UX Discursive Design
This project is an example of discursive design, a practice that uses designed artifacts to provoke reflection rather than solve problems. Discursive design encourages cultural inquiry through speculation, ambiguity and storytelling.
Parametric Studios imagines a future aesthetics clinic where cosmetic procedures are reversible and trend-based. If perfection becomes accessible to everyone. Will imperfection become the new form of individuality?
My Role
The project involved speculative and cultural research. I developed the concept and promotional materials for a fictional boutique offering reversible cosmetic procedures. The website prototype deliberately borrowed the layout and aesthetic of a high-end e-commerce site, which I adapted with speculative content to shift meaning and provoke reflection. I also contributed to the exhibition’s spatial presentation and created supporting visual storytelling through scriptwriting, editing, motion design and voiceover.
The outcome is a discursive artifact composed of two elements a context video and a website offering cosmetic treatments that can be reversed. The project aims to provoke reflection. It also incorporates the logic of dark patterns. Parametric Studios profits from imperfection by encouraging users to adopt visually distinct modifications, then monetizing the process of returning to a more socially accepted appearance once the trend has shifted.
Context
We follow a young woman through her everyday life: texting with friends about their latest procedures, heading out for coffee and nightlife, and finally logging onto the Parametric Studios website to purchase her next look. These moments reflect how personal identity, peer culture, and algorithmic beauty trends may merge.
The project operates from an inquisitive mindset and a provocative aim. It does not take a stance for or against cosmetic procedures, but instead frames a set of open-ended questions: What happens when beauty becomes as changeable as fashion? What is lost when every face becomes optimized? Through speculation and critical framing, the project invites reflection rather than resolution.
Website
The website prototype functioned as one of the touchpoint in the exhibition. Designed to simulate a speculative beauty service, it intentionally borrowed the structure and aesthetics of a high-end e-commerce interface, creating a familiar environment disrupted by subtle differences as a typical discursive design strategy to encourage critical reflection. My contribution focused on shaping the speculative concept, adapting the visual language to a future context, and framing the interaction as a critical design artifact that questions how cosmetic modification could be normalized.
Poster
The exhibition combined a poster, a video, and an interactive website to present Parametric Studios a speculative aesthetics clinic from the year 2074.
The poster introduced the concept in a clinical, subcultural tone.Together, the elements formed a discursive artifacts designed to provoke reflection on identity, beauty, and technological control.