#aigasf

Tonight I went to the event, A conversation with John Maeda and design leaders from eBay, held by AIGASF and located at Zendesk, where they have a beautiful and huge space for events!

To be honest, I really have a small database of well-known designers in the world, especially I'm really bad at memorize English names. It took me a while even memorizing Jony Ive. (Steve Jobs is not in this case though.) Anyway, I wouldn't have been to this amazing sharing by John Maeda if AIGA wasn't looking for volunteers. Thank you AIGA for giving me this opportunity!!! Now I know who John Maeda is and what great works he has done.

John is really a great speaker. I felt fully concentrated and engaged while he was talking. He shared about his thought process before coming to Silicon Valley and after, and the relationship between design and Silicon Valley. Does Silicon Valley need design? Or, is that design needs Silicon Valley?

The part that I also thought about a lot is when John was talking about "Top-Down". In any given company structure, people on top have more power to make decisions, so any change from bottom up will be hard and little. It's clear that the more the leader thought about design, the greater the company can grow. That's why when he saw John Donahoe, eBay CEO, and Brian Chesky, Airbnb CEO, had a meaningful conversation on the stage, it gave him a ratatouille-moment. They are both CEOs and they both know the value and importance of design.

Watching him talking about how the CEO brought design thinking into the huge company and had the courage to try new stuff, I'm really moved. I want to make change in the place I'm working with, but I feel lots of resistance, and don't know if I'm should insist to push it forward, or the leaders are the one that should take the move. The more talks I went, the more expectations I put on our leaders, and I'll look back at myself thinking that maybe I'm not trying enough?

Borrowing his words, I'm also thinking about how to elevate the value of design thinking, but actually what I need to do is to reveal the value of design thinking. This shouldn't be anything new, but I look at this as a strategy to talk about design to non-designers, and it's brilliant! I'll have to think about how to implement it from now on.

A free AIGA Student lecture: please spread the word!

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IBM Design lead Doug Powell outlines design on a massive scale.

After more than two decades as a self-employed designer and design community leader, Doug Powell got a real job. In 2013 he joined the leadership team of IBM Design in Austin, Texas. IBM, one of the largest and most respected companies in the world, is building a global design operation to bring human-centered design to this traditionally engineering-driven organization. It’s an ambitious vision on a massive scale. Doug will tell the story of his career transition and connect this all to his passion for the emerging practice of design-driven social change on Thursday, March 27th. You’re invited to come see him at the Academy of Art University’s Morgan Auditorium located at 491 Post Street. Doors at 6:30pm, lecture at7pm. Everyone is welcome. And it’s free.

  Event details 

http://www.79nm.com

More about IBM design

[ Photos by: SFPaparazzi / See photo album HERE ]

We know how important protecting your work can be. AIGA San Francisco is hosting a talk on copyright infringement on Aug. 15th. If you're in the area check it out.

Written by Lexie Tiongson [ Images by: Sam Jang ] Creative minds, modeling talent and invoking fashion designs were energized at San Francisco Design Week's fashion show Saturday night. The show was colorful, confident and appealing for any fan of San Francisco fashion.

Hosted by SFFAMA and Astro Studios, the runway navigated beautiful talented models and designs from Jennifer Schmidt, Rogue, JYJZ, Scott Ian Mcfarland and Audrey Szeto. The highly innovative show was secured with perfect ensembles meant to produce a fanciful image for luxury, texture and effortless creation.

With every direction, Owen Geronimo succeeded this runway show as the creative director. The music was phenomenal and on point, with a twist on what might be a true San Franciscan's Pandora station. And Astro Studios proved to show that great interior design and runway can truly mix.

But the real standouts of the event were the astounding drinks provided by Izze Sparkling Juice and tasteful h'orsdourves provide by Cheat-a-Little catering.

In efforts to make a great runway show, the collaboration between SFFAMA, Inc., Astro Studios, AIGA SF, SF Design Week and Fashion+Tech SF cultivated every point of design achievement and fashion victory.

This event was sponsored by 360 Fashion Network, Fizz Marketing, Izze Sparkling Juice, Hip Swap, Smart Energy Shots and the SFIEC.

Lexie Tiongson interns for Stipple as a Fashion & Style Specialist researching celebrity fashion trends. She has also had editorial internships at Shojo Beat Magazine, NOVO Magazine and The Sacramento Press. She currently writes for several magazines including Arielle Simone, We The Urban Magazine and UniversityChic.com, and is a contributing writer for SFFAMA. Lexie majored in journalism and fashion at San Francisco State University and currently attends Academy of Art University studying fashion journalism and visual merchandising.

Join SFFAMA, Follow SFFAMA, Like SFFAMA.

I just got back from my first trip to San Francisco which turned out to be an unbelieveable experience.

The trip was for two events planned by the AIGA chapter at Cal Poly, which I will be VP for next year. The first event was our annual design studio tours that we do in LA and SF. My friend Lindsey, who is membership officer of the chapter, was able to line up some incredible studios for us to visit. My group and I got to visit Moving Brands, Title Case (Jessica Hische and Erik Marinovich’s side project), Landor and Lux Design. These companies and people within them have been a huge inspiration to me, so it was just unreal meeting them in person. I never thought I’d be sitting next to Jessica Hische talking over cake and donuts, whoa!

It gets better. The next event was AIGA SF’s Portfolio Day which was held at California College of the Arts. This is one of the biggest events AIGA puts on for us students because it is our chance to have our portfolios critiqued by leaders in the graphic design field. I was fortunate enough to talk one–on–one and have my portfolio reviewed by two of my biggest design idols, Rob Duncan of Dowling | Duncan and Tom Crabtree of Manual. I also was able to have a lead designer from Turner Duckworth be one of my reviewers. The feedback I got was both eye opening and motivational and is something that is really going to benefit my portfolio. Brand identity development is an area I really have acquired a passion for, so it was so great talking to leaders in this area. On top of that, Rob Duncan and Tom Crabtree posed a lot of interest when I asked them about speaking at Cal Poly next year and taking tours of their companies!

Thanks to everyone that made this weekend all that it was!