Hi,
I am Thamya, Brazilian designer graduated in Industrial Design by the School of Design of University of Rio de Janeiro (Bachelor) and finishing a Master of Arts degree on the University of Arts of Bremen (Oct 2011). Having background on Product Design, Graphic Design, New Media Research and Concept, my actual interests are on Design Concepts, Design Research and Trend Research.
Welcome to my portfolio! Here you will find a selection of my agency, academic and experimental works. For any questions or comments, please contact me: rocha_thamya[at]yahoo.com
For more information about me: curriculum vitae
Global Design: an intercultural analysis on Rio de Janeiro and Bremen – Master Thesis Project (M.A.)
Design Concepts / Design Research / Trend Research
University of Arts Bremen, Germany – Dec 2010/ Oct 2011
The project "Global Design" is a design research based on the comparison between the Brazilian and German culture. The main interest was on the everyday life of normal people, especially when they are outside, at the streets, moving from one place to the other or just relaxing outdoors.
Three main aspects were chosen as guidance for the study: Food, Mobility and Informality. Each theme passed through the following steps of research: documentation, analysis and implementation. The documentation was the flâneur moment, sometimes a detective work or even stalker. This was the moment for observing, discovering, taking pictures and gathering information. The analysis was made in two stages, first the evaluation of the material collected for each city independently and then from the results of it, a cross-cultural comparison between the chosen relevant aspects. For each aspect, on the implementation, one characteristic that is present in one city was transformed in an action and tested on the other location, as a cross-cultural experiment.
The project, through an extensive research on the two cultures, aim to promote a better understanding of both extremes, through the material exposed or even through the “shock experience” of living other culture.
"Global Design" was the opportunity to reunite in one project some of my main professional interests. It's the result of a passionate study on design and culture and I wanted to share the joy that this project provided me with you, for checking the detailed project, please visit
the blog www.thamyarocha.com/blog
Trend Union – Internship
Iconography Research / Trend Research
Paris, France – Mar/Mai 2010
Working for the publications and presentations realized by Li Edelkoort together with Imke Klee and Lena Thamm – specially for the summer season for 2012 called "Earth Matters", was an opportunity to go on in a deep and luxurious – complex and rich – research on iconography for different niches. Lifestyle, fashion, interior design, patterns, beauty, art, color and well-being were some of the topics researched every day on the streets of Paris, on bookshops and museums, galleries and internet. On each day, we worked on the analysis of hundreds of images of all kind and the constant discussion together with Trend Union team for building up concepts and narratives of trend concepts.
During the internship there was also the opportunity to follow the work done by Studio Edelkoort and other parallel projects and lectures. Heart Wear, for example, a nonprofit organization that in association with an African community that works with indigo dyeing process, produces clothes with differentiated design. There were amazing lectures like one talk made by Li and Arik Lévy, the "Bordello of the 21st century," done on the Parisian strip club Crazy Horse and other remarkable presentation on the release of the "Post Fossil" exhibition and catalog, curated by Li Edelkoort to Issey Miyake.
Contemporary design production, trend research and social design were topics always present on the everyday life of the office. It was a great opportunity to immerse myself on such a deep research on art, product design, materials, colors, textures and senses. The experience with Imke Klee course was a key moment for my career and took me to this great working experience with her in Trend Union.
_ Librairie du Passage, Palais de Tokyo, Musée du quai Branly, Grand Palais, Artazart and Centre Pompidou were just some of the places of research. Arik Lévy and Li Edelkoort at the “Bordello at the 21st century” talk and some books and brochures produced by the studio.
Handmade Illusions – Book
Design Concepts / Design Research / Trend Research / Graphic Design
Trend Forecasting course of Imke Klee, University of Arts Bremen, Germany – 2009
The course was an intensive experience on trends exploration. Through Imke Klee guidance, each attendant could follow their own method on researching and developing concepts of trends that were observed on the news, at the streets, on magazines, libraries, internet, museums...
During the research, I've chosen the topic "Illusion" as concept and main guideline for the design and production of the material that would be organized in a book. The imagery selected was based on the work of artists like Olafur Eliasson and Henrique Oliveira that through an artisan work on ordinary materials and techniques explore illusive results. Other direction of the research was on handicraft traditional techniques like hand shadow-casting and Origami, which generate, with paper or the hands movement, animated scenes and recreate objects and play with the senses and perception.
My Forest - Interactive Installation
New Media Research and Concept
Project developed for a master course application
The task for this project was to develop through new media technologies a proposal that would deal with relevant aspects for the world. The topic chosen was Environmental Education and the target group would be school-age children.
The project is constituted by an installation that simulates a rain forest, projections create the scenery, obstacles, danger and action elements - all made for children feel themselves in a real forest. Trough feedback of points and bonus the child is stimulated to take care of the environment; extinguishing burnings, pollution and traps set to catch wild animals. Finished the playtime, the child can check out, with the parents, all that was done for the environment. The game can be a healthy dispute among friends or even schools. Environmental responsibility is introduced to children in a playful yet educative way.
Interactive Gift for Children's Day – Book, Game and Package
Product Design / Graphic Design / Design Research
For the telecommunications company Oi at Crama Design Estratégico – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Team: Vitor Araripe, Erik Philipp and Paulo Henrique
Educational and interactive kit for children. The kit contained a book, a game board and a plate with characters and a dice – like the illustrations of the book, it was all made of paper, to be detached and put together by the child. With the game, the two-dimensional experience turned into a 3D interaction where the child can make its own history and establish a healthy competition with parents and friends. A traditional media turned into a new interactive educational experience in group.
The designers, together with the writing team, worked intensively on the project. Brainstorming with the client, creative meetings with other professionals of the office and a lot of Design research were some of the stages of the process. In the end, all the effort was responsible for the amazing feedback we got from the 10.000 people who got the gift.
YouMe - Feature for mobile devices
Product Design / New Media Research and Concept / Design Research / Trend Research
Project made for Microsoft Design Expo 2004 with School of Design of the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro, Esdi
Team: Barbara Emanuel, Luiz Henrique Sá
Microsoft invited Esdi to participate on the 2004 Expo and therefore the school was involved with it during almost one semester. User experience professionals from Microsoft Seattle went regularly to the school and promoted brainstorming and creative research meetings with the students together with school teachers. With Andy and Debbie Cargile (Microsoft) we got in an intense learning period on design research and development methods, trends on new media, user experience and many others. At the same time, it was a rich intercultural experience, since we have also followed and analyzed the work done from other institutions of the whole world that were also involved on the Design Expo 2004.
Aiming to do a social utility for getting people together, our group worked on a feature for mobile phone to promote the exchange of information. youMe works pointing the cell phone to another nearby phone, and then it will give you information about the owner of that phone, such as likes and dislikes. youMe works with Bluetooth technology, restraining the action to the cell phones that are close to you. The main interest is to promote face to face interaction. With youMe is easier to find a start conversation topic, finding some ways to initiate an eye-to-eye talk. The feature permits the user to search information about people, add friends to a personal list or even hide information from others.
History Magazine of the National Library of Brazil
Art Direction / Graphic Design / Editorial Design
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Working directly with the visual concept for the history magazine of the National Library of Brazil, each month it was a challenge to give shape to history and make it a part of people's lives.
Before getting all the images and the text to be on layout and sent to the pre-press bureau, there was an intense collaborative work with the iconography, writing and reportage teams. The agenda of each edition would be discussed with the team and the editor. While the texts were produced the search for the images would also happen. Trough the iconography, the heart of the magazine, I had the opportunity to access to the Brazilian imagery present on the archive of the library, which is the 7th largest library in the world. Paintings, illustrations and photography covering all topics related to the country like lifestyle, culture, habits, art, anthropology, history, religion and many others that tell the history of Brazil and its people.
Design, writing and iconography effort together promoted a refreshing view of Brazilian history through an innovative navigation a lot simpler and easier than history books or visits to the library.
Interactive Calendar
Product Design / Graphic Design
For the telecommunications company Oi at Crama Design Estratégico – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Together with Vitor Araripe
Developing projects for the inside communication of “Oi” is always a challenge, since most of them happen every year. Brainstorming with the graphic and product designers together with the writers’ team and the client was always important for getting the best results for the 15.000 employees of the company.
Bringing concepts of digital interaction to an object made of paper, the calendar functions as a traditional media and as a customized mood pop up. It is divided in two parts: one changes every month and the other can be chosen distinctly each day, depending of your humor, appointments or desires. Used by Oi employees as a desk calendar, it also works as social interaction tool, since the coworkers can check out each other's mood.
Caramujo - Children's Toy
[Product Design] [Design Concepts] [Design Research]
Design for Children Course / Modeling Workshop , School of Design of the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro, Esdi
Team: Yael Dikstein, Bruno Cruz
For the project of the product design course students had to develop a toy for children. One of the main goals, together with experiencing the research and process of production on product design, was also learning the techniques on the Modeling Workshop of the school. I've worked on all the stages of the project, on the first steps of research, concept and on the realization of the product.
Caramujo is a toy for the kids up to 2 years old having the first interactive experiences. Playing with the pieces the kid will learn concepts of color, fitting and volume with visual and touch interaction. Children learn that their actions have re-actions - either by the creation of a new shape or by the interference in another child's creation.
DVD for Emergeandsee International Festival
[New Media Research and Concept] [Design Concepts] [Media Design]
Fachhochschule Potsdam, Germany
Team: Nicole Ernst, Sybille Pirklbauer, Jens Adamaszek, Philine Arnt and Thomas Rudolph
Students from the Advanced New Media design course of the school were asked to develop the official DVD for the Emergeandsee International Film Festival. After brainstorms with the client and creative research meetings with the group of students involved on the project, groups were formed covering different concept directions.
Among the others, the team I've worked with had the project chosen to be the official one for the event. My work was focused especially on concept and media design, creating the concept for the media of the festival and working on its navigation and information architecture.
DaVisMo – Data Visualization and Student Mobility
[Design Concepts] [Design Research] [Trend Research] [Management]
University of Arts Bremen + University of Bremen – sept 2008/ jul 2009
Team: Abu Sumon, Carola Lagos, Elkhader Nabil, Guido Shahin, Ivana Ebel, Jan Smeddinck, Pardis Alizadeh, Paulo Marcondes Neto, Mudhireddy Raju, Stefan Kreitmayer, Stella Widiasanti, Tobias Hildebrandt, Hemant Vudatu and Zuolin Xu.
One important part of the master program in Bremen was the DaVisMo project. Together with other 13 students from all over the world and with different backgrounds we had to develop a data visualization search system for helping students willing to have an academic experience abroad. The project would bring together both media informatics and design to be applied on the software development for complex data visualization in the specific contexts of those students.
All the steps of the development of the work were organized and decide by the students. Therefore one of the first tasks was the organization of the dynamic of production between people and the production of work itself. During the whole project extension I was involved on its organization, from the decision of the best method for management until the agenda of the group meetings and internal presentations. We mainly used a project management software, a wiki for sharing the students’ production and a system of weekly meetings with agenda and transcription of the content.
On the content production, I've worked in a subgroup of students more focused on design research, concept design, user experience and the research on innovative user interface projects. Together with the concepts studied for the search engine navigation and interaction there was a strong creative research on metaphors for making this process even more intuitive and direct for the students. We developed also some prototypes for testing the system we were creating as well as the interaction methods that were researched. Some sketches and the paper prototype developed, you can see on the image below.
This was a unique experience, working with people from at least 10 different countries on the same project. With them I had the opportunity, to get to know others perspectives on design thinking, researching and projecting in practice, discussing together about our ideas. Quite deep and immeasurably rich experience, this project is one of the major reasons for my ambition on keeping this international atmosphere on my professional career.
>> www.digitale-medien-bremen.de/de/studium/master/master-program.html
