A Train to Vienna, a Cup of Coffee and a Curious Mind

It was a cold morning.

The kind of cold where you can smell the dampness in the air. A little foggy, a little gray, and everyone was bundled up at the station waiting for the train to Vienna.

There’s something about waiting for a train. Everyone watching the tracks, checking the time, waiting for it to appear through the fog.

Finally, it came.

We got on and immediately everything felt different. Warm. Quiet. So clean. And surprisingly empty.

We found our window seats, settled in, and started watching the world go by.

Not long after, the server came around.

Breakfast and coffee, of course. :)

A few minutes later, this really authentic breakfast, hot chocolate, coffee were delivered..

Nothing fancy. Everything just felt considered.

And of course…being a designer, I noticed the napkin.

At first, I thought the striped part was a separate wrapper. It looked like a little paper band holding the folded napkin together.

I actually thought, Oh, that’s nice.

Then I opened it.

Wait…

The wrapper IS the napkin. There wasn’t another piece of paper at all.

The stripe was part of the napkin, positioned and folded in just the right way to make it look like a separate wrapper.

I don’t know why, but I loved that.

It’s such a small thing, but so thoughtful.

You get the feeling of this beautifully wrapped little napkin without actually adding anything. No extra material. Nothing extra to remove. Nothing extra to throw away.

One thing doing two jobs.

And then, because my designer brain apparently never turns off, I started noticing everything else.

Even the toilet paper in the bathroom. How it was placed. How you reached for it. How it dispensed.

Something we use every single day and probably never give a second thought to…someone still had to design it.

And that got me thinking. UX really is everywhere.

We hear “UX” today and immediately think about websites, apps, screens, buttons and user flows.

But UX has been around long before any of that.

Actually, it was around long before we even had a word for it.

Think about a door handle.

A chair.

A staircase built 500 years ago.

A coffee cup.

A train seat.

A napkin.

Even a toilet roll.

At some point, someone had to think about the person who would use it.

How will they use this?

What will feel natural?

What would make this easier?

And sometimes…

How can I do this with less?

That’s the part I love. Good UX doesn’t always mean adding something. Sometimes it’s actually about taking something away. It doesn’t have to announce itself. Most people probably opened that napkin without ever thinking about the little striped “wrapper.” And that’s okay.

It still worked.

Maybe that’s one of the things I love most about being a designer. You start seeing these little decisions everywhere.

Sometimes the best design isn’t the big, impressive thing. Sometimes it’s just a stripe on a napkin that makes you stop for a second and think…

That was clever!

So here I am, still sitting by the window on a train to Vienna. Coffee in front of me.

Foggy Austrian countryside passing by outside. Apparently thinking way too much about a napkin…and toilet paper.

But maybe that’s the point.

UX is everywhere.

It’s in the things we touch, the things we use, and the tiny, everyday moments we barely notice.

It was there long before websites, apps, or screens.

Long before we gave it a name, someone was already thinking about the person on the other side.

And as the train keeps moving toward Vienna, I’m still looking out the window.

And still noticing.

Because good design is everywhere, if you pay attention.