Feel Viscosity: Unlock Intentional Innovation through Sensory Semiotics
Coco Wu, Megan Bourner-Powell
This workshop invites participants to experience viscosity by engaging with the sensory thickness of meaning. Using sensory semiotics as our lens, we’ll move beyond abstract theory into lived experience – decoding how touch, sound, scent, and visual carry emotional and cultural significance.
Through live sensory decoding, metaphor-based exercises, and projective techniques, participants will learn to surface unspoken needs and deep-seated motivations that consumers themselves often find hard to express. Together, we’ll explore how sensory cues act as “sticky” cultural signs — how they attach to memories, identities, and everyday choices.
By the end of the session, participants will:
- Experience hands-on methods for sensory decoding and cultural insight generation.
- Gain practical skills to reveal hidden meanings that drive behaviour.
- Learn how to translate sensory insights into intentional, meaningful innovation — ideas that truly resonate because they are felt, not just understood.
Blending play with purpose, this workshop offers a tangible way to feel the viscosity of culture — shaping perception to connect strategy, creativity, and innovation seamlessly.
Coco Wu
Coco Wu is APAC Associate Strategy Director at Huxly (By MMR), one of the few native experts in semiotics and cultural insights in the APAC region. Born and raised in China, educated in Europe, and now residing in Singapore, she is dedicated to promoting commercial semiotics in Asia. Her work focuses on cultivating authentic, ground-level cultural insights that bridge global perspectives with local realities.
Megan Bourner-Powell
Megan is a brand strategist and semiotician at Huxly, consulting for FMCG brands and based in London. She specialises in finding the meaningful overlap between brand positioning, culture & society and consumer insights. She does this through decoding the hidden meaning behind food labels and brand comms, and contextualises them in wider culture to help brands build distinctive experiences. She co-developed and leads the sensory semiotics methodology across the MMR sensory research group.