Grand Rapids

Clive Owens and Experiential Design

Left to right – John Berry, director of Design West Michigan, with Clive Owens. On Wednesday, February 5th, Design West Michigan hosted a lecture featuring Clive Owens, founder of Society for Experiential Graphic Design. It introduced me to something that I hadn’t known much about before – experiential design. Experiential design is the category of …

Design/Educate/Connect at the GRAM

Design/Educate/Connect partners with the GRAM to showcase local entrepreneurs who bridge the gap between design and business.  On Friday night, the third annual D/E/C event featured seven business owners. One defining characteristic of D/E/C is the fact that the interviewees are interviewed by people who they know well – often colleagues, friends, or partners.  The …

Two Start Garden Projects That You Should Endorse

Start Garden is the Rick DeVos – powered venture capital fund in Grand Rapids. Instead of going the traditional investing route of picking a few business ideas and hoping that they are profitable, Start Garden is investing small amounts in a greater number of businesses, and offering guidance and further investments down the road. Every …

Process: Collaborative Projects

Design is all about process, and that’s especially true of large, long-term projects.  This semester, I’m taking Collaborative Projects, and we’re working with the Grand Rapids Public Museum to create a traveling exhibit. The first step in the our process was research.  On the first day of class, we went to the Van Andel Museum …