Brief
Design a way to intensify how we experience human hair
Team-mates
Jumleena Bhagawati, Changlin Hou (Charlie), Manfredi Montaretto, Linjia Fang
Date
27/10/22 - 3/10/22
Welcome to UX of Hair. For this project, we worked to explore and design a way to intensify how we experience human hair. In this project, we will seek to explore the cultural significance of hair (both in its presence and absence) by investigating its place in contemporary society and culture. We had to use two distinct research methods, bodystorming, and directed storytelling for the purpose of this project.
In this blog post, I have presented my documentation of our observation, research, and prototype-building process that we did as a team of 4 on the project "UX of Hair". I have also discussed the feedback received on the prototype and my reflection on the week's work at the end of the post.
- The Project Timeline -
- Observation-
What is hair? Hair is a protein filament that grows from follicles found in the dermis. Hair is one of the defining characteristics of mammals. The human body, apart from areas of glabrous skin, is covered in follicles that produce thick terminal and fine vellus hair.
But what is Hair?
Exploring The Research
Hair is almost like our own personal platform that allows a form of self-expression. But sometimes it is governed and policed constantly through notions of race, class, cleanliness, religion, and family institutions. The power hair holds over our worth and identities is one that is often used against us.
Hair sometimes allows us to fit into our society's impression of who we are. Our teammate Charlie narrated his experience of cutting his hair to fit into his friend's perception of how his hair should look like.
Sometimes it plays its part as a symbol of rebellion and non-conformation.
Whatever it was, we observed that hair definitely makes a statement.
- Design Process -
Brainstorming
We started out by mapping what interested us about hair on a piece of paper. Then we analyzed and narrowed down a few common topics that interested us the most.
After the discussion, we discovered our interest in the relationship between culture, status, religion, and hair.
Interview
In order to dive deeper to know more about what hair means to people we started our research.
For Directed-storytelling:
We interviewed people around the UAL campus and asked them about what their hair means to them.
We successfully interviewed 10 people and took pictures of their hair from behind.
Then in order to understand how other people would perceive their hair, we made a questionnaire. We went around again, but this time with the questionnaires in our hands and the photos on our iPad. We showed people the 10 different hairstyles of the volunteer and then asked them to answer whether they like that particular hairstyle and what they thought their occupation is.
Working on the Design
Body-storming:
To explore this further we tried different ways by which we could hide our hair and take photos. In order to further our research on change in the perception of people in the absence of hair we started building a model which could successfully hide the hair.
The design for our prototype was very simple. We used a cardboard box as a base for our prototype. Then using a cutter we cut an oval hole in it through which people can put their heads without showing their hair.
Goal
To see whether in the absence of hair will our perception of someone be any different.
- Prototype & Experience Design -
Our prototype was extremely simple to use and wear. The person wearing it just needs to put their head in the box and push their face out through the opening in the front of the box.
The above gif shows how the design works
We documented us trying our prototype and this was the final result.
Us wearing the prototype.
- Evaluation & Feedback -
Finishing the initial week, our prototype was by our classmates in UAL. The feedback was very mixed. As our prototype was mostly meant for research purposes the feedback we recieved was very much anticipated.
After seeing the demonstration the class came up with the following insights to help us with our concept and design further down the road:
1. It was not very experienceable. There were suggestions of letting other volunteers draw the hair on the cardboard beside the volunteer's face.
2. It did not convey our idea well.
3. We were asked to zoom in on a particular topic of interest and analyze it thoroughly to find the links and see what we can discover from that.
-Reflection -
While doing the project we took so much time in doing our research for a concept that we did struggle a little as a group to arrive at a solid concept for our prototype during the 1st week. We decided to access all the materials we have so far and change our direction for the prototype. With a hint of an idea of how we could proceed for week 2 after the presentation, we decided to wind up our first week's work and get on with developing new ideas for the following week.
- Reference -
Davis, Angela. Angela Davis: And Autobiography. London: Women’s Press, 1990.
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