SUBGRID ISSUE 009 Note: This week’s column is at the end. I’m also transitioning Subgrid from a strict weekly schedule to a weekly-ish schedule. Occasionally, you might receive it in consecutive weeks. Otherwise, I’ll aim for every other week. Your inbox and attention deserve respect and space, so I’ll send out Subgrid only when I have stuff worth sharing. PRODUCT DISCOVERIES Things I observe, try or love from makers who seem to put care & thought in the design. Just personal recommendations...
23 days ago • 8 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 008 The fall of the American monoculture, as Ben Fritz, writes in his long read for WSJ earlier this week, mostly centred around cinema as the tentpole: "Americans could count on the fact that their neighbors, their co-workers, or the stranger they sat next to on a plane knew the same pop culture as them and quite possibly had an interesting opinion about it. We talked about the stuff we had watched and listened to at work, on dates and at family reunions." While Fritz sees this...
about 1 month ago • 6 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 007 Welcome back to Subgrid. As the New Year is here, I'm thinking a lot about productivity. Particularly, slow productivity. "In the 16th century, Galileo’s professional life was more leisurely and less intense than that of the average twenty-first-century knowledge worker. Yet he still managed to change the course of human intellectual history." – writes Cal Newport in Slow Productivity (see This Week's Book). In Newport's words, underlying slow productivity is a concept of...
about 1 month ago • 7 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 006 As the last issue of 2025 being sent out on Christmas Eve, I want to keep it brief. For as long as I remember, I've identified as a curator. A curator of ideas and products, small and big. Apart from software interface design, the medium of writing is how I express myself best. I've long held on to the dream of curating and writing via a regular publication. Even though, I've had a blog for 20 years, I've never been able to stick to a discipline of regular writing through...
2 months ago • 6 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 005 As we near the 52nd week of the year, macro questions bubble up to the top of my mind. What design future are we heading towards in the near term? From what I can tell at the intersection of where I work (technology + design), it feels like everything is happening all at once. The technological era of the 2010s of apps and smartphones hasn't come to an end. Apple's services revenue (revenue Apple Inc. makes just from software, for e.g. iCloud+ or apps people pay for) last...
2 months ago • 7 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 004 A few years ago, I read 5 pieces of advice from a design futurist I subscribe to and it's been on my desktop in a pdf ever since. Every so often, when I get stuck in some temporary bout of pessimism around design or the future, I glance at that doc. I wish I could link to it, but the issue isn't available online anymore, so I'll quote the 5 things here verbatim and maybe you will find it useful: 1) Look at the world with wonder and amazement; 2) Be the optimistic contrarian:...
3 months ago • 6 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 003 Advertising is inevitable. But as consumers spending money we work hard to earn, we deserve more thoughtful typography, design and editorial in advertising in our daily lives. Partly thanks to the success of Google Adwords, online advertising over the last two decades or so has become a hellhole of clickbait and in-your-face elements that are devoid of soul and accessibility. One trip to a recipe website might drive this point home (making me reach for the "Hide Distracting...
3 months ago • 6 min read
SUBGRID ISSUE 002 Every week I read maybe a dozen or so articles about how people are thinking of generative AI in their work and domains. Lately, they've been increasingly more so about design. I was reading a piece last week by a designer named Steve Vassallo (now a venture capitalist running Foundation Capital). As I was reading it, I found all the bits relevant to what could be said about design & generative AI today. Except, that piece was written some two years ago. What does that say...
3 months ago • 6 min read
S U B G R I D ISSUE 001 Design is all around us. The work of a designer influences your life every day in big and small ways, even if you don't notice. It genuinely feels good to interact with objects and experiences that are designed thoughtfully. Good design nourishes the soul. SUBGRID is for the design curious. It’s my on-going catalog of curated signals of product design and craft. Of things and ideas discovered from around the web, and from designers, writers and makers all across this...
3 months ago • 7 min read