Archive for category: Random Stories

Original Source: https://ecommerce-platforms.com/articles/easyship-vs-shipstation

When it comes to eCommerce fulfillment, shipping software isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s a core part of your operational engine.

Whether you’re fulfilling international orders or automating domestic shipments, the platform you choose can affect customer experience, costs, and scalability.

Easyship and ShipStation are two of the top-rated tools in this space, but which one is the better fit for your store?

I’ve tested both platforms extensively across pricing, international capabilities, automation, integrations, and ease of use. Here’s what I found.

Easyship vs ShipStation: Quick Verdict

ShipStation – Best for high-volume domestic shipping, warehouse automation, and advanced workflows
Easyship – Best for international shipping, tax and duty calculations, and global courier access

In this review, I’ll take a closer look at how Easyship and ShipStation stack up across key areas like automation, pricing, carrier support, and returns.

Quick Comparison: Easyship vs ShipStation

Here’s a quick side-by-side overview of the two platforms:

FeatureEasyshipShipStationBest ForInternational sellersHigh-volume US-based operationsStarting PriceFree plan available$9.99/monthCarrier Support250+ global couriers50+ couriers (mostly US-based)Own Carrier AccountsNot supportedFully supportedTax & Duty EstimatesYes (automated at checkout)No (manual entry required)Customs DocumentationAuto-generatedManual or 3rd-partyLabel PrintingYesYes (batch & automated)Automation RulesBasicAdvancedReturns PortalCustomizableBuilt-inIntegrations100+ (Shopify, Woo, etc.)300+ (incl. ERPs, marketplaces)SupportEmail, chatPhone, chat, email

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Pricing: It’s a Close Match, But It Depends on Your Use Case

Both platforms are priced competitively, but how you pay (and what you get) differs quite a bit.

Easyship Pricing

Easyship offers a freemium model, making it easy to get started.

Free – $0/month
For up to 50 shipments/month and one store integration

Plus – $29/month
Up to 500 shipments, branded tracking, and automation

Premier – $69/month
For stores shipping 2,500+ packages monthly

Enterprise – Custom pricing

What I liked about Easyship is that it includes full access to its courier discounts, even on the free plan. You don’t need to bring your own carrier accounts, and you won’t pay extra fees per shipment outside of the courier charges.

ShipStation Pricing

ShipStation charges based on shipment volume and user count.

Starter – $9.99/month
50 shipments/month, 1 user

Bronze – $29.99/month
500 shipments, 1 user

Silver – $59.99/month
1,500 shipments, 2 users

Gold – $99.99/month
3,000 shipments, 3 users

Enterprise – $159.99+/month
6,000+ shipments, up to 10 users

You also get access to discounted rates through ShipStation or can use your own accounts with UPS, FedEx, DHL, and USPS.

The Verdict:
If you’re shipping internationally and want built-in rates, Easyship gives you more value out of the box.

If you’ve already negotiated rates and ship high volumes domestically, ShipStation could save you more in the long run.

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Courier Support and Carrier Flexibility: Easyship wins for international shipping

This is where the two platforms start to diverge.

Easyship Courier Support

Over 250 global couriers

Rates from major providers like DHL, UPS, Aramex, SF Express, Australia Post, and regional carriers

Rates are pre-negotiated by Easyship

You cannot use your own rates

In practice, this setup works best for sellers who want a plug-and-play approach to fulfillment. You don’t need to negotiate your own deals, which is a major plus if you’re just getting started or you’re expanding into new countries.

The downside is that if you already have better rates with a courier, there’s no way to plug them into Easyship. You’re locked into using Easyship’s marketplace pricing, which might not be ideal for more experienced merchants.

ShipStation Courier Support

50+ couriers (primarily US-focused)

Supports all major US carriers: USPS, UPS, FedEx, and DHL

You can use your own carrier accounts

Multi-warehouse support for logistics teams

ShipStation gives you the flexibility to choose between using your own accounts or leveraging their discounted rates. That freedom can lead to significant savings for high-volume shippers with good negotiated deals.

It also makes the platform a better fit for fulfillment networks, 3PLs, or businesses with multiple operational hubs that need to control their logistics stack down to the courier level.

The Verdict:
Easyship wins for international shipping, but if you already have great rates and want to stick with your own providers, ShipStation gives you that flexibility.

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Automation and Workflow Rules: ShipStation wins (for scale)

Shipping automation saves hours—especially when dealing with thousands of orders. Let’s break down what each platform offers.

Easyship Automation

Basic automation rules (e.g., choose courier based on delivery zone or weight)

Default shipping options at checkout

Auto-generates customs forms

Auto-selects lowest cost or fastest courier

While helpful for small teams, automation is relatively limited compared to ShipStation. It’s designed to simplify the basics—ideal if your operations aren’t very complex or if you’re a solo founder.

That said, as your fulfillment needs grow, you may find Easyship’s automation lacking the nuance required for more granular workflows like splitting orders, tagging customers, or prioritizing certain couriers under specific conditions.

ShipStation Automation

Deep automation engine

Auto-select carriers based on SKU, customer location, or shipping service

Set label printing triggers

Automate warehouse routing

Integrates with inventory tools for syncing stock levels

ShipStation is built for scale. The automation features allow you to create conditional workflows that can take actions based on dozens of data points—like weight, value, order age, or tag.

This level of customization is especially helpful when managing multiple sales channels, warehouses, or international shipments with specific handling needs.

The Verdict:
For serious volume and hands-off workflows, ShipStation’s automation is in a different league. You’ll get full control over how orders are handled.

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Tax, Duties, and Customs: Easyship Wins Big

If you sell internationally, this section matters—a lot.

Easyship

Automatically calculates taxes and duties at checkout

Displays landed costs to customers before payment

Generates all required customs paperwork

Reduces chargebacks and failed deliveries due to unpaid taxes

These features make Easyship ideal for cross-border selling. Customers get full visibility on what they’ll pay—no surprises when their package arrives.

This reduces failed deliveries and increases trust, especially in markets like Canada, the UK, and the EU, where VAT and import taxes can get expensive fast.

ShipStation

Limited support for international tax

Requires manual customs setup or third-party tools

No checkout tax estimation

With ShipStation, international sellers have to handle much of the customs and tax management outside the platform.

That could mean using third-party tax calculators, entering customs values manually, or risking under-declared shipments that get delayed or returned. For high-volume global sellers, this setup becomes inefficient fast.

The Verdict:
If you sell outside the US, Easyship is the clear winner here.

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Returns and Customer Experience: ShipStation wins

A streamlined returns process is essential for customer satisfaction.

Easyship Returns

Customers can initiate returns via a branded portal

Store owners approve or reject returns before label generation

Return labels use Easyship’s carrier rates

Tracking included on all shipments

The returns portal is one of Easyship’s most underrated features. It’s clean, customizable, and simple for customers to use. You can even localize the experience based on where your customers are located.

However, if you’re handling high return volumes or need deep reporting on return reasons and resolutions, you may still find yourself limited without third-party tools.

ShipStation Returns

Built-in return labels

Rules-based automation for accepting or rejecting returns

Return status tracking within your dashboard

Easy to handle in bulk across multiple warehouses

ShipStation is designed for operational teams. The return management tools help your staff process returns quickly and at scale, especially when handling multiple SKUs, fulfillment centers, or customer support requests.

You can build return workflows that are as automated as your outbound shipping rules.

The Verdict:
Both are solid, but ShipStation offers better control for large-scale returns, especially if you’re using multiple warehouses.

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Integration and Platform Support: ShipStation wins again

Whether you’re on Shopify or WooCommerce, both tools offer good support—but ShipStation goes further.

Easyship Integrations

100+ platforms including:

Shopify

BigCommerce

WooCommerce

Magento

Kickstarter

Integrates with marketplaces like eBay, Etsy, and Amazon

Basic CRM integrations

Easyship’s integration catalog covers most common eCommerce platforms and marketplaces. It’s more than enough for small to mid-size sellers.

But when it comes to advanced use cases—like syncing with inventory software, ERPs, or accounting platforms—you’re likely to hit some roadblocks unless you’re willing to work with third-party middleware like Zapier or API connectors.

ShipStation Integrations

Over 300+ integrations:

All major shopping carts and marketplaces

Amazon, eBay, Walmart

ERPs like NetSuite and Brightpearl

Accounting platforms like QuickBooks

ShipStation is built for sellers who operate across multiple systems.

Its extensive catalog makes it a go-to for businesses that rely on custom tech stacks, multi-channel operations, or 3PLs.

Whether you’re syncing with accounting tools, connecting inventory software, or managing suppliers, ShipStation has the depth to support it.

The Verdict:
If you’re working in a complex tech stack, ShipStation offers deeper integration options.

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Onboarding and Ease of Use: Easyship is quicker to launch

Easyship Onboarding

Signup takes less than 10 minutes

Plug-and-play setup with Shopify or WooCommerce

Dashboard is clean and beginner-friendly

Ideal for small teams or solo operators

The UI feels modern and well-organized. You can connect a store, set up shipping preferences, and start printing labels in under an hour.

Most users won’t need much onboarding help unless they’re configuring international tax or automating complex return workflows.

For small teams, that makes Easyship a strong entry-level choice.

ShipStation Onboarding

More setup steps required

Takes 1–2 hours to configure rules, integrations, and carriers

Best suited to sellers who understand logistics

Steeper learning curve, but more powerful long term

Expect a steeper learning curve if you’re new to shipping software.

The interface is functional, but not overly intuitive. That said, the platform’s power becomes clear once everything is configured.

For teams with operational experience or technical support, the payoff is worth it.

The Verdict:
For ease of use, Easyship is quicker to launch. For flexibility and scale, ShipStation pays off after setup.

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Case Studies and Real-World Examples

Here’s how real businesses are using these tools:

Easyship Case Study: Lexdray

Kickstarter project with international backers

Reduced delivery errors by 90%

Enabled upfront tax/duty visibility

Boosted on-time delivery by 30%

This case highlights Easyship’s strength in cross-border logistics. Lexdray had to fulfill thousands of orders in over 40 countries, and they needed a reliable way to reduce customs-related delays.

Easyship handled everything from duty estimates to customs forms, making international fulfillment seamless for a one-time campaign.

ShipStation Case Study: Fast-Growing Shopify Brand

3,000 orders/month

Cut fulfillment time by 40% using automation rules

Integrated with multiple warehouses

Saved 18 hours/week on manual tasks

This brand needed a platform that could keep up with rapid growth. They used ShipStation to route orders based on geography, set rules for shipping services, and automatically print labels across locations.

The efficiency gains weren’t just about time—they reduced errors and improved delivery times without adding headcount.

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Customer Support and Documentation: ShipStation wins

Easyship Support

Email and live chat support

Onboarding specialists for paid plans

Knowledge base and video guides

Support response times vary based on time zone

Easyship’s help center covers most common questions, and the live chat is responsive during business hours. That said, support quality can vary depending on plan level and timezone.

US-based users may occasionally encounter slower replies, especially during peak hours or holidays.

ShipStation Support

Phone, chat, and email support

Live agent access during US business hours

Priority support for enterprise clients

Help center with tutorials and user forums

ShipStation offers reliable and fast support for users in the US.

The knowledge base is extensive, and the support team is trained to help with both tech setup and shipping strategy. If your operations are time-sensitive, that responsiveness can make a big difference when you’re troubleshooting an issue.

The Verdict:
ShipStation offers more accessible and faster support, especially for US sellers.

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Final Thoughts: Which Should You Choose?

Both Easyship and ShipStation are excellent tools, but they suit very different business models.

Choose Easyship if you:

Sell internationally and need built-in support for tax, duties, and customs

Don’t have your own negotiated carrier rates

Want to offer transparent checkout costs to global customers

Run a crowdfunded or subscription-based store

Easyship is ideal for brands looking to grow across borders without dealing with the complexities of international logistics.

From customs documents to tax estimation, it takes care of the messy details so you can focus on building your brand. It’s especially useful if you’re operating lean, with minimal technical support or logistics infrastructure.

Choose ShipStation if you:

Ship high volumes domestically

Already have carrier accounts and negotiated rates

Need complex automation across multiple locations

Operate multiple warehouses or sales channels

ShipStation is designed for scale and control. If your fulfillment process involves high order volume, custom workflows, and multiple warehouses or suppliers, it’s one of the most capable tools available.

The automation engine alone can save your team hours every week, and the flexibility around carrier accounts is unmatched.

The post Easyship vs ShipStation: Which Shipping Software Is Right for You? appeared first on Ecommerce-Platforms.com.

Original Source: https://abduzeedo.com/dorset-color-happy-design-sea-sisters

From Dorset with Color: The Happy Design of Sea Sisters

ibby
09/02 — 2025

Discover Sea Sisters, the British brand reimagining canned seafood with bold colors, playful typography, and packaging that turns the everyday into inspiration.

We first discovered Sea Sisters while flipping through Monocle’s latest Entrepreneurs issue, and the brand’s story and visual language instantly caught our eye. What began in West Dorset in 2020 as a lockdown experiment has grown into one of the UK’s most design-forward canneries. Founders Charlotte and chef Angus, frustrated by the lack of canned British fish on shelves, decided to do it themselves, celebrating local catch through bold design and thoughtful craft.

Packaging That Speaks

Vivid, tactile wrappers: Every tin wears a bold, full-color cap, ocean blues, leafy greens, and coral hues, that feel more like art than packaging. A wave-patterned border evokes the sea, while the matte finish adds a tactile, artisanal presence.
 
Human-centric logo: Two fisher figures in bright hoods stand against a stylized sail, an image that feels timeless and personal, connecting the product back to coastal heritage.
 
Type with character: The rounded, retro “Sea Sisters” lettering carries warmth and confidence, nostalgic yet unmistakably modern on the shelf.
 
Eco-conscious design: With recyclable wrappers and a minimized use of plastic, the packaging reflects the same sustainability ethos guiding their sourcing and production.
 

Telling the Story Through Design

Sea Sisters’ packaging is more than visual decoration, it’s storytelling at a glance. It brings heritage, craft, and playfulness together, transforming a humble tin into something you want to display as much as devour. It’s a reminder that design has the power to elevate the everyday and spark inspiration in places like a tin of Cornish hake or Norfolk mussels. Learn more about the brand at https://www.seasisters.co.uk/.

Original Source: https://www.creativebloq.com/creative-inspiration/digital-crafting/i-tested-cricut-explore-4-and-found-this-speedy-whisper-quiet-craft-machine-made-my-projects-easier

It lacks Maker 4’s depth of tools, but for most crafters, this is all that’s needed.

Original Source: https://smashingmagazine.com/2025/08/prompting-design-act-brief-guide-iterate-ai/

In “A Week In The Life Of An AI-Augmented Designer”, we followed Kate’s weeklong journey of her first AI-augmented design sprint. She had three realizations through the process:

AI isn’t a co-pilot (yet); it’s more like a smart, eager intern.
One with access to a lot of information, good recall, fast execution, but no context. That mindset defined how she approached every interaction with AI: not as magic, but as management.
Don’t trust; guide, coach, and always verify.
Like any intern, AI needs coaching and supervision, and that’s where her designerly skills kicked in. Kate relied on curiosity to explore, observation to spot bias, empathy to humanize the output, and critical thinking to challenge what didn’t feel right. Her learning mindset helped her keep up with advances, and experimentation helped her learn by doing.
Prompting is part creative brief, and part conversation design, just with an AI instead of a person.
When you prompt an AI, you’re not just giving instructions, but designing how it responds, behaves, and outputs information. If AI is like an intern, then the prompt is your creative brief that frames the task, sets the tone, and clarifies what good looks like. It’s also your conversation script that guides how it responds, how the interaction flows, and how ambiguity is handled.

As designers, we’re used to designing interactions for people. Prompting is us designing our own interactions with machines — it uses the same mindset with a new medium. It shapes an AI’s behavior the same way you’d guide a user with structure, clarity, and intent.

If you’ve bookmarked, downloaded, or saved prompts from others, you’re not alone. We’ve all done that during our AI journeys. But while someone else’s prompts are a good starting point, you will get better and more relevant results if you can write your own prompts tailored to your goals, context, and style. Using someone else’s prompt is like using a Figma template. It gets the job done, but mastery comes from understanding and applying the fundamentals of design, including layout, flow, and reasoning. Prompts have a structure too. And when you learn it, you stop guessing and start designing.

Note: All prompts in this article were tested using ChatGPT — not because it’s the only game in town, but because it’s friendly, flexible, and lets you talk like a person, yes, even after the recent GPT-5 “update”. That said, any LLM with a decent attention span will work. Results for the same prompt may vary based on the AI model you use, the AI’s training, mood, and how confidently it can hallucinate.

Privacy PSA: As always, don’t share anything you wouldn’t want leaked, logged, or accidentally included in the next AI-generated meme. Keep it safe, legal, and user-respecting.

With that out of the way, let’s dive into the mindset, anatomy, and methods of effective prompting as another tool in your design toolkit.

Mindset: Prompt Like A Designer

As designers, we storyboard journeys, wireframe interfaces to guide users, and write UX copy with intention. However, when prompting AI, we treat it differently: “Summarize these insights”, “Make this better”, “Write copy for this screen”, and then wonder why the output feels generic, off-brand, or just meh. It’s like expecting a creative team to deliver great work from a one-line Slack message. We wouldn’t brief a freelancer, much less an intern, with “Design a landing page,” so why brief AI that way?

Prompting Is A Creative Brief For A Machine

Think of a good prompt as a creative brief, just for a non-human collaborator. It needs similar elements, including a clear role, defined goal, relevant context, tone guidance, and output expectations. Just as a well-written creative brief unlocks alignment and quality from your team, a well-structured prompt helps the AI meet your expectations, even though it doesn’t have real instincts or opinions.

Prompting Is Also Conversation Design

A good prompt goes beyond defining the task and sets the tone for the exchange by designing a conversation: guiding how the AI interprets, sequences, and responds. You shape the flow of tasks, how ambiguity is handled, and how refinement happens — that’s conversation design.

Anatomy: Structure It Like A Designer

So how do you write a designer-quality prompt? That’s where the W.I.R.E.+F.R.A.M.E. prompt design framework comes in — a UX-inspired framework for writing intentional, structured, and reusable prompts. Each letter represents a key design direction, grounded in the way UX designers already think: Just as a wireframe doesn’t dictate final visuals, this WIRE+FRAME framework doesn’t constrain creativity, but guides the AI with structured information it needs.

“Why not just use a series of back-and-forth chats with AI?”

You can, and many people do. But without structure, AI fills in the gaps on its own, often with vague or generic results. A good prompt upfront saves time, reduces trial and error, and improves consistency. And whether you’re working on your own or across a team, a framework means you’re not reinventing a prompt every time but reusing what works to get better results faster.

Just as we build wireframes before adding layers of fidelity, the WIRE+FRAME framework has two parts:

WIRE is the must-have skeleton. It gives the prompt its shape.
FRAME is the set of enhancements that bring polish, logic, tone, and reusability — like building a high-fidelity interface from the wireframe.

Let’s improve Kate’s original research synthesis prompt (“Read this customer feedback and tell me how we can improve financial literacy for Gen Z in our app”). To better reflect how people actually prompt in practice, let’s tweak it to a more broadly applicable version: “Read this customer feedback and tell me how we can improve our app for Gen Z users.” This one-liner mirrors the kinds of prompts we often throw at AI tools: short, simple, and often lacking structure.

Now, we’ll take that prompt and rebuild it using the first four elements of the W.I.R.E. framework — the core building blocks that provide AI with the main information it needs to deliver useful results.

W: Who & What

Define who the AI should be, and what it’s being asked to deliver.

A creative brief starts with assigning the right hat. Are you briefing a copywriter? A strategist? A product designer? The same logic applies here. Give the AI a clear identity and task. Treat AI like a trusted freelancer or intern. Instead of saying “help me”, tell it who it should act as and what’s expected.

Example: “You are a senior UX researcher and customer insights analyst. You specialize in synthesizing qualitative data from diverse sources to identify patterns, surface user pain points, and map them across customer journey stages. Your outputs directly inform product, UX, and service priorities.”

I: Input Context

Provide background that frames the task.

Creative partners don’t work in a vacuum. They need context: the audience, goals, product, competitive landscape, and what’s been tried already. This is the “What you need to know before you start” section of the brief. Think: key insights, friction points, business objectives. The same goes for your prompt.

Example: “You are analyzing customer feedback for Fintech Brand’s app, targeting Gen Z users. Feedback will be uploaded from sources such as app store reviews, survey feedback, and usability test transcripts.”

R: Rules & Constraints

Clarify any limitations, boundaries, and exclusions.

Good creative briefs always include boundaries — what to avoid, what’s off-brand, or what’s non-negotiable. Things like brand voice guidelines, legal requirements, or time and word count limits. Constraints don’t limit creativity — they focus it. AI needs the same constraints to avoid going off the rails.

Example: “Only analyze the uploaded customer feedback data. Do not fabricate pain points, representative quotes, journey stages, or patterns. Do not supplement with prior knowledge or hypothetical examples. Use clear, neutral, stakeholder-facing language.”

E: Expected Output

Spell out what the deliverable should look like.

This is the deliverable spec: What does the finished product look like? What tone, format, or channel is it for? Even if the task is clear, the format often isn’t. Do you want bullet points or a story? A table or a headline? If you don’t say, the AI will guess, and probably guess wrong. Even better, include an example of the output you want, an effective way to help AI know what you’re expecting. If you’re using GPT-5, you can also mix examples across formats (text, images, tables) together.

Example: “Return a structured list of themes. For each theme, include:

Theme Title
Summary of the Issue
Problem Statement
Opportunity
Representative Quotes (from data only)
Journey Stage(s)
Frequency (count from data)
Severity Score (1–5) where 1 = Minor inconvenience or annoyance; 3 = Frustrating but workaround exists; 5 = Blocking issue
Estimated Effort (Low / Medium / High), where Low = Copy or content tweak; Medium = Logic/UX/UI change; High = Significant changes.”

WIRE gives you everything you need to stop guessing and start designing your prompts with purpose. When you start with WIRE, your prompting is like a briefing, treating AI like a collaborator.

Once you’ve mastered this core structure, you can layer in additional fidelity, like tone, step-by-step flow, or iterative feedback, using the FRAME elements. These five elements provide additional guidance and clarity to your prompt by layering clear deliverables, thoughtful tone, reusable structure, and space for creative iteration.

F: Flow of Tasks

Break complex prompts into clear, ordered steps.

This is your project plan or creative workflow that lays out the stages, dependencies, or sequence of execution. When the task has multiple parts, don’t just throw it all into one sentence. You are doing the thinking and guiding AI. Structure it like steps in a user journey or modules in a storyboard. In this example, it fits as the blueprint for the AI to use to generate the table described in “E: Expected Output”

Example: “Recommended flow of tasks:
Step 1: Parse the uploaded data and extract discrete pain points.
Step 2: Group them into themes based on pattern similarity.
Step 3: Score each theme by frequency (from data), severity (based on content), and estimated effort.
Step 4: Map each theme to the appropriate customer journey stage(s).
Step 5: For each theme, write a clear problem statement and opportunity based only on what’s in the data.”

R: Reference Voice or Style

Name the desired tone, mood, or reference brand.

This is the brand voice section or style mood board — reference points that shape the creative feel. Sometimes you want buttoned-up. Other times, you want conversational. Don’t assume the AI knows your tone, so spell it out.

Example: “Use the tone of a UX insights deck or product research report. Be concise, pattern-driven, and objective. Make summaries easy to scan by product managers and design leads.”

A: Ask for Clarification

Invite the AI to ask questions before generating, if anything is unclear.

This is your “Any questions before we begin?” moment — a key step in collaborative creative work. You wouldn’t want a freelancer to guess what you meant if the brief was fuzzy, so why expect AI to do better? Ask AI to reflect or clarify before jumping into output mode.

Example: “If the uploaded data is missing or unclear, ask for it before continuing. Also, ask for clarification if the feedback format is unstructured or inconsistent, or if the scoring criteria need refinement.”

M: Memory (Within The Conversation)

Reference earlier parts of the conversation and reuse what’s working.

This is similar to keeping visual tone or campaign language consistent across deliverables in a creative brief. Prompts are rarely one-shot tasks, so this reminds AI of the tone, audience, or structure already in play. GPT-5 got better with memory, but this still remains a useful element, especially if you switch topics or jump around.

Example: “Unless I say otherwise, keep using this process: analyze the data, group into themes, rank by importance, then suggest an action for each.”

E: Evaluate & Iterate

Invite the AI to critique, improve, or generate variations.

This is your revision loop — your way of prompting for creative direction, exploration, and refinement. Just like creatives expect feedback, your AI partner can handle review cycles if you ask for them. Build iteration into the brief to get closer to what you actually need. Sometimes, you may see ChatGPT test two versions of a response on its own by asking for your preference.

Example: “After listing all themes, identify the one with the highest combined priority score (based on frequency, severity, and effort).

For that top-priority theme:

Critically evaluate its framing: Is the title clear? Are the quotes strong and representative? Is the journey mapping appropriate?
Suggest one improvement (e.g., improved title, more actionable implication, clearer quote, tighter summary).
Rewrite the theme entry with that improvement applied.
Briefly explain why the revision is stronger and more useful for product or design teams.”

Here’s a quick recap of the WIRE+FRAME framework:

Framework Component
Description

W: Who & What
Define the AI persona and the core deliverable.

I: Input Context
Provide background or data scope to frame the task.

R: Rules & Constraints
Set boundaries

E: Expected Output
Spell out the format and fields of the deliverable.

F: Flow of Tasks
Break the work into explicit, ordered sub-tasks.

R: Reference Voice/Style
Name the tone, mood, or reference brand to ensure consistency.

A: Ask for Clarification
Invite AI to pause and ask questions if any instructions or data are unclear before proceeding.

M: Memory
Leverage in-conversation memory to recall earlier definitions, examples, or phrasing without restating them.

E: Evaluate & Iterate
After generation, have the AI self-critique the top outputs and refine them.

And here’s the full WIRE+FRAME prompt:

(W) You are a senior UX researcher and customer insights analyst. You specialize in synthesizing qualitative data from diverse sources to identify patterns, surface user pain points, and map them across customer journey stages. Your outputs directly inform product, UX, and service priorities.

(I) You are analyzing customer feedback for Fintech Brand’s app, targeting Gen Z users. Feedback will be uploaded from sources such as app store reviews, survey feedback, and usability test transcripts.

(R) Only analyze the uploaded customer feedback data. Do not fabricate pain points, representative quotes, journey stages, or patterns. Do not supplement with prior knowledge or hypothetical examples. Use clear, neutral, stakeholder-facing language.

(E) Return a structured list of themes. For each theme, include:Theme TitleSummary of the IssueProblem StatementOpportunityRepresentative Quotes (from data only)Journey Stage(s)Frequency (count from data)Severity Score (1–5) where 1 = Minor inconvenience or annoyance; 3 = Frustrating but workaround exists; 5 = Blocking issueEstimated Effort (Low / Medium / High), where Low = Copy or content tweak; Medium = Logic/UX/UI change; High = Significant changes(F) Recommended flow of tasks:
Step 1: Parse the uploaded data and extract discrete pain points.
Step 2: Group them into themes based on pattern similarity.
Step 3: Score each theme by frequency (from data), severity (based on content), and estimated effort.
Step 4: Map each theme to the appropriate customer journey stage(s).
Step 5: For each theme, write a clear problem statement and opportunity based only on what’s in the data.

(R) Use the tone of a UX insights deck or product research report. Be concise, pattern-driven, and objective. Make summaries easy to scan by product managers and design leads.

(A) If the uploaded data is missing or unclear, ask for it before continuing. Also, ask for clarification if the feedback format is unstructured or inconsistent, or if the scoring criteria need refinement.

(M) Unless I say otherwise, keep using this process: analyze the data, group into themes, rank by importance, then suggest an action for each.

(E) After listing all themes, identify the one with the highest combined priority score (based on frequency, severity, and effort).
For that top-priority theme:Critically evaluate its framing: Is the title clear? Are the quotes strong and representative? Is the journey mapping appropriate?Suggest one improvement (e.g., improved title, more actionable implication, clearer quote, tighter summary).Rewrite the theme entry with that improvement applied.Briefly explain why the revision is stronger and more useful for product or design teams.

You could use “##” to label the sections (e.g., “##FLOW”) more for your readability than for AI. At over 400 words, this Insights Synthesis prompt example is a detailed, structured prompt, but it isn’t customized for you and your work. The intent wasn’t to give you a specific prompt (the proverbial fish), but to show how you can use a prompt framework like WIRE+FRAME to create a customized, relevant prompt that will help AI augment your work (teaching you to fish).

Keep in mind that prompt length isn’t a common concern, but rather a lack of quality and structure is. As of the time of writing, AI models can easily process prompts that are thousands of words long.

Not every prompt needs all the FRAME components; WIRE is often enough to get the job done. But when the work is strategic or highly contextual, pick components from FRAME — the extra details can make a difference. Together, WIRE+FRAME give you a detailed framework for creating a well-structured prompt, with the crucial components first, followed by optional components:

WIRE builds a clear, focused prompt with role, input, rules, and expected output.
FRAME adds refinement like tone, reusability, and iteration.

Here are some scenarios and recommendations for using WIRE or WIRE+FRAME:

Scenarios
Description
Recommended

Simple, One-Off Analyses
Quick prompting with minimal setup and no need for detailed process transparency.
WIRE

Tight Sprints or Hackathons
Rapid turnarounds, and times you don’t need embedded review and iteration loops.
WIRE

Highly Iterative Exploratory Work
You expect to tweak results constantly and prefer manual control over each step.
WIRE

Complex Multi-Step Playbooks
Detailed workflows that benefit from a standardized, repeatable, visible sequence.
WIRE+FRAME

Shared or Hand-Off Projects
When different teams will rely on embedded clarification, memory, and consistent task flows for recurring analyses.
WIRE+FRAME

Built-In Quality Control
You want the AI to flag top issues, self-critique, and refine, minimizing manual QC steps.
WIRE+FRAME

Prompting isn’t about getting it right the first time. It’s about designing the interaction and redesigning when needed. With WIRE+FRAME, you’re going beyond basic prompting and designing the interaction between you and AI.

From Gut Feel To Framework: A Prompt Makeover

Let’s compare the results of Kate’s first AI-augmented design sprint prompt (to synthesize customer feedback into design insights) with one based on the WIRE+FRAME prompt framework, with the same data and focusing on the top results:

Original prompt: Read this customer feedback and tell me how we can improve our app for Gen Z users.

Initial ChatGPT Results:

Improve app reliability to reduce crashes and freezing.
Provide better guidance or tutorials for financial tools like budgeting or goal setting.
Enhance the transparency of Zelle transfers by showing confirmation messages.
Speed up app loading and reduce lag on key actions.

With this version, you’d likely need to go back and forth with follow-up questions, rewrite the output for clarity, and add structure before sharing with your team.

WIRE+FRAME prompt above (with defined role, scope, rules, expected format, tone, flow, and evaluation loop).

Initial ChatGPT Results:

You can clearly see the very different results from the two prompts, both using the exact same data. While the first prompt returns a quick list of ideas, the detailed WIRE+FRAME version doesn’t just summarize feedback but structures it. Themes are clearly labeled, supported by user quotes, mapped to customer journey stages, and prioritized by frequency, severity, and effort.

The structured prompt results can be used as-is or shared without needing to reformat, rewrite, or explain them (see disclaimer below). The first prompt output needs massaging: it’s not detailed, lacks evidence, and would require several rounds of clarification to be actionable. The first prompt may work when the stakes are low and you are exploring. But when your prompt is feeding design, product, or strategy, structure comes to the rescue.

Disclaimer: Know Your Data

A well-structured prompt can make AI output more useful, but it shouldn’t be the final word, or your single source of truth. AI models are powerful pattern predictors, not fact-checkers. If your data is unclear or poorly referenced, even the best prompt may return confident nonsense. Don’t blindly trust what you see. Treat AI like a bright intern: fast, eager, and occasionally delusional. You should always be familiar with your data and validate what AI spits out. For example, in the WIRE+FRAME results above, AI rated the effort as low for financial tool onboarding. That could easily be a medium or high. Good prompting should be backed by good judgment.

Try This Now

Start by using the WIRE+FRAME framework to create a prompt that will help AI augment your work. You could also rewrite the last prompt you were not satisfied with, using the WIRE+FRAME, and compare the output.

Feel free to use this simple tool to guide you through the framework.

Methods: From Lone Prompts to a Prompt System

Just as design systems have reusable components, your prompts can too. You can use the WIRE+FRAME framework to write detailed prompts, but you can also use the structure to create reusable components that are pre-tested, plug-and-play pieces you can assemble to build high-quality prompts faster. Each part of WIRE+FRAME can be transformed into a prompt component: small, reusable modules that reflect your team’s standards, voice, and strategy.

For instance, if you find yourself repeatedly using the same content for different parts of the WIRE+FRAME framework, you could save them as reusable components for you and your team. In the example below, we have two different reusable components for “W: Who & What” — an insights analyst and an information architect.

W: Who & What

You are a senior UX researcher and customer insights analyst. You specialize in synthesizing qualitative data from diverse sources to identify patterns, surface user pain points, and map them across customer journey stages. Your outputs directly inform product, UX, and service priorities.
You are an experienced information architect specializing in organizing enterprise content on intranets. Your task is to reorganize the content and features into categories that reflect user goals, reduce cognitive load, and increase findability.

Create and save prompt components and variations for each part of the WIRE+FRAME framework, allowing your team to quickly assemble new prompts by combining components when available, rather than starting from scratch each time.

Behind The Prompts: Questions About Prompting

Q: If I use a prompt framework like WIRE+FRAME every time, will the results be predictable?

A: Yes and no. Yes, your outputs will be guided by a consistent set of instructions (e.g., Rules, Examples, Reference Voice / Style) that will guide the AI to give you a predictable format and style of results. And no, while the framework provides structure, it doesn’t flatten the generative nature of AI, but focuses it on what’s important to you. In the next article, we will look at how you can use this to your advantage to quickly reuse your best repeatable prompts as we build your AI assistant.

Q: Could changes to AI models break the WIRE+FRAME framework?

A: AI models are evolving more rapidly than any other technology we’ve seen before — in fact, ChatGPT was recently updated to GPT-5 to mixed reviews. The update didn’t change the core principles of prompting or the WIRE+FRAME prompt framework. With future releases, some elements of how we write prompts today may change, but the need to communicate clearly with AI won’t. Think of how you delegate work to an intern vs. someone with a few years’ experience: you still need detailed instructions the first time either is doing a task, but the level of detail may change. WIRE+FRAME isn’t built only for today’s models; the components help you clarify your intent, share relevant context, define constraints, and guide tone and format — all timeless elements, no matter how smart the model becomes. The skill of shaping clear, structured interactions with non-human AI systems will remain valuable.

Q: Can prompts be more than text? What about images or sketches?

A: Absolutely. With tools like GPT-5 and other multimodal models, you can upload screenshots, pictures, whiteboard sketches, or wireframes. These visuals become part of your Input Context or help define the Expected Output. The same WIRE+FRAME principles still apply: you’re setting context, tone, and format, just using images and text together. Whether your input is a paragraph or an image and text, you’re still designing the interaction.

Have a prompt-related question of your own? Share it in the comments, and I’ll either respond there or explore it further in the next article in this series.

From Designerly Prompting To Custom Assistants

Good prompts and results don’t come from using others’ prompts, but from writing prompts that are customized for you and your context. The WIRE+FRAME framework helps with that and makes prompting a tool you can use to guide AI models like a creative partner instead of hoping for magic from a one-line request.

Prompting uses the designerly skills you already use every day to collaborate with AI:

Curiosity to explore what the AI can do and frame better prompts.
Observation to detect bias or blind spots.
Empathy to make machine outputs human.
Critical thinking to verify and refine.
Experiment & Iteration to learn by doing and improve the interaction over time.
Growth Mindset to keep up with new technology like AI and prompting.

Once you create and refine prompt components and prompts that work for you, make them reusable by documenting them. But wait, there’s more — what if your best prompts, or the elements of your prompts, could live inside your own AI assistant, available on demand, fluent in your voice, and trained on your context? That’s where we’re headed next.

In the next article, “Design Your Own Design Assistant”, we’ll take what you’ve learned so far and turn it into a Custom AI assistant (aka Custom GPT), a design-savvy, context-aware assistant that works like you do. We’ll walk through that exact build, from defining the assistant’s job description to uploading knowledge, testing, and sharing it with others.

Resources

GPT-5 Prompting Guide
GPT-4.1 Prompting Guide
Anthropic Prompt Engineering
Prompt Engineering by Google
Perplexity
Webapp to guide you through the WIRE+FRAME framework

Original Source: https://abduzeedo.com/6-taschen-coffee-table-books-spark-visual-inspiration

6 Taschen Coffee Table Books That Spark Visual Inspiration

ibby
08/28 — 2025

Discover 6 Taschen coffee table books that blend bold design, ads, logos, and color theory, essential inspiration for designers and visual creatives.

Few publishers know how to turn a book into a design object quite like Taschen. Their releases balance scholarship with spectacle, oversized pages, bold layouts, and photography that feels as collectible as the subjects themselves. For designers, artists, and anyone drawn to visual culture, these volumes are more than references; they’re sources of daily inspiration. Below, we’ve rounded up six Taschen coffee table books—some entirely new, others fresh new editions, that push the boundaries of form and content, each one ready to earn a permanent spot in your creative space.

 

The Package Design Book 8 (2023–24 winners)

Now in its eighth edition, this annual series presents over 600 award-winning packaging designs from global Pentawards competitors. It’s an endless source of creative inspiration, from concept to shelf-ready execution, perfect for designers attuned to branding and visual storytelling across surfaces.

Get it here

 

Graphic Design. 1890–Today. Basic Art (New release)

Part of Taschen’s “Basic Art” series, this title surveys the evolution of graphic design across more than a century, from early poster art to modern digital expression. A concise, richly illustrated primer that makes design history approachable and visually enticing.

Get it here

 

The Book of Colour Concepts. 45th Edition (New)

For designers who seek inspiration in palettes and theory, this new edition revisits color across historical and contemporary contexts. The “45th Ed.” design signals a collector-friendly, framework-driven exploration of color’s creative potential.

Get it here

 

Logo Beginnings. Logo Modernism. 45th Ed. by Jens Müller

A visual feast for designers, a sprawling anthology of over 3,000 logos tracing the evolution of iconic trademarks from the mid-1800s to 1980. This masterful compendium (combining the original Logo Beginnings and Logo Modernism volumes) is meticulously organized by visual categories—Pictorial, Form, Effect, Typographic—and then further divided by elemental forms like circles, lines, overlays, and dots. With essays offering historical perspective alongside profiles of luminaries like Paul Rand, Yusaku Kamekura, and Anton Stankowski, it’s more than a design reference—it’s a cultural journey through brand identity.

Get it here

 

Mid-Century Ads

A time capsule of the golden age of advertising, this volume highlights American print ads from the 1950s and 1960s—an era defined by bold typography, hand-illustration, and the birth of modern consumer culture. Each spread is a vivid reminder of how mid-century aesthetics shaped visual communication and brand storytelling.

Get it here

 

Menu Design in Europe

Menus are more than functional—they’re cultural artifacts. This Taschen release collects over a century of European menu design, from ornate Belle Époque flourishes to sleek modernist layouts. It’s a rare look at how design mediates between food, hospitality, and visual style, making it a delicious resource for both designers and history lovers.

Get it here

 

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