Nathan Green
November 29, 2024

Inspirations from World Design Day

Held on April 27 each year, World Design Day recognises the ways in which design has changed the world and the importance of design in our daily lives.

Held on April 27 each year, World Design Day recognises the ways in which design has changed the world and the importance of design in our daily lives. Why? Because design can make the ordinary extraordinary, turn the mundane into the remarkable, and perfectly marry function and form.

So, we caught up with our Wizards Behind the Curtain to see what timeless designs have inspired them and how design has influenced our approach to collaborating with our clients and partners to connect major projects to audiences and stakeholders across Australia, New Zealand and North America.

“Our approach to design is always to put the user at the heart of every project,” said Spatial Media’s Creative Director Nathan Green. “Ultimately, good design must balance functionality with form, so our first approach is to ensure that whatever solution we are designing prioritises user accessibility, functionality, and ease of use. We then build on this principle, adding our knowledge of game design, community engagement strategies and technology platforms to build assets such as virtual engagement rooms that achieve the perfect balance of function and form.”

“It’s been interesting to see the designs and designers that have influenced our team, but as you will see from each one, classic design is timeless. My favourite is Fallingwater; it is the stuff of dreams, and its impact on design can’t be overstated; it’s why more than one team member is in awe of Frank Lloyd Wright’s design and vision,” said Nathan.

Here are the designs that have inspired us this World Design Day.

Matt Supranata, Senior 3D Visualiser – Fallingwater by Frank Lloyd Wright

"At almost 90 years old, I’d be surprised if anyone with a love of design or architecture hasn’t heard of one of the world’s most iconic homes," said Matt. Completed in 1938, the home was built over a waterfall and was intended to settle into the site’s rural Pennsylvania setting. It uses limited colours, with flowing designs, cantilevered terraces, and balconies designed to resemble nearby rock formations. The design also incorporates local materials and boulders, which feature as fireplaces and hearths. Wright also made sure that the devil was in the detail, with interior and exterior elements connected seamlessly using recesses in the stonework to hide joins and not interrupt the flow between outside and in.”

Alison Collen, Senior UX Developer – Cars, Mice and Racoons

“I couldn’t choose just one design; it's an impossible task,” said Ali. “As a UX Designer, you are continually immersed in designs and trying to ensure that above all they work for their users, so I am going to pick three designs that show what I think to be the best of style, simplicity and fun.”

It’s just the very definition of sleek. The aerodynamic design not only makes it “go fast” but also makes the car look graceful while doing it. I love the car's compact proportions, notably the smaller grille compared to its siblings, like the Vantage or Vanquish, which fits the car's proportions much better and softens the design. It is an automotive work of art.

The design is so simple it’s almost ridiculous. It’s a curved piece of glass that fits perfectly in my hand, and when I tap it, it responds. For a piece of simple technology to be so well-designed and comfortable to use…it is perfect.

Tails Noir

I am slightly obsessed with pixel art, which might seem to some as if I’m stuck in the 90s. This game brings the 8-bit image-style format right up to date with its stunning graphics and use of parallax. Quite simply, if I were tasked with designing a game, it would look like this. The game is a post-noir narrative adventure in which you can become raccoon private eye Howard Lotor and explore dystopian Vancouver inhabited by animals as you uncover a deeply personal story of change and transformation; what’s not to like?

Nathan Moro, Senior 3D Modeller - Avantgarde Trio G3

“Sure, speakers can be dull black boxes or works of art,” said Nathan. “But in both cases, they have to sound great, regardless of their appearance. For me, The Avantgarde Trio G3 is the perfect balance between the two.”

It’s a very unique design for a loudspeaker, highly efficient, simplistic beauty with a large canvas for the colour-shifting paintwork. I also think it is timeless as it’s hard to tell without knowing which decade it comes from; it could be 60 years old or 60 days old. It's a high-end design without compromising the performance of the object for the sake of that design, but with prices starting at $70,000, it will be a little while before I can upgrade.”

Blake Maverick, Brigadier 3D Generalist - Consolidated PBY Catalina

“Coming in at the tail-end of the Gold Age of Flight, the Catalina, for me, is the culmination of everything that made my personal favourite type of aircraft, the Flying Boat,” said Blake.

“It is such a special, timeless design that combines American excess and some big fat radial engines, all bolted to an amphibious hull, allowing it to go anywhere. At this time, global travel was, sorry - starting to take off, and there would have been a huge sense of excitement about how the world would open because of the age of flight. When you think the Wright Brothers only took to the air in 1903, it’s amazing that we went from the Kitty Hawk to the Catalina in just over 30 years.”

from our clients

Spatial are my go-to for solutions

Spatial are my go-to for solutions nobody has dreamt up yet! They have an incredible knack for combining tomorrows tech solutions with creativity, intuitive UX and analytics. The results are engaging interfaces that are impactful and ultimately bridge the gap between project and stakeholders.
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Kate Kernaghan, Company Director, Factotum Communications

They look tremendous, the team have done amazing work!

Our booth very popular - the corflute poster was so incredible to point at our ideas, even at a concept level. Well done to you and the Spatial Media team!
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Rainer Knobloch, Co-Founder - Strategy and Operations

It was a pleasure to work with everyone

Spatial Media masterfully brought our CETO wave energy technology to life and provided a glimpse into how we're harnessing the immense power of the ocean to create clean, renewable electricity. Thank you to Spatial Media - Visual Engagement Solutions for their incredible work on this animation!
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Brighid Jay, Chief Commercial Officer, Carnegie Clean Energy

A very straightforward and fun process for EnergyAustralia

From the initial kick off meeting to the final video, it was a very straightforward and fun process to work with Spatial Media. The final video is outstanding and really helped bring the project to life for our stakeholders. Highly recommended.
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Matt Bruers, Development Director, Wooreen BESS, EnergyAustralia

Top shelf solutions for North East Link project

Spatial Media offers top shelf solutions that help tell the often intricate stories around the construction of major infrastructure. From animations to 3D models, dealing with Spatial has been seamless, and the end results have been first class.
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Jamie Aldridge, Communications Manager, Spark – North East Link – D&C 

Airside Driving Simulator an important part of the training program

It can be storming outside. It could be night time. Any time of the day or night we can create these simulations. It’s very flexible.
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Niel Young, Training Coordinator, Brisbane Airport

Enhancing and innovating communication for Melbourne Airport

Spatial Media is an excellent partner and we’ve been impressed by the work the team has produced for Melbourne Airport to help inform our travellers and community about our terminal upgrades and new runway. They are great to deal with and deliver a polished product with creative thinking and a can-do attitude.
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Andrew Lund, Head of Media and Communications, Melbourne Airport

They are our go to tech-savvy experts with huge amounts of creative flair!

COVID19 social distancing restrictions made having our large scale community event nearly impossible, so we decided to take our face-to-face event online. Spatial worked really closely with us to develop the concept, design and platform that would host our virtual community event. The Spatial team are exceptionally creative, with a fantastic ability to bring your idea to fruition in a way you never thought possible. They made our pen on paper scribble into something that over 45k stakeholders visited online, more than what we could have reached in person. Thank you
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Emily Divitaris, Senior Communications Advisor, WestConnex

Valuable long-term partnership with Brisbane Airport Corporation

The Spatial Media team are always professional, well organised and continuously deliver high quality content pieces on time and on budget. They bring new ideas to the table and constantly adapt to changing requirements. I would highly recommend Spatial Media to all.
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Lauren Graham, Head of Commercial Marketing, Brisbane Airport Corporation