Beyond the Chart: Turn Data into a Compelling Experience

Every dataset tells many possible stories. The challenge is not creating a chart, but discovering which story deserves to be told and how to make people understand, remember and care about it.

In this workshop, participants will work with a curated real-world dataset and learn how to move beyond spreadsheets and conventional dashboards. Rather than jumping straight into software, they will explore the data, identify meaningful patterns, define a clear audience and message, and develop a visual concept before choosing any tools.

Through sketching, rapid prototyping and collaborative feedback, participants will experiment with visual encoding, storytelling and interaction. Finally, they will use AI-assisted coding to transform their analogue concept into a simple interactive prototype that could become the foundation of a richer digital experience.

What participants will work on

• Exploring a real-world dataset to identify patterns, comparisons and meaningful questions.
• Defining a clear audience, message and narrative before selecting any visual representation.
• Sketching alternative visual concepts using position, colour, shape, scale, sequence and interaction.
• Testing visual ideas with other participants to understand how design decisions affect interpretation.
• Transforming a paper sketch into an interactive prototype using AI-assisted coding.

Format

This hands-on workshop combines short theory sessions, sketching exercises, collaborative critiques and rapid prototyping. Participants will progressively move from raw data to a visual concept, validate their ideas with others, and finish with a working interactive prototype built from their own design.

Target audience

UI and UX designers, frontend developers, creative technologists, data storytellers, journalists, researchers, marketers and anyone interested in communicating information through engaging visual experiences. It is particularly relevant for people who want to move beyond dashboards and traditional charts towards more creative, audience-centred approaches to data visualisation.