Will Evans
Will Evans is Director, Experience Design for Semantic Foundry with 15 years industry experience in interaction design, information architecture, and user experience strategy. His experiences includes directing UX for social network analytics and terrorism modeling at AIR Worldwide, UX Architect for social media site Gather.com, and UX architect for travel search engine Kayak.com. He worked at Lotus/IBM where he was the senior information architect, and for Curl – a DARPA-funded MIT project when he was at the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science. Prior to Curl, Will was an interaction designer for Dataware working on various search (Northern Light) and KM related product suites including KM Suite II and QueryServer.
His passions include design and critical theory, information architecture, information visualization and red wine. He lives in Philadelphia, PA, drinks far too much coffee, wears only black, and was Design Co-Chair for the IxDA Interaction10 conference in Savannah, Georgia in February, 2010. He was elected to the board of directors of the Information Architecture Institute.
A distinguished speaker, Will provides lectures and seminars on such topics as user experience, strategic design, social interaction design, and findability. Will’s work has been featured in numerous publications including Business Week, The Economist, Fortune, MSNBC and the Wall Street Journal.
Will’s current activities include:
- Founder, Experience Designer at Semantic Foundry
- Director,Information Architecture Institute (http://iainstitute.org/)
- Design Co-Chair, IxDA’s Interaction10 Conference (http://interaction.ixda.org/)
- Founder, IxDA DC Local Group (ixdadc.ning.com)
- Kahuna, Contributing Editor, Johnny Holland (www.johnnyholland.org)
- Member: ACM SIGCHI, UPA, IAI, IxDA , AIGA
Will Evans weighs more than 174lbs in the morning. He’s American with thick dark brown wind swept hair (except when its held in place by various salon products). He nearly became an investment banker when he left school (Occidental College ’94) and started work for a Boston real estate investment firm. For three reasons, investment banking didn’t grow on him:
* He found excitement in computers, art, and ideas;
* Investment Banking is just a fancy name for accounting;
* He hates accounting.
His favorite wine would be a bottle of Penfolds Grange Hermitage. Ideally a 1976, but let’s not get too picky. The Grange Hermitage is red of course. But his favorite colour is black. He isn’t sure why.
OK, OK. For a creative that’s a bit of a cliché. To say he is passionate about ideas is to say that Warren Buffett has a mild, fleeting interest in money. His first love may be for creative ideas but this preoccupation extends to ideas from and for every area of human and non-human activity that involves complex information systems. In other words, all-inclusive. Ideas are what make life worth living for him.
“What can I say about Will that hasn’t already been said? He quite literally sets the standard for every component of what can be considered interaction design. He is a tireless worker and educator. And this only complements his ability to listen completely and critically, and truly apply solutions for where people and clients are at. I’ve seen him lead teams as large as a defense contractor to as small as our work on the IDEA2009 conference, and in every case, he lays out a clear plan that creates win-win scenarios for all parties: the client, the development/design team, and of course, the people who will be using the technology. From start-ups to large-scale redesigns and information visualization, you won’t find anyone more qualified than Will.”
Michael Leis , Strategic Consultant , Michael Leis
“Will Evans is one of the most impassioned people I know. His mind never stops, making connections between today’s foremost issues and historical precedents from a wide range of fields. His analytical abilities are unparalleled, and the wealth of knowledge from which he draws on is nothing less than staggering. Not only is he a highly sought after user experience consultant — having worked with the world’s largest agencies, best-known startups and much loved brands — he is also a mentor to many up-and-coming practitioners, and even many seasoned ones. His reputation for brazenness proceeds him, and is a welcome change to the echo-chamber lip service that has been all too pervasive in our community. The man never sleeps, never stops learning, never stops teaching, never stops giving back to the user experience community in long-lasting, meaningful ways. He is one of the most, if not the most, prolific contributors to the various mailing lists, sharing his unconventional realizations, answering people’s questions, providing links to valuable resources, and just generally giving his time to those who need it. The most remarkable thing about him is that despite his never-ending contributions to the community, he has still managed to stay out of the spotlight, always working behind the scenes to make the experience better for everyone else. Will Evans is unusually qualified to serve on the next board of directors of the IAI because of his absolute independence, unwavering dedication, rare work ethic, terrifying smarts, and deep desire to help bring the practice of user experience far beyond where we are today.
Whitney Hess, User Experience Consultant
“Will holds a vast library of information and wisdom that seemingly knows no limits. It’s not often you come across those that can inspire you, and force you to re-think your assumptions and ideas with the goal of improving how you can think, process and innovate. Working with Will is not a recommendation – I view it as a requirement if you are truly going to drive teams, and yourself to evolve and improve your game. While I hope that I can, one day, prove to be as resourceful a resource – with the integrity and depth of Will, I know that continuing to learn and work with him will only help me continue along my own path of evolution – understanding critical approaches to building products, working with teams and providing thoughtful and inspiring leadership.”
“Will is not only an advocate of great experiences, he also is open-minded and open-sourced in his approach. I spent about 8 months writing a book, and Will constantly offered his time, shared his work, offered pointers and advice–and also found opportunities for his own growth. Not only did Will share all of this with me, he also made sure he had a platform to share it with any other person who had a desire to review his work, mash it up and make it better as their own. There are people who are driven to succeed and there are those who drive their greater communities to succeed. Will is very clearly a leader in both of those regards.”
Russ Unger , Author , Peachpit Press
“Anything I write that ends up appearing on the same page as what Will Evans writes looks inferior. He is a very intelligent person coupled with an artistic flair. The type of person who not only paints the Sistine Chapel, but could also describe in detail the physics behind the ceilings arched support structure; all while the rest of us stand far below with disposable cameras and fanny packs. Will was a pleasure to work with and challenged those around him to work as passionately as he does. One of his challenges was to create a Twin Technologies brand experience from the ground up. Will delivered something that is visually beautiful, simple and engaging. Will is a superb member of any team.”
David Ladd , SVP Operations, Managing Partner , Twin Technologies
“I worked with Will at AIR Worldwide. Will was a senior Information Architect. He contributed tremendously in fixing existing products as well as helped designing new products. He constantly generated great ideas during our brainstorming sessions and meetings. He is very well versed in curent tools and tecnologies. He specializes in ‘user centric design’. His art reinforced by his technical abilities would prove to be extremely valuable for any company. He is very highly recommended.”
Susan Modak , Sr. Web Developer , Air Worldwide