On #Black Lives Matter

Forgive me if you feel that what I’m about to write makes you uncomfortable, because you may have a different viewpoint about the following matter and don’t expect to read someone like me to write about human rights and political issues who publishes a website mostly dedicated to design. However, design is about humans and the collective history and narrative of how humans treat each other what makes this profession (as a designer) so fascinating and important.

Mural in Berkeley near Ashby St and Adeline Ave

For the past few weeks I’ve felt a need and a responsibility to weigh in the conversation and write something about the events unfolding and the horrific killings of George Floyd by a policeman kneeling on his neck for more than eight minutes and Breonna Taylor being shot in her own home and the outpouring of protest that’s followed. 

I left Europe in 1995 for America not only because I pursued opportunities in design and technology following a scholarship I won for Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, but I also left (Europe) because of the repercussions and traumas that I inherited from my parents, who were children and victims growing up during World War II. They have witnessed and experienced some of the worst crimes humanity has endured, and I always and naively believed America was the savior and liberator from those perpetrators who were racists and Nazis in Europe harming and murdering millions of innocent people, simply because they believed that they were of the wrong ‘race’. Yet, quite unexpectedly, I’ve come to painfully witness especially since 2016 is that fear, hatred and racism against African Americans (not Jews, as I learned it in the past from my parents) are among the most powerful forces on earth and almost impossible to eradicate. This has really always been true throughout human history, but in American society we tend to focus only on a handful of their most strident expressions. And even then, we really only consider with any depth our finest moments, those historical events when we’ve been able to marshal truly potent responses: the Civil War, the Second World War (as I mentioned was perceived by me as European as Americans being heros and liberators), the Civil Rights Movement.

Now, more than two decade later — after having left Europe for good, I’ve also come to understand that the real menace of fear, hatred and racism lies not just in these flash points of history, when the contrast between freedom and tyranny are most stark. The real menace is in how infinitely adaptable and resilient these forces are.

Even after they’ve been put down, disbanded or made to heel, they find a way, again and again. They discard their censured hallmarks, whether it’s swastikas, skulls, chains, or segregation laws. And then they change — evolve — into new, more subtle ways of exerting their influence; they co-opt progressive ideals and insert themselves into virtuous agendas, and they assert themselves in popular culture and common language. Their inflection point, the moment when they’ve succeeded, is the moment when society at large accepts them as policies, as laws, as common sense, as pragmatism — while assuming that these methods apply to “other people.”

This moment in time is ripe with human potential, and we must act on it, and we must transform it from mass protests to structural change. But our challenge is also that we must also renew our vigilance and our ability to understand how fear, hatred and racism will adapt and change yet again. Because they will.

It feels distasteful to me to salvage any kind of a silver lining from the horror of George Floyd’s death, but I am grateful for the way that public support for Black Lives Matter and for systemic change in policing has surged over just a handful of weeks. That’s reason for hope that we all will engage in a dialog and awareness of this issue.

I’m also grateful for the clarifying light that these events have thrown on own my understanding, and humbled by the realization of how much I need to do to live up to the principles that I endeavor to pass along to my children. Particularly the idea that we cannot right the world simply by not doing wrong — we must do right, too, and particularly we must do right by those who have been perpetually wronged. Especially when their lives are being unjustly and viciously sacrificed by a brutal system.

I’m grateful for the understanding of how much work and processing we all really need to do. I will start today and remind myself about how much I need to learn, how much I need to ask, how much I need to listen, how much I need to speak up, how much I need to read, how much I need to expect of myself and of my family and my friends, how much I need to give, how much I need to change anything I can possibly change.

A thing of beauty

Have you ever wondered, whether your software (or product) could be as beautiful as nature and touch humans in a similar way?

What if technology could be as beautiful and meaningful like a butterfly wing, or have the depth of a night sky in the desert? Or, what if it was almost invisible and soft like balmy air if it is only your content that matters, say when you want to edit a movie or sound clip, or write your novel or research material for your memoir? These are the type of questions my team and I have asked ourselves for over 20 years when designing products for the world’s most iconic companies, typically, with amazing outcomes. For instance, when designing ProKit, a new design language for Apple, we got inspired by glow in the dark creatures living in the lightless depths of the ocean, and the dashboards of a car, because we needed to create interfaces at Apple that would only show GUI elements on demand that people would use and need when editing film in a dark editing room.

Nature inspired the interfaces of today.

At Huawei when we created the look of the P-Series and needed to update EMUI, and give it its own ‘hallmark’ look and feel — different from anything that the world had seen before — we turned to nature again and got inspired by both, nature’s palette and forms. While we ensured that the human interface would fulfill all requirements of accessibility, it turned out that our preferred and primary color palette for EMUI, with a blue hue as the primary default color and an expanded palette with both analogous and complementary accent colors was an excellent choice, both from an aesthetical point of view. and in terms of usability: the user interface turned out to be clear and robust: clear because it helps people navigate the interface with distinct calls to action. Robust, because we accommodate all kinds of users, including the color blind. We succeeded to lower the cognitive load by lowering distractions. We not only keep people’s eyes solely focused on the essential aspects of the interface, but also created delight by eliciting positive, visceral reactions.  

P-Series ‘twilight’

Often some designers are criticized for wanting to create something beautiful. As if creating something that was a delight to the senses was superficial. I am a firm believer that design should not only be functional, but also aesthetically pleasing — to all senses, the visceral senses — also known as gut reaction — included. I also think that function and aesthetics aren’t mutually exclusive. I have learned, if you intend to create a product that works well, it should feel and look good, too. And, that being said, if something appeals, it doesn’t mean it was created to appeal on the surface only. Quite the contrary is the case. A deeply aesthetic design is usually the result of an elimination process where every element or attribute has been carefully considered until it has been designed and selected as a part of the final product or experience. Many nos to one yes. I am stating these observations not only from the perspective as a designer, but also as a student of the humanities and a musician — I was formally trained in classical voice and piano for many years, before I decided to focus on design at Art Center College of Design in the 1990s which were an important decade and turning point for design from analog to digital. Back to music: as many people know from their own experience, music is not only a great source of delight, it is also virtually impossible, to have people listen to a piece that’s performed somewhat out of tune and expect them to to enjoy it. Not without reason, humans love harmony. Something similar happens when people eat or prepare food. If there are too many ingredients in a dish, or the wrong kinds coming together, something isn’t right. Yet when the right flavors are combined, sometimes in a very unexpected way, magic happens. Therefore, great attention to every detail in design matters. This is my take on design, because everything can and should be in harmony, both functionality and aesthetics, not only those that appeal to the eye, but to other senses, too.

I visited with my team the California Academy of Sciences many times to learn about the life of color and other exhibitions. The Naturalist Center is home to hundreds of specimens and hands-on activities for all. We shot a Huawei documentary at the academy while creating the look and feel of EMUI and the new P-Series device.

Meet my new site and showcase.

…meet my new site & design studio showcase. Hi. Welcome to my site. So happy to have you around. 😃 You might be curious to learn who I am and how I approach my work and what I believe. You might wonder what’s that look about the butterflies and the sky? Well, I’ve created this site to help answer all these questions — at, least I’ll try — soon.

If you want to learn why I picked a blue-white color palette for my website and other design attributes, read my colophon page.

If you haven’t met me yet: I’m Abi Brody and I help make products, services and experiences that people love. Because what matters to people, matters to business too. If you just stumbled both on my site and this blog by chance, go ahead and explore. A great place to start is my ‘about’ page, ‘work‘ and ‘studio’. Perhaps you want to launch a new venture or business for the digital age. Amazing, because I love to help people and companies who want to change the world. Maybe you are just curious about me. Great! Whatever the reason, contact me and tell me how I can help.