The Aesthetics of StripeMaps: Being Small and Beautiful

Abstract

Maps are a very powerful form of information visualization. Beside their main purpose to communicate often very complex relationships between elements of some space, “good” maps are often perceived as aesthetically pleasing and beautiful. Maps are collected for those reasons; since centuries and ages they are “beautiful” – over all trends. Cartography, the study and practice of making maps, has long tradition. Even today, most of the maps, e.g., road maps and public you-are-here maps, are still crafted by professional cartographers. However, maps do require space to be displayed while mobile and wearable devices are getting smaller and smaller. This presents new challenges in cartography, as designing aesthetic user interfaces is an important aspect in the area of HCI. With StripeMaps we present a technique to bring maps to very small displays without destroying their utility and beauty. In this workshop paper we discuss our design considerations in depth and open up the discussion for alternative approaches.