InnovationCreation

I wrote about the Tyvek Wallet from Dynomighty Design Inc in early February and mentioned I received lots of questions and complements:

• "Is that a wallet?"
• "Wow, that is a cool wallet!"
• "Tyvek??? What's that?"
• "Is that an envelope?"
• "That is a pretty neat wallet, where did you get that?"

I still get questions and comments about it. Just this morning the Hubbard & Cravens barista asked me what my wallet was made of. I told her about the wallet, how I got it, who made it, and where she could get one. So in one conversation I mentioned Dynomighty Design, Tyvek, The Indianapolis Museum of Art, and my family. So one product elicited a connection multiple interests and levels, to me of course. When was the last time you got that from your wallet?

Labels: conversation, idea virus, innovation, tyvek

After my post on spaces to think, do design, and innovate, Mark Henson, chief imagination officer for sparkspace, sent me a note with info on other design/innovation/thinking spaces in the USA and a few outside the USA that I had not mentioned.

What makes a great space? The space certainly has to be inviting, big enough for your team, not be too distracting yet inspiring for you to want to be there. Some adjectives from personal observation: open, light, fun, inviting, playful, colorful, surprising, wants to be utilized, supportive.

• open: This means open space, freedom to move, not confined by a barrier (desks, walls, etc).
  
• light/colorful: Colors do play an important part in the way you feel and act within an environment. Having light from the outside helps people feel better.
  
• playful/fun: When people get together to design and think requires an element of fun. The space has to help support and even generate the opportunity for fun.
  
• wants to be utilized/inviting: The space must beg you to step in and participate.
  
• surprising: Spaces that surprise can help generate ideas or off shoots to ideas that might not have occurred in other settings. Surprise can come from what the space has (food, toys, gadgets, oxygen bars) or the way the space operates (super staff, space lay out, space reconfiguration).
  
• supportive: All spaces must have the basics that when they don't exist become annoying or inconveniences. Pen, paper, bathrooms, food, drink, ability to park, lunch / dinner spots away from the space, etc.
  

Labels: deep thought, design, innovation, space, thinking

This last weekend I had the chance to participate in a discussion of the ideas from Deep Economy: The Wealth Of Communities And The Durable Future put on by Smaller Indiana at the IUPUI Herron School of Art and Design. Bill McKibben, the book's author, presented for about 30 minutes and then a group of Citizen Panelists dialogged about the core ideas contained in the book and related that to central Indiana: consumption & growth, local food, and durable futures.

After the event, I had the opportunity to chat with Bill about a recent interview he gave where he said he preferred the words Mature and Durable over Green and Sustainable. I asked him to elaborate.

He said that we as humans have no connection to the words Green and Sustainable; when we are young we know we will grow and that growth is a good thing. Once we reach a certain age we stop growing (physically) and move into a mature state. In this context, mature is understood because we live with its meaning. As an aside, Bill said that, unfortunately, the word mature has been taken over by the AARP and can have good / bad meaning, depending on where you are on the age curve:)

Sustainable is another word we have no direct experience with in day-to-day life. When you say something is "sustainable" what do you really mean and how can I relate to it? However, we do have life experiences for the word "durable"; when we buy something of cheep plastic we know it is not going to last, but something made of fine leather or wood has the feeling of longevity and is durable. Look at the tools made by Durabuilt... they even took the feature of the tools, durability, and made it part of the product's brand name. Trying to do that for the word sustainability (sutainbuilt?) ...

Labels: community, environment, future