Lead Experience Designer
- Qualitative user research
- Placemaking
- User experience design
- Facilitation
- Visualisation + Storytelling
When developing the brief for the upcoming GCEC, the MCET recognised that there was a gap in their understanding about how different users (event organisers, attendees, locals, etc) would engage with the centre. The MCET contracted Paper Giant in the planning stage of the build to complete user research to inform the architectural brief.
We were tasked to create a set of experience and service design principles to help future practitioners involved in the design of the physical, operational and experiential aspects of the build keep important user values front and centre of the design process and support consistent decision making.
In addition we were asked to complete a market analysis of the events space and identify ways the GCEC could differentiate its branding, technology offerings, design and experiences to stand out from competition.
A community-based approach was taken to collectively reimagine and shape the new precinct. We conducted a series of 28 interviews and 5 workshops with a group of end users to create a comprehensive list of requirements that defined the physical, technological, cultural and environmental experiences that the GCEC should provide.
Participants were carefully selected to ensure we captured the broad perspective of people that would use or be affected by the centre. This included event organisers, prospective attendees, locals, staff, industry professionals and the first nations community of Geelong.
Interviews were used to build our understanding of the problem space and capture the unique perspective of each user group. We then used the workshops to create an opportunity for collective ideation, validation and discussion. During these sessions we asked participants to capture what their ideal GCEC experience was in a series of user stories which informed the concepts and design principles.
I distilled the discovery research phase into a set of 9 prototype experience and service design principles that covered the physical, operational, technological and user experience aspects of the precinct. These principles were then presented back to the user groups in the workshops and a survey to allow the group to collectively refine the principles, ensuring they accurately captured their feedback and were understandable to a wide audience.
To ensure successful implementation, I created a set of goals and metrics that the MCET could use to evaluate proposed designs to ensure they adhered to the principles.
Using the principle as a base, I created a series of 18 concepts that envisaged how the principles could be brought to life in a future state vision. These concepts were a combination of designs that I developed in response to research insights and solutions co-designed with participants in the workshop phase.
To communicate these concepts, I illustrated a series of storyboards each centred around a different user type that showed, rather than told how the concepts and principles could be brought to life.
The principles, concepts and storyboards were packaged into a research report that was included in the architectural brief for the GCEC. The report also included our analysis of current and future trends in the events space and recommendations for how to position the GCEC to differentiate it from other event spaces.
Paired with the report, I created a series of 9 posters that provided a short, sharp summary of each of the principles to help the MCET share the principles with a wider range of stakeholders.
The outputs from the project went on to inform the brief of the GCEC which is currently in the design phase.
