It%u2019s so inspiring to read about people's journeys into the arena of design! Thanks to all who've shared. Here's my story...
I have always been a designer, but did not know it for many years. I've always drawn, and imagined things that did not exist, and tried to make the world a more user-friendly place. I love to put things together, and was always the lone girl in the model airplane shop. One of my fondest memories when I was living in Beijing, China from 1983-1985 (when I was 10 - 12 years old) was spending a weekend creating a model of a washing machine that worked without electricity...cutting up straws and taping cardboard and all that good stuff! My freshman year at Stanford, I tried to get into the over-crowded ME 101 course, but was bumped for being too young and writing down "English" as my potential major. Ah, the road not taken! So I was a Modern Thought & Literature major while studying in Paris, France during my junior year. With a crazy guy I met there, I spent many long nights inventing & building a novel triangular binder system (and we design-patented it, too) as well as starting up a business doing trompe l%u2019oeil paintings in people%u2019s homes. But apparently my bourgeois self still didn't realize that I could make a career out of making things.... Flash forward two years after graduating with a terribly useful English & French Literature degree. With a go-nowhere day job, I was charged up by doing interior design projects for friends. When I sat down to make a list of possible career moves, I was mainly pondering whether I should a) go to art school or b) pursue a philosophy PhD. Then, the lightning bolt struck me: that DESIGN would unite the creative & analytical parts of myself. I could go on about my steps & career after that (attending San Francisco State University for a master%u2019s degree, freelancing in web, graphic & exhibit design, and then getting recruited by Cooper) but this thread is about that revelatory moment. For me, it truly was a thunderous experience to recognize that there was a professional path that would let me imagine, create, and make things for a living. All the different design fields that I have studied formally thus far (interior, exhibit, web, graphic, industrial and interaction) share a common process and approach. Practice in any makes you stronger in all. I didn%u2019t even know about interaction design at the time of my epiphany in 1997, but for me, this amazing field we are championing has the perfect combination of human psychology, concrete analysis, artistic creativity and intellectual rigor, with a nice dash of theory & philosophy thrown in for good measure. Woo!! Cheers, Liz P.S. Merry Christmas to those that celebrate such a holiday (I'm utterly secular about it myself), and Happy New Year to all! P.P.S. Don%u2019t forget to send in your application for a position on the IxDA Board of Directors before Dec 28! :) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=23679 ________________________________________________________________ *Come to IxDA Interaction08 | Savannah* February 8-10, 2008 in Savannah, GA, USA Register today: http://interaction08.ixda.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
