Howdy! I’m Liana, a rising ID senior working in Palo Alto at Pebble, the smartwatch company. Going into my internship at Pebble, I really didn’t know what to expect. Wearable tech was a recent interest mostly because it seemed like a good bridge for physical as well as digital interaction design. However, I didn’t really know what I would be working on or what a start-up would be like or even what wearable tech exactly meant.
Design is getting their own space! We're in the process of moving.
The design team is actually pretty big if you include the four interns and consider the size of the company as a whole (we just broke over 100 employees this summer). Since most everything is done in-house, we design the interface on the watch and every physical part as well, so a lot of work is being done in completely different forms. I came to Pebble with the official title of UX/UI intern, but much of what I do surpasses that role. I’ve worn many hats this summer, from working on animations to package design to branding to product photography (including some hand modeling) to even a little bit of ID work.
First week on the job, call me David Duchovny.
We eat lunch outside almost every day.
Being at a start-up, I’d say the most challenging part this summer was to be mostly self-driven. I’m given a problem to solve and am expected to have progress for the next time we meet as a team, but much of it is very open-ended. I’ve been asked what a typical day is like at Pebble, but I can’t really say. I come in at different times in the morning and there are days when I leave the office pretty late. Sometimes I work at my desk alone for hours and other times I sit at a table with the rest of the design interns and we collaborate and work together all day. The freedom of a start-up is stressful but also exciting. Because we’re a relatively small company, a lot goes on and I’m jumping from project to project frequently, but I've been enjoying working on UX while working closely with the ID team.
Occupying one of the conference rooms for the World Cup.
It’s been interesting getting different perspectives on design. Working with a recent CMU ID alum and an ID student from University of Cincinnati has changed the way I look at my work and how I want to continue into my last year as a senior. It’s been eye opening but also a little frightening to realize how much I don’t know about design and how much more I need to progress. A lot of the most valuable things I learned this summer was from branching out to other people from different disciplines to see how they work and think. It’s hard to step outside of the CMU mindset and to be completely self-critical of your own work in comparison to everything else that’s out there without being swallowed in the so-called bubble we live in.
The Pebble house, in a quiet neighborhood next to a park.
Casual Oculus Rifting at the house.
I’ve gotten really close to a lot of people here, mostly because I live in what we call the Pebble Pad, aka the intern house. Living in Palo Alto has been pretty interesting. Everything is so bright and well manicured and warm and there’s never any clouds in the sky, quintessentially the Anti-Pittsburgh. Being the only female intern living in a house with 8-10 other guys has been surprisingly fun, as we’ve grown a little family. We cook together, walk/bike to work together, watch movies, blast Beyonce songs, and I bake them treats every so often if I’m feeling nice (complete with the meyer lemon tree in our backyard). The amount of inside jokes we have are obscene, and I’m really going to miss my strange but wonderful jumble of housemates when I leave.
Pebbles on Pebbles (literally)
Obligatory intern BBQ picture.
Working here surpassed everything I expected, and it’s strange that I’m leaving so soon. It was an eye opening experience and, in the words of a certain group of alums, I learned a lot. We’re a rapidly growing company, but everyone is accessible and incredibly friendly and diverse. Free food and swag aside (a pretty popular topic amongst these blog posts), I’m glad I had the opportunity to work here and can’t wait to see where the company is headed in the future.
