Clever Design for a Non-Stop Train

Via Kottke

Bus Stop Designs

Hey! Take a look at these fun bus stop shelters.

What could we resuse to create practical spaces and art at the same time?

This purple bus shelter seems to resonate with Robert Venturi's house below...

http://blog.designpublic.com/

For more interesting bus shelters see Village of Joy's blog post:

http://villageofjoy.com/interesting-bus-stops-around-the-world/

And right in our backyard...

Denver University Station

Design and Branding

The goofy picture of the baby first caught my attention, but the topic is interesting. Branding has changed over the years, to the point that today, the design of logos and other marketing features is a huge tool. Interesting concepts to consider in our marketing, designs, and even our personal consumer decisions!

To see the full post...

http://www.designobserver.com/archives/entry.html?id=38882#more

Enjoy!

Via Design Observer

Architecture and Interface

This is an interesting article from one of my favorite blogs about the parallels between the process of designing a building and the process of designing an interface. What could be more perfect for HB&A, since we do both every day!

One quote:

Good design supports intuitive pathways within the structure. The design accounts for the most common use cases and makes solving these use cases obvious. In our work, we always want users to have a sense of where they are and where they can go.

Link

Clever Wayfinding

This parking garage is painted so that you can see which way to go if you're looking at it from the right angle.

Link

Thanks, Doug

Microsoft Trying to Compete With Sketchup

Microsoft has purchased a 3-D modeling program called trueSpace and released it for free. You can build models and place them in Microsofts Virtual Earth.

You can get trueSpace here.

via Digital Urban

Paths

"Collect all the paths you can think of in a pile, pull out the 8 paths that 80% of your visitors come looking for, and that’s your home page."

A lot of planning is about information design, and it is very important to separate out how we experience data from how the user of a plan experiences it. We may think it hierarchies, but the user thinks in paths.

A good short blog post about the difference between paths and hierarchies. Could be important in the way that we think about our website or our plans.

Link

Via 37Signals: Signal Vs. Noise

"Think Star Wars storm trooper without the helmet"

Real Life Iron Man suit.

Link

Thanks, Matt!

British Coins

Awesome design from a graphic designer that had never done coins before.

Link

Via Kottke