Collaborative Unit Review

Whilst it was only two weeks long, the Collaborative Unit had a big impact on us as students. The increase in pace from a two-week project to only 5 days applied pressure to every decision and made the high points very enjoyable, however, also emphasised the low points as well.

Week one with Claire Farrell was fascinating; her boundless energy, engagement and passion was inspiring, and the brief was tangible to get our head around and action quickly. I thought all the groups produced fantastic catwalk experiences, and the format of physically demonstrating the design as a performance worked really well, and allowed us to take pride in what we had created together.

The second week with Rosie Oliver had great elements to it, and I could really see the depth of psycho-geography and its place within creating experiences. However I feel that it was an extremely tough brief to comprehend and design for within a week. Additionally, it is worth noting that requiring us to visit Hackney Marshes (a fair distance for some students) meant that design work couldn't start until Tuesday afternoon, leaving us with an even smaller length of time to action a difficult brief.

Due to our lack of a viable design, both the evening before, and directly after the week 2 presentation, I felt extremely defeated, had lost confidence in my abilities and questioned my place here. As a successful designer with a rich portfolio in my previous field, to be knocked down so swiftly by a 5-day design challenge was unsettling.

I feel the collaborative unit was good fun overall, and the format of short projects gives us opportunity to develop more skills in a short space of time. The cohort now know each other very well and enjoy our projects together, and therefore have been the biggest support in the more difficult challenges in these two weeks and beyond - this will be the best take away into Macro UX.

Collaboration team 1. Photo credit Qibin Cheng. Collaboration team 2. Photo credit Roshni Suri