Interaction Styles: An Aesthetic Sense of Direction in Interface Design

In architecture and industrial design, the concept of style plays a major role in education as a way of establishing an understanding of visual design expression. In this article we claim that interaction design can benefit greatly from an understanding of the concept of style. It can provide designers with strong visions and a sense of direction in designing new interfaces. In particular we focus on Solid User Interface design, i.e. products with small displays and a limited number of keys, because of the tight coupling of interaction and industrial design. We explore style theory and an aesthetic for interaction design and report on an experiment with introducing interaction style thinking in a user centred design practice in industry. Further we open the discussion about parallels between our approach to interaction design and the dominant styles of the 20th century Scandinavian design in particular.