06 — Interactive archive
Histocom
A century of communication, one object at a time
The challenge
Build an archive that does not read like a timeline of dates. The subject — a century of communication devices — is usually presented as a horizontal scroll of years, and that flattens the thing that actually matters: how radically each object changed what a person could do.
The response
The archive is organised by object, not by date. Each device opens as a fragment you can turn over, with its record — year, maker, what it made possible — assembling around it. Chronology is a filter, never the structure.
01 — Approach
Objects first, dates second.
Every entry is an artefact with a story about capability. The year is metadata. Restructuring the archive this way meant a visitor could arrive anywhere and immediately understand why the object mattered, without needing to know what came before it.
02 — Design system
Archive grammar — plates, rules, and one cold accent.
The visual language borrows from museum labelling: hairline rules, monospaced record data, generous margins. A single cold cyan marks anything interactive so the interface never competes with the artefacts.
03 — Development
JavaScript, graphics and animation, hand-built.
Written in JavaScript with every graphic and transition authored for the project. Fragment assembly, the record reveal and the filter transitions all run on a shared timing system so the whole archive moves with one rhythm.
04 — Outcome
An archive you browse instead of scroll.
Removing the timeline as a structure is what made the collection explorable — visitors move by curiosity rather than by chronology, and every entry works as an entry point.
Stack
- JavaScript
- Custom animation system
- SVG
Services
- Development
- UI / UX design
- Motion design
- Optimisation
Images
- Illustration — Histocom, HETIC
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