What an awesome disguise for electric ‘cupboards’ found on public streets! This one I spotted near Kings Cross.

Taken this morning during an early run around 7am -it was dark, but there was a red tone to the sky which was quite beautiful.

Went to the beautiful Rose Garden in Hyde Park, which smells amazing and has stunning flowers, not just roses. It’s incredibly well kept. I hope to one day live somewhere where I can grow some flowers in a small garden. Here are some photos!

Yesterday at the Aging2 event at the Design Council. The overall goal of the evening seemed to be about generating interesting thoughts and discussion about Aging2’s goal:

“Aging2.0 is a global network of innovators who are collaborating to accelerate business innovation for the 50+ market. Our goal is to improve the aging experience and quality of life for older adults around the world. “

Me and Kirsty were very welcomed when we first set foot inside the small lecture space inside the Design Council, and were greeted by Stephen from Aging2.o who was moderating the event.

Just before the speakers took the stage, everyone in the room was asked to introduce themselves in a short sentence, asying what they do and where they work etc. I thought this was such a nice detail, that really adds to creating a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. 

I really, really, enjoyed the event and listening about what great things are being made to help support the aging population and people with dementia. I hope there are more of these events in the future.

I don’t have my notebook with me at this moment, but tomorrow I’ll upadte this post with my most memorable phrase from the night. For now, some photos of the speakers below!

David Sinclair from the International Longevity Center, talked about some really interesting (and shocking) data and behaviours about the aging population.

David illustrating how Interflora discriminates the 60+ age group, as their birthday balloon range only goes up to 60 years old.

Amanda Gore from the Design Council - presenting some products developed for people with dementia, aiming to solve some of their needs with technology. 

Adrian Westaway from Vitamins Design, showing his research project in collaboration with Samsung where they studied the user experience of opening a new phone box, and observing how people read the instruction manual and began to use their phone. Very interesting project. This is one of their solutions from the research gathered: really simple instruction cards with RFID tags on them. 

At the BT River of Music Festival today - Asia Stage. Was a beautiful day… 

Some belated photos of the amazing Made by Many Summer party from July the 5th! A super fun night.

Cooking with Nicki on the day of the party. 

Just before the party started, sun was shining and office looking beautiful with lights hanging from the ceiling. 

The beginning of the night! 

Amazing balloon woman made us amazing balloons. 

Rob and his alien hat. 

Me and Kirsty got matching balloon bracelets for our dresses. 

Chris wearing the Alien hat!

Inside the Picle booth!

The view outside at the end of the night. 

The end of the night… 

At the Friday Late at V&A yesterday.

The theme was: De/Constructing Architecture: Exploring the interplay between architecture and the visual arts. 

By rotating a handle attached to this huge roll, you would pull our the guide to the Heatherwick Studio exhibition, and tear it off! Brilliant idea. 

My outfit from yesterday seen from above. 

Took a trip to the heavenly Scandinavian Kitchen with my Mum this weekend. I discovered them on Twitter last week. It’s filled with delicious delicacies from all over Scandinavia and they import a lot of products such as cheese, salmon, spices, sweets, sauces, caviar….the list goes on and on and on.

I was sooo happy to find that I can buy some of my favorite Swedish food here in London. It felt like my Mum’s kitchen back home away from home, which is always filled with delicious Swedish products that we love. I bought my favorite hot chocolate in the world, O’boy and knäckebröd (hard bread). In the meanwhile I sat down and ate one of their  delicious wienerbröd.

Thank you Scandinavian Kitchen, I’m so happy I found you.

Watching the Portugal x Czech Republic game last Thursday in Stockwell, at ‘Nacional de Londres’ a Portuguese restaurant. 

Sebastian Seung at London School of Economics

I had already heard LSE do brilliant public events with influential figures. Today I attended my first and heard Professor Sebastian Seung talk, a Professor of Computational Neuroscience at MIT and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.  It was centered around his book Connectome: “How the Brain’s Wiring Makes Us Who We Are” (Check his profile on TED talks here.) It was a 45 min talk with 40 min Q&A.

It was really interesting, although I felt Sebastian could have gone into more detail about the science of what really goes into our brains with more real life examples - he left me a bit hungry for more. Some photos of the inside of LSE’s New Academic Building. 

Almost 3 months at Made by Many - What has inspired me and where is this path taking me?

I think it’s quite important to live the present, but also think about the future, particularly on a professional level. It’s almost 3 months since I first started on March 5th, as a Service Design intern at Made by Many, and I’m at a point where I need look at everything I’ve learnt here and try to envisage my future ahead.

Am I doing a good job? Has my work/presence made a positive or negative impact on projects?  Where would I like to be after these 6 months? Well as you’ll understand from my pictures and reflections below, I am very happy here, and at the moment I can’t imagine being anywhere else for now, mainly because of two reasons - 1) The great atmosphere created by the lovely people who work here and the beautiful office space makes it a naturally motivating place to work, and 2) The diverse projects I’ve been involved in have taught me many new things and faced me with new challenges (check images below). I know for sure that for now I want to be working with service design, and the part I have enjoyed the most is working with service users and understanding where their problems lie, while connecting the dots back to us, answering questions like “how can we make their life better”? 

Here are some more short learnings about my time here so far, and some that have shaped my understanding of the Made by Many way(s)!

1 - Drawing and Sketching is at the heart of Service Design

These are some of my sketches working on the future of Picle App - I had never really been introduced to how helpful and essential sketching journeys can be - although they may sound so obvious. I hadn’t done that much UX work before, so this has been a very strong learning tool and I know how important it is now.

Sketches when talking about the future of Picle App -I think these were made by Paul.

These are Paul’s drawings. Every time he is talking to me and has a piece of paper near him, he draws stuff to try and illustrate the points he talks about - he is great at articulating things. The service designers here seem to be natural born sketchers. 

Kirsty’s beautiful drawings have inspired me very much. This is a large wall in one of our meeting rooms where she’s planned out the user journeys in a very understandable way for one of our projects.

3 - The Agile Way

Planning Poker - cards to estimate effort for Taskboard stories. This was a method completely new to me, and I found it a very interesting collaborative exercise, patiently explained to me by Nicki in the first few weeks here.

Some notes from a chat with Cath - She was very insightful and taught me a lot about user testing and how I could talk to Picle users to understand their habits and problems. (one of my favourite tasks in Service design is talking to users and connecting their needs)

3 - The Made by Many magic

There are certain ‘happy things’ that happen in this office that really add to the positive environment. Most important of all it helps getting to know everyone else better, rather than always sitting in front of our laptops all the time. I call this MxM Magic :) 

The Made by Many supper club 

It was a beautiful and warm (27C) weekend in London. We spent it in the sun, and even managed to get a slight tan, imagine that! Just wish it would always be this warm here, but you can’t have it all.

Saw this house in Portobello Road yesterday - there was something about it that struck me and I had to stop and admire the harmony going on here. Everything about this house feels at peace, the house looks so cosy. The warm purple and the flowers draping on the front, as well as the subtle grey of the front door and windows - all fit perfectly with the symmetrical design of the house. Basically I love this house-front, from colors to architecture!

I can only imagine how beautiful it must be inside… 

At the Jose Gonzalez concert last night - beautiful! http://picleapp.com/anacecilia/stories/1401