Profile

Many a designer has claimed human connection as the root of their professional practice. After all, with buzzwords like empathy and human-centered jumping out at us from Medium articles and “about me” pages, it’s easy to get swept up in the hype and tack this one last keyword onto your identity as a designer. I’m […]

In my interaction design studies at California College of the Arts, I find myself designing on and for physical screens. I ponder the size of each icon (can a user easily tap it?), the micro-interactions lacing a scroll, pinch, or press-and-hold, adjustments from screen to screen (responsive design) and more. All of these activities rely […]

Black Mirror is a Netflix anthology series exploring the darkness of technology and its uses in the near future. It’s easy to see why it’s become so popular with mainstream audiences: the tech itself is at once wildly inventive and shockingly close to digital tools in our lives today. In addition, the show touches on […]

For a very long time, information architecture was this slippery thing that I’d only ever experienced in site maps and task flows. Foundations class was arguably our (IXD students’) biggest dive into these practices, likely due to the fact that, at the time, none of us were really aware of the complex frameworks underpinning our […]

Microsoft Word! We all know it, and chances are we all use it, too. But no software stays the same over time—that’s the nature of this iterative career path we’ve chosen. So let’s take a quick dive into Word’s history: Who designed Word, and when? Then called the Multi-Tool Word, Microsoft Word was brought into […]

I was a bit hesitant, at first, to choose Anisha Jain for my second biography. After all, virtually nothing is known about her “early life” (i.e., anything pre-college). I can’t provide any details on where she was born, for instance, or where she grew up – not even the dreams she held close during her […]

My IXD peers and I joke around a lot, saying things like, “Once you become an design major, nothing ever looks the same again.” Design problems everywhere! Design patterns everywhere, too. More often than not, to recognize the former you must first recognize the latter. How do things work? What defines them not working? How […]

The PDA and BrainPal in Old man’s War In Old Man’s War, a military-focused science fiction novel by John Scalzi, protagonist John Perry comes face-to-face with some startlingly intuitive technology. A trainee for the Colonial Defense Forces, he is equipped with a Personal Data Assistant (PDA), which is some kind of handheld touchscreen device, and […]

Man-Computer Symbiosis Take a look at the image directly above these words. What kinds of feelings does it rouse up in you? Comfort? Curiosity? Uncertainty? Dread? Either way, you’ve likely seen something like this before; it’s an example of what a symbiotic relationship might look like between a person and a machine. It may also […]

fitting the Machine to the Man What do you think of when you hear the term human-centered? It’s not the first time you’ve heard it. Out of ten LinkedIn profiles, it’s bound to pop up more than once—perhaps even alongside other tired words like empathy and detail-oriented. It paints a pretty picture, sure. Your design […]

Sharae Gibbs is the CEO and founder of She Designs, home of The Women of Color UX Design Course. An avid champion of women and celebrator of diversity, Gibbs provides training, mentorship, and support to hundreds of WOC designers, both emerging and seasoned. Please learn more about her through my interactive infographic.