Aesthetics of interaction

In the Aesthetics of Interaction course, together with my group, I designed “Forgive and Forget Me Not,” a pair of interactive flowers representing a symbolic “break-up wake-up” experience for couples in long-distance relationships. The concept uses the familiar interaction of picking petals to represent emotional uncertainty in a relationship [3]. When the user removes a petal, the partner’s flower visually and sensorially responds, encouraging the couple to talk about it. Throughout the design process, I learned how aesthetics of interaction communicate functionality through material, movement, and multisensory feedback.

I applied theory from the Frogger Framework [2] and experience prototyping [1], learning to translate emotional scenarios into meaningful interaction. Through prototyping with magnets, LEDs, scents, and mechanisms, I explored how physical interactions could convey different messages and initiate different actions. We demonstrated our design while practicing Wizard of Oz techniques to enhance the experience. The aesthetics of interaction invite us to view design as a language through which products and technologies communicate with us, influencing our feelings, behaviors, and perceptions. I now better understand how to design products to indicate certain functionalities, be expressive, or minimalistic.