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This book's layout is itself an experience in experience design. With its dynamic typography and visually elusive chapter divisions, it is definitely not a how-to manual, or even a primer on software. It's more like a visual and textual think-piece: a personal gallery of intriguing user experiences, e.g., online shopping or offline dinner parties--even human-to-human conversation. (You can get an idea of this at the book's companion Web site: www.experiencedesignbooks.com.)
Every spread is filled with images (in some cases, the very typography is like an image) that illustrate specific issues in experience design. Examples range from Web sites to traffic signs to restaurants. Whether discussing a young woman's online diary (www.moments.org); the seating arrangements at Emeril's Delmonico restaurant in New Orleans; the complaint community at www.kvetch.com; the garden-like bounty of Nokia cell phone covers; or the "simpler" experiences of matches, tarot cards, or Bang & Olufsen home media products, author Shedroff invites readers to figure out what the attraction is, what keeps the user engaged, and how the experience gets resolved. Among the general topics explored are navigation in information design, usability in interface design, and narrative structure in interaction design. All come with both online and offline examples (e.g., the Louvre for "offline" navigation and www.thehungersite.com for online usability).
Shedroff is an experience strategist and has designed experiences in a variety of media, especially interactive and information design and branding. His client list includes Herman Miller, Nike, Bell Atlantic, Swissbank, and Microsoft. In 1995, I.D. named him one of the 40 most important designers in the country. Here his analyses, like the form of the book, are open and flowing. Whether he's discussing wayfinding, personal meaning, or the use of metaphoric devices, Shedroff raises important questions for anyone involved in design today. In many ways, this book is like a list of author's faves--albeit, a list in which each item illuminates some kernel of contemporary design wisdom. --Angelynn Grant
Book Description
With Experience Design, Nathan Shedroff has designed and written a book for those in the digital and related design professions, especially those creating online and interactive media who are looking for core inspiration and meaning in their work. This is a book directly at the intersection of today's design disciplines - interaction design, information design, visual design, and more. Shedroff provides not only a way of designing online experience, but also, and more importantly, an approach to all design, whether it be of products, services, environments, or events. Read cover-to-cover, Experience Design is a kind of textbook that presents theories and examples. Opened to any page at random, it is a source of inspiration that challenges your thinking about your creative work.
Book Info
Textbook presenting theory and practice in interaction design, information design, visual design, and other parts of the field as a whole. Includes a companion Web site with the latest information on the subjects in the text, as well as reference information. Offers a holistic view of how to approach online design. Highly illustrated. Landscape format. Softcover.
About the Author
Nathan Shedroff has been an information and interface designer for over eight years. He worked with Richard Saul Wurman as a senior designer at The Understanding Business, helping to design the Pacific Bell Smart Yellow Pages and the book, Information Anxiety. He co-founded vivid studios in 1990, leading creative teams in developing new interaction paradigms for digital reference tools, online worlds, and productivity software. Nathan was nominated for a Chrysler Innovation in Design Award in 1994, and lectures regularly at Stanford University and San Francisco State University. He has spoken at numerous industry-related conferences, and university programs in Helsinki and Tampere, Finland, Amsterdam, and San Francisco. More information about Experience Design will be available at his web site, nathan.
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