Collabbook

Franziska Stroh
& Tim Bauer

About

In this project, we attempted to design a collaborative book using a web tool that we developed ourselves. The tool was intended to enable multiple people to jointly create a layout. It is deliberately unpredictable, aiming to move users away from conscious decision-making and toward intuitive design and play. The individual design elements were therefore intentionally conceived in a humorous way as “tools.” The book itself is a collection of four texts from the field of design, laid out by more than 41 different participants across 146 pages.

Design Rules

• Texts were predefined, one paragraph per page
• Tools modify pages via click, hover, or scroll
• Each double-page spread can only be designed once and is then locked
• Otherwise, complete freedom in design

Technical implementation

• JavaScript
• HTML
• CSS
• Der Cline

Conclusion

The project demonstrates the different approaches taken by designers and non-designers when they are given a new tool. This results in atypical double-page spreads as well as attempts to create classical layouts.