’s upcoming Graphex 2008 Design Competition.

IDEAS

The site brings to interactive life the look established in the print campaign and uses a content management system (CMS) for ease of updates and search engine indexing seamlessly integrated with Flash to allow for dynamic motion and interest.

Functionally, the site is divided into two parts: the left hand side to give designers pause to think about the potential impact (and power) their designs may have on the world around them, especially as a result of the exposure from winning a Graphex honour; and the right hand side serving to provide vital contest requirements, information and entry forms.

WORK

The entire campaign was a resounding success and the competition was the largest in its 30-year history with 25% more submissions than in 2006.

Launch website: www.gdc.net/graphex

WHERE

The identity of the recently merged programs of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at this leading Canadian university were suffering from a fragmented and underwhelming online presence. In comparison to the programs of other universities of this calibre, the site would have little influence on potential new students, and was not functional as a means to unite those currently in the program.

IDEAS

A key to the redesign of the SALA website was to present the UBC School of Architecture as a leader in the education of architecture, as well as to reflect a culture of design, research and community within the four recently merged departments. Additionally, the site required the delivery and management of a vast amount of program and admissions information in diverse graphic and textual forms in an easy to navigate format.

The site’s audience was identified as five distinct constituents, each with different goals, content priorities, and expectations for the website. The new site needed to present different information for each constituent. If a faculty member was to log in, their experience and permission to edit or create content would be different than that of a student’s or the public’s

WORK

In contrast to the many brochure-style school websites, Industrial Brand proposed that SALA present the exemplary work that is produced on an ongoing day-to-day basis by its community on their new site. The new design dynamically features content individually input by staff, faculty and students using a Drupal platform as a content management framework and an HTML and Flash presentation layer. Through the provision of individual blogs/conversations and the areas of the site provided to key groups, the site fosters interaction, exchange and exploration amongst the SALA community.

The site’s homepage greets visitors with three key navigational methods for entry to content: 1. Taxonomy – the familiar hierarchic menus along the top; 2. Folksonomy – a unique, sortable tag bar system along the right side; and 3. Chronology – time-based content like upcoming events/news displayed along the bottom.

“Industrial Brand’s process was educational, creative and productive, all at the same time. More importantly we are proud of the result (www.sala.ubc.ca), which has been a good fit with our unique design-oriented community and faculty, staff and students.” - Ronald Kellett, Professor of Landscape Architecture, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (SALA)

Launch website: www.sala.ubc.ca

WHERE

Stornoway Diamond Corporation is a world-class diamond exploration company with the largest diamond property portfolio of any publicly traded diamond company in Canada. The identity we were briefed to create needed to reflect the the status the company had attained.

IDEAS

The new identity symbolizes the primary activity of diamond exploration in the vast Canadian north, and the leading position of the company as pioneers in the industry. Mining for diamonds in the Canadian north conjures up images of vast, open spaces and cold, blue-hued ice – and of course diamonds.

The use of the half diamond icon allows us to layer it onto a wide variety of imagery related to diamonds and diamond exploration, effectively framing them with the brand. Thus, we are not limited to any one image to define this rapidly growing and changing company.

In fact, recent developments taking the company’s focus to other geographic locations around the globe, and a company merger, had us updating the brand even further, adding a complete set of secondary colours to define different project areas, and also refreshing the look with photography based on the original flexible and unique system we designed.

WORK

Over the many years we’ve been working with Stornoway, we’ve designed stationery systems, numerous trade show booths and no less than five annual reports. With the 2005 report we moved one step closer to the promise computers would reduce paper, building a CMS-based website with navigation mirroring what one would find in a traditional annual report. Since then, the basic structure has been re-purposed for every subsequent annual report, with updated designs of course.

The net effect has been a strong, consistent brand in the mining industry, one that is instantly recognizable and hold the highest standard others are continually reaching toward.

Launch corporate website: www.stornowaydiamonds.com
Launch 2007/8 online AR: stornowayannualreport.com/2008
Launch Styleguide: http://styleguide.industrialbrand.com/stornoway

WHERE

We maintain a soft spot for our architect clients. The reason is simple: they embrace the same basic creative processes we do. Marceau Evans Johnson Architects get it. They specialize in projects designed and constructed using a collaborative framework that fully involves clients, future users and sometimes whole communities in the development of a project.

They hired us to help them update and standardize the Marceau Evans Johnson Architects (MEJA) brand to better reflect their unique personality and innovative skills, and prevent the inconsistent usage that resulted from a decentralized store of various ad hoc logos.

IDEAS

The new Marceau Evans Johnson logomark is intended to resemble a cross section of 2×4 lumber, and the logomark, in combination with the “MEJ” portion of the wordmark reproduces this same 2×4 proportion. Wood is an essential building material indeed, but especially so for MEJA since it is featured prominently in many of their projects. The wood grain as depicted can also be viewed as a fingerprint: with the structures they create, it is a symbolic representation of the mark they, as architects, make on the land, communities and cultures.

WORK

With the identity refreshed, we delivered an online graphic usage Styleguide http://meja.ca/styleguide along with the new stationery system and electronic versions of all documents. This enabled MEJA complete control over their brand and no excuse for inconsistent use of the identity.

With the identity well in place, our attention turned to the creation of a completely new CMS-driven website that reflects the unique personality and innovative skills of the company. It also gives MEJA control over their own ever-changing content and sets them apart in the highly competitive architectural design field.

“Our work with Industrial Brand was really enjoyable, and clarified for us the importance of establishing a consistent brand identity, especially being in the architectural field where good graphics is so important. Their entire team had a high level of enthusiasm for all they did, and their creativity and technical expertise made us feel that we were in extremely capable hands.” - Greg Johnson, Partner, Marceau Evans Johnson Architects

Launch website: www.meja.ca
Launch Styleguide: MEJA Styleguide