Junfei Teng and the Relationship Between Objects, Interaction, and Attention

Winning the NY Product Design Awards means a lot to me—both as recognition of the work and as validation of the design stance behind it. EntoPedia proposes a gentler relationship with nature by reframing “collection” from possession into documentation, and it’s meaningful to see that idea resonate with an international jury. 

As a designer, I’m encouraged that values like care, respect, and shared learning can be recognized as strong design outcomes—not just aesthetics or novelty.

The impact of EntoPedia has been very personal: it’s strengthened my confidence in pursuing work that blends product thinking with cultural and ethical questions. It has also made outreach easier—editors and collaborators take the project more seriously when it’s award-recognized, and it opens doors for features, conversations, and potential partnerships. 

Professionally, it supports my long-term goal of building an internationally visible body of work and pursuing opportunities where design can shape how people learn and connect.

Experimentation is central—especially when the goal is to change behavior, not just interfaces. With EntoPedia, I iterated on how to make observation feel natural in daily life: the wearable form, the mechanical “two-finger press” release, and the app’s discovery logic. 

For example, the decision to use a tactile mechanical release wasn’t purely functional—it was tested as a way to make recording feel intentional, like a small ritual that starts with attention. I also experimented with how to represent shared knowledge through “first local sighting” markers to make attribution visible and learning cumulative.

Jewelry mechanisms and everyday objects have been surprisingly influential—magnetic clasps, pendants, and small tactile closures. They taught me that interaction can be quiet and intuitive, embedded in form rather than signaled with “tech” language. For EntoPedia, that became a key principle: if it feels like something you’d actually wear, it can stay present in your life—and then learning can happen in ordinary moments.

That good design is often less about “a great idea” and more about making trade-offs visible and intentional. Designers are constantly balancing clarity, constraints, and values—what we prioritize, what we remove, and what we choose to make easier or harder. The final outcome may look simple, but it usually comes from many rounds of questions, testing, and refinement.

I try to align on the real goal first—what success looks like for users and for the business—then use prototypes to make ideas concrete early. When there’s tension, I don’t treat it as “my idea vs. theirs”; I treat it as a hypothesis to test. I also communicate trade-offs transparently: what we gain, what we risk, and what the user impact is. That approach tends to build trust and makes it easier to advocate for stronger solutions.

A key challenge was designing an interaction that is fast enough for real-world encounters—while still feeling respectful and intentional. Another challenge was avoiding the aesthetic language of “technical gear” so the object could live naturally in daily wear. I handled this by treating form and interaction as inseparable: the pendant presence reduces friction, the tactile gesture anchors attention, and the system rules (metadata + attribution) reinforce the value of shared learning.

When I hit a creative block, I step away from the screen and return to something tactile—often making ceramics. Ceramics helps me reset because it’s quiet, physical, and honest—your hands tell you what’s working. The process also teaches patience: you can’t force a result, you shape it over time. After a session, I return to design work feeling calmer and more focused, with new ideas about form, rhythm, and how people experience objects in daily life.

Care, respect, and clarity. I’m drawn to designs that reduce friction without reducing thoughtfulness—tools that help people act with more attention, not less. I also care about attribution and shared learning: making it clear where knowledge comes from and how it evolves over time. Those values are central to EntoPedia, and they show up across my work in different ways.

Build a practice, not just a portfolio. Choose a few themes you genuinely care about and keep making work around them—your voice becomes clearer with repetition. Seek feedback early, prototype often, and learn to explain trade-offs with confidence. And don’t wait for “perfect” conditions—many breakthrough projects start as small experiments.

I’d love to collaborate with Naoto Fukasawa. His work is grounded in careful observation of everyday behavior, creating objects that feel quiet, intuitive, and inevitable. That attention to subtle gestures strongly resonates with my interest in wearable interactions that guide attention rather than distract from it.

Question I wish people asked: “What is your work trying to protect?”

My answer: I’m trying to protect attention and care. As AI accelerates how we produce, decide, and document, it’s easy to turn everything into a faster workflow or a numbers game. I’m interested in designs that slow us down in the right moments—where interaction encourages noticing, learning, and shared understanding rather than just quick outputs.