OTHER

[INTRODUCTION]

First impressions are everything.

Will yours be one of one, or one of many?

OTHER® is a 5-step, project-based design method developed by Joshua J. James. Its premise inquires: how can design be used to introduce a product or service’s unique Self? The “Self” being its authentic identity and distinguishing qualities.

It was created with the belief that the world doesn’t need more brands, but rather, more effort to solve real, human problems. That’s why OTHER® rejects branding for branding’s sake by identifying and emboldening the things that make brands valuable in the first place: the solutions & utilities they offer.

Inspired by frameworks from thought-leading organizations and universities, and informed by insights gathered from creative projects on behalf of prolific modern institutions, the method is most tailored to commercial design sprints, but is intentionally wide to span a variety of use cases.

Just as the other invites us to gaze into the mirror, this method invites us to find identity and belonging in the entities we're creating.

[METHOD]

The process begins when there's a brand that doesn't yet cohere to the value it provides—an organization, product, or person whose meaning and expression aren't aligned. There's something to find about who they are, and no clear path toward how they should look, sound, and feel.

0 — INTENT

OBSERVE

TRANSLATE

HARMONIZE

EXTEND

REFLECT

1 — OUTCOME

The result is a coherent brand identity with a resolved approach that's been translated into form and language, reconciled across every constraint, and extended across every touchpoint. Success is fit: the gap between who they are and how they appear has closed.

[CONTACT]

To learn/teach the method, or to book a creative project of your own, please introduce your self:

hello@other.ooo

"Change is the procreation of the self and the other. The infinite is begotten through their sameness and their difference."

—Thomas McEvilley
Art & Otherness