Intro
The starting point of this month is literally going on a trip to Brazil. It was an amazing trip exploring Rio de Janeiro and its food and people. One of the highlights of my trip was definitely Brigadeiro, an excellent and simple sweet treat. This month, I was able to bring out a base version for the very blog section you're visiting right now. Of course, I have more plans for my website; however, it will take some steps to prepare before I can start developing again. Most of my focus will be on getting back up to speed and designing new sections of my website.
Short Intro: What's a monthly update?
Stepping back for a second, I'd like to introduce you to this type of blog post: The Monthly Update. Within these snapshots of my creative journey, or perhaps my life, I will take you with me. As I rant and dump thoughts, I'll try to explain the why, how, and what behind everything I'm doing.
Okay, let's continue then…
What's more, I want to prepare ahead of time with some sketches or conceptual stuff. This will prevent endless programmatic prototyping doom spirals, what a term that is, lol.
Following that line of thought, I wanted to study these topics:
- Website navigation bars
- How is stationery used to navigate (documents)
- Essay writing
- Design systems
- Transition from stationery to computer technology
Anyway, let's take a look at my month.
Lack of Time and Energy
First things first, let's talk about managing calendars and keeping high spirits—what I like to call a lack of time and energy. Possible culprit? My sleep schedule was somehow shifted by three hours. (Might be a result of the Brazil trip) Besides embarking on a creative journey, I am also a full-time employee for this corporate organization. Surprisingly enough, my corporate job has gotten very busy this month. Being asked to work for different domains and stakeholders is very exhausting and definitely throws my energy off.
Not to mention that my plans for researching design concepts are also quite ambitious and dense for one month alone. Although this isn't the first time my planning or goal-setting has turned out to be overly enthusiastic. As I will show later, I was able to learn something that will be useful for my creative journey. Another great thing is the support system I'm fortunate enough to have. Their support really keeps me going through these moments.
This Month's Yield
Despite the lack of time and energy... Did I actually manage to learn something new?
On the fun side, I spent some time writing essays, which will help me progress in my writing skills. Just like writing a blog post, the challenge lies in setting up a cohesive narrative and choosing a structure that can hold my arguments or findings. Though most of my time went to studying and reading about digital design.
First of all, I am planning to create a navigation bar (nav bar) for my website; one that feels both personally and thematically correct. So I decided to look into the evolution and essence of nav bars. Perhaps controversial and lazy, but I decided to use generative AI to create some examples, with each example representing an era or design system. What struck me the most was how, over time, the essence stayed the same, and how blatantly visible that is. A couple of questions pop up:
- Are there alternatives to the current standard horizontal nav bar?
- What is the true essence of a nav bar?
- How can I bend the rules?
Next up are design systems. I am interested in why, how, and what design systems are. So I decided to start by reading an article from one of the popular design software called Figma. They published a series of articles that explain the concept of design systems and how you can use them to solve your design problems. In the future, I might experiment by creating some of my own and publishing my own perspective on this topic.
Although it was an interesting article series, I realized my digital design challenges concern mostly me as both the designer and "client". I don't see the necessity for building an extensive and holistic design system. The point of a design system is to aid design teams who need clearer communication when tackling design challenges and chores more effectively and efficiently. This leaves me with a personal question about the strong points of design systems and how they can benefit smaller scales and scopes, which would be nice for my case.
For what It's Worth
In closing, the holiday season is coming, so I'll keep calm with my goals for now. Though I have to admit, I am bummed about not studying stationery and the history of how the world moved from analog to digital. 'Cause my interests and growing passion for stationery bring me to this inquisition.
To add to this, I believe it is worth studying how the use of stationery can be transformed into digital experiences and affordances. It will be useful for my personal design and aesthetics. As I have proven myself this month, I can read about new concepts and find reference material.
Meaning that next time I have time and energy to study, it will be a fruitful one.