I’ve moved around design disciplines over the last 25 years, and this has contributed to the way I approach projects.

After studying Product Design (Glasgow School of Art), my first design job was in retail interior design (Designhouse), followed by shopper marketing (Vivid Brand). I then moved into brand experience (Landor and Imagination), before steering my career towards more civic work in the form of museum and heritage visitor experience projects (Event Communications, and subsequent freelance work).

This cross-sector, cross-disciplinary experience has given me a broad outlook in how to go about engaging people with brands, places, stories and ideas. I often act as a bridge between design and interpretation roles – or between a planner and designer in a more commercial design sense. I’m a firm believer in design ideas being built on a simple but strong rationale, and defining that rationale is often a key part of my work.

What next?… I’m interested in co-creation, seeing it in visitor experience work as a natural adaptation of a human-centred design approach from user experience fields. I wonder how techniques such as participatory futures might inform the practice of activist museums, for example.

And, where a museum’s remit might be constrained by its collections material and mandate, often with a retrospective gaze, I wonder if there is an opportunity for libraries to host something akin to an ongoing festival-of-ideas around current affairs – or lead in collaborating with museums, and others, in engaging publics in mixed media experiences around the more immediate issues of our times.

In essence, drawing on a broad range of influences, I’m continuing to explore and adapt the role of strategic creativity in developing transformative destinations that primarily have a public purpose.