James Woolford Design

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User Research Is Storytelling

Ever since I was a boy, I’ve been fascinated with movies. I loved the characters and the excitement—but most of all the stories. I wanted to be an actor. And I believed that I’d get to do the things that Indiana Jones did and go on exciting adventures. I...
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Ambassaden by Bleed

Designed by Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen, the Ambassaden’s angular modernist stature holds a striking presence in the heart of Oslo. When it opened in 1959, it functioned as the US embassy until its closure in the early 2000s. Fast-forward to today – the building has been reopened and its...
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Full Pin by Rethink

Since 2020, engineers-turned-mushroom entrepreneurs Vathana Len and Daniel Vogt have been growing the fanciest mushrooms I’ve ever seen, from their shiny urban greenhouse in Montreal. From Pholiote adipeuse to King eryngii (I don’t know what those are either) and everything in between, Full Pin’s mushrooms are cultivated with meticulous...
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Rolus by Re

Back in the early 00s – the era when arguably Hollyoaks was at its zenith, and bellybutton piercings their most bejeweled – Botox was gradually emerging from the hushed clinics of Harley Street and LA to become part of common parlance. As such, brands cottoned on to the word’s...
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TwelveLabs by Pentagram

Remember when the conversation around gradients was about making ‘bad’ design look ‘better’? When RGB colours were frowned upon because you couldn’t print them? Yeah, those ideas feel a bit outdated now. HP Indigo can now run fluorescents affordably, and business card mock-ups (in RGB) are more about selling...
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Ten by Paul Belford Ltd

I’ve been writing about the work of Paul Belford Ltd. (Next Chapter, Spudos & Social Enterprise) for very nearly fifteen years. Initially, and admittedly, the articles practically wrote themselves, which was ideal for a self-taught designer with very little experience but keen to take an approach to learning that...
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Hip Pop by Robot Food

Running a design blog sharpens your eye for category conventions. Stick with it long enough, though, and you’ll start to see those conventions unravel. What once felt fixed begins to flex. This creates a challenge for writing about design: you’re constantly assessing the landscape, but that landscape is always...
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Buena Fé by Saint Urbain

Buena Fé is the first 100% organic tequila-based cocktail-in-a-can, and is made in Jalisco, Mexico, the ‘birthplace of tequila’, where the spirit was first distilled. The drink is made with 100% Blue Weber Blanco tequila, which means that all the alcohol in Buena Fé comes from the agave plant....
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being by Zuru Edge

What does Gen Z really want? It’s the question at the heart of a thousand nigh-on identical think pieces; and at the fulcrum, it seems, of endless board meetings chaired by Gen Xers, and populated by ‘geriatric Millennials’, like me. My generation was simple. We wanted avocados, didn’t we?...
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