A designer tested a site with highly interested map enthusiasts and used their feedback to refine a travel- and design-driven personal project. The project is presented as a website to carry real ideas through the browser rather than relying on social media alone, while still supporting community submissions via an Instagram-based process. Grid Systems informed the design approach, emphasizing clarity, rigor, and respect for readers, with strong legibility and graphics that remain minimal and charming. The work prioritizes functionality and utility over aesthetics alone, aiming to create everyday usefulness. The goal is to collect outlet photos from the wild and update the site periodically, so searches for needed power adapters lead to Outlet Atlas.
"With some feedback, he continued to shape the personal project fueled by a love for travel and design. "As a designer, you build up a graveyard of ideas over the years, and digging this one up and bringing it back to life was incredibly cathartic. I still believe the web and the browser are an important medium. They can carry real ideas, which is why I chose to ship this as a website rather than, say, just an Instagram account," says Michael, although there is an account for the community submission side of things."
"Josef Müller-Brockmann's Grid Systems was an important book for Michael when he began software design in his early days, and its sensibility is woven through the whole project. There's plenty of clarity, rigour and respect for the reader, placing ultimate legibility above all with handsome graphics that sometimes even make the accidental faces of outlets look like charming, minimalistic emojis. "I've always been a usability and product designer, and functionality and utility are almost always present in my work. It's really hard for me to imagine things that are beautiful just for beauty's sake. I'm not that type of designer. The expressions I make, I want them to be useful to other people," says Michael."
""But what really gets me excited is giving someone something they use every day, like a good bottle opener. That's the bar I hold myself to, and Outlet Atlas is built in that spirit: something genuinely useful, made with real care." The end goal is simple for Michael, he'd like people to submit photos of outlets in the wild via Instagram and he'll periodically update the site with them. As well as that, he hopes that someone Googles 'what power adapter do I need?', the first page result will be Outlet Atlas. "And the most beautiful one too," adds Michael."
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