Design Wishes for 2010 and beyond

R- your throughts are very nicely articulated, a good read… I agree with your wishes for the future, i wonder though, how the business and marketplace mentality of ultra consumerism, that has really taken hold, can be “evolved” to more of a “less quantity, more quality” strategy. certainly designers can be cheerleaders for that cause, but I mean how do you get the marektplace to break free of it at this point? I kind of liken it to the energy question- there is a huge infrastructure based around fossil fuels, which means you can’t change it too quickly without hurting a lot of people. So i’m thinking, are we now stuck in the same situation here relative to companies, retailers, online stores, even designers who thrive simply because consumers buy enough stuff, enough times in a year? Economically, what happens if companies switch from making 12 products a year that last 3 years, to say 4 products a year that last 10 years? I mean i don’t know the answer but perhaps this can be the next big area of innovation - figuring out how to do this successfully…

These two comments together I think are interesting and have a lot in common.

First, it’s the word “rebel”. Why is it that is seems there is a need to rebel against corporate to get good/interesting/s4xy design? Why can’t corporate see the vision, take more risks and produce good stuff? Sadly, much corporate design is boring, sad and uninspired, hence the need for that rebel corporate designer. I’m all for the rebel, but woudn’t we all win if the corporation itself could better position a brand to be that rebel?

Secondly, I see your point, 6ix and I am too kinda tired of seeing so many nicely rendered but never made (or made once) things. Yes, it is not really ID, per se, but closer to art. Yes, they do get a lot of traction on this blog and others. However, I don’t think that this kind of work is getting undue attention. Rather than seeing less of this, (and back to my first point), let’s see more corporate companies pushing out stuff of this level of interest. You’ve said yourself, that the corporate stuff is less flashy. I’d say less interesting.

The problem is not that corporate is not getting enough attention and the one-offs are, it’s that corporate stuff can be boring, and people want exciting. If the mentality at corporate changed, both these problems would be solved - no need for the rebel, and the corporation itself could become the “rock star” to capture people’s attention.

Of course I’m generalizing “corporate” and not all companies are the same. But still the premise holds.

R

I think 6ix makes a good point, if the avant garde stuff is what the general public and corporate people think of when they think of “great design”(becasue thats what is promoted in the media, basically stuff that doesn’t sell lots of units) then you end up fighting this perception of what “great design” actually means. It seems like pitching great design to corporate is like the boogeyman, they are so quick to equate it to spending more money - either on R+D or materials, manufacturing processes, which in turn only produces products that are less accessible for the common person (Starck’s lemon squeezer anyone?) i.e. loss of revenue by not spanning more of the mass market. i think classic business/corporate culture, when you boil it down, really believes that “less interesting” equates to higher revenue, and its a very difficult perspective to change.

a job.

by corporate rebel I’m not meaning someone who rebels against a corporation, but someone who works within one and uses all of the resources at their disposal to do some mass produced product that has impact. Jonathn Ive = corporate rebel. He is an easy one to point out, but their are tons of others, David Beckstrom at Pitney Bowes, Bob Schwartz at GE, John Hoke at Nike and so on.

To Six’s point, lets celebrate Industrial Design, and not so much a couple of kids in Brooklyn making a box on a band saw. Great to talk about, but it has almost become central instead of peripheral.

I think industrial designers are born to be rebels while working for corporations. Our thought-processes just aren’t the same as the pencil pushers. That said, that’s one major reason why I left my last job. Couldn’t stand it any longer. I tried for YEARS to develop a VBL for every line and stressed the value or proper design methodology, which I was taught in school (mainly in graduate-level courses.) In other words, I thought I knew what I was talking about. Well, they didn’t. Or rather, they had their own egos to protect, so I was never really heard. Very very frustrating.

Now I am only working with companies that actually value my opinion, and heck, even pay me for it.

Having just read another thread about an Apple blog: Apple Industrial Design cg commented that with Apple ‘Industrial Design has a seat at the executive table, reversing the typical pecking order with Engineering. They have an involved CEO who personally reviews everything, maintains very clear vision and very high standards’.

As a consultancy designer for several years, when I presented concepts to companies who didn’t have any inhouse design, or a designer as part of the descision making team, the company invariably went for the safest option, most closely linked to what they already had. Even when pushed - and I pushed. The people holding the purse strings have the most to loose, so they always want to play safe. Taking risks in many companies invariably means putting your job (and other members of staff’s jobs) on the line if it goes wrong; and most people are not prepared to risk it. That’s why it’s easier to follow than to lead, which is why Apple is so good and why there are so few companies around like them.

I’ve seen this too, if everyone left their ego’s at the door and just concentrated on the product, not climbing the ladder etc, then products really would move forward. Why do people shout down an idea just because it’s not their own, or feel they are loosing control of a project, because someone lower, but better (not me BTW) is racing ahead.

great point product tank. I remember this all to well from my days at a consulting firm. It reminds me of a quote that someone used during a presentation recently:

“The trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more” - Erica Jong

I’m not sure why this simple platitude is not more widely understood, but for whatever reason, having a designer that is an officer of the company seems to help.

Why do people shout down an idea just because it’s not their own, or feel they are loosing control of a project, because someone lower, but better (not me BTW) is racing ahead.

I really didnt want to get into this but my answer is because human beings are not the way they present themselves, to themselves :slight_smile: their needs and greed overcomes anythingelse including the envronment they live in. Then they talk about piece and humanism, but individually they all have the urge… to be better than some other. total holy ratrace that started before classical age…
Off topic, apologies but, someone i know in Africa once gave a very racist comment about africans not evolving fast enough etc. I thought about how the african tribes were away from civilisation and design for a better world. This is quite a seperation where the design should be there to better our lives but in this fast paced economy it isnt. it actually never was lets not fool ourselves here. It is there mostly to please the client for the time being and get the job. I might be a bit too much of a blunt weapon here but i dont like to lie about my thoughts. and i do not aggree with the way its done either.
I told that person about the need for civilisation, that the disease of the white men ( im Turkish and not racist at all) to evolve to conquer, also force fed the need to design better equipment for WAR. the need was towards a gain not towards a better life. Better recources may be. so, being happy with your nakedness running around like crazies dancing around the fire, even though is not acceptable in todays society, is less sick then evolving in a fast pace in order to gain power to control everything. the problem is, it doesnt even make you happy in the end. Cuz its just not enough. Nothing is ever enough for this race, and the way we are living aorund the world with our self created economies and our unique ways are definately to end us drowning in our own stupidity.
sorry if i sound negative. but i seriously do see a connection between daily behaviour of human kind from its first existance till today. just better toys. behaviour is the same. and i think we are a race that gives itself too much credit. so dont be upset when someone in your office gets a fit, he just wants what he always wanted. POWER

My wish for design in 2010:

A little less conversation, a little more action (quoting Elvis here :wink:)

I’m tired of overcomplicated philosophising of apparently simple concepts, it gets in the way of the final quality of the project.

  1. Less talk + fewer ‘manifestos’ and more ACTION on sustainability. Pathetic how much ink and words have be spend v.s. results achieved…

  2. Designers to be less self-referential star worshipers - cowboy-up and FINALLY join the business world you are apart of already. Too many designers hiding in studios, treating their careers as a ‘lifestyle choice’…

That’ll ruffle some feathers… but I have to agree.

Not at all. Lets not forget that Dieter Rams was on the board at Braun. There is a precedent. Going into executive leadership does not mean leaving design behind, it means being an advocate for it. An evangelist when needed. To many rock star designers only promote themselves instead of advocating for design as a whole and using their notoriety to educate.

I’m grinding axes today.

well said. put another way, rock star or not, as an advocate of design (or designer in general, though one does not necessarily mean the other), no matter your position, it is up to you to decide how you use your design powers…for good or evil, to promote yourself, or promote design or the brand in general. at any level (pretty much) we all have a degree of influence and I’m all for using that to push good design as much as possible. As Yo also mentioned, notoriety or business power can also be used for the same good ends. It’s not one or the other. If someone could become the design Bono and be a design-rockstar and design advocate, why not? Jonny Ives pretty much fits that mold, no?

R

Hello,

great topic

Personally, I’d like to finally see democratic design rear its beautiful face. It is a possibility, I’m sure of it. Now is the perfect time. The work of Project H is a prime example of its possibility. Democratic design can be a useful tool for the whole world. Why try to bomb people into believing in democracy when we could simply design with them. If a bully is left out of the action they will come to their senses and want a part of the cake. they will have to learn the value of sharing.

Since there is a wide spread lack of respect for bankers, big-business and politicians, I’d like to see design, designers, crafts people, artists, manufacturers, whom ever, to use the technological resources that we have to pursue good design to be sold to local markets or even global ones. Money out of the pockets of the few would remove the bullshit that goes with overly big corporations. It would encourage innovation. The innovations that we need, sustainable innovations. It could enforce a skilled work force, it could control the growth of industrialising countries. It could create sustainable economies basing its function for the needs of people rather than the wants of marketers.

Everyone wants an iPod. Completely understandable. I think they are marvelous. Who doesn’t. But the amount of products I have consumed that have pissed me off so much that I have had to force myself to upgrade is immoral. We can do better than this. For a complete profession to move away from what it knows would be suicide. I know. I only want to see a few more examples of such systems in place that are powerful enough to challenge big business. To over throw the notion that people are part of a hierarchy that we don’t talk about.

Design could prove its worth and its value to business. We live in the age of self promotion on an international stage. Etsy.com is an example of this. I am hoping such communities will grow in a sustainable and democratic manner. Mankind now has the resources to not have to trust the blind faith of religion or political manifestos of the past centuries. A decade in, there is no reason why we shouldn’t utilise these resources to the best of our advantage. I have no political belief. I do know however that money is power. Money is in the hands of a few. Democracy and capitalism can be worked for the people by the people at little risk of political over throw, terrorism or economical downfall. Design has an important part to play in this. Democracy was worth fighting for. It still is.

My main hope, once I graduate, would be to get a job.

Wow… Above is a mouth full, but I can say that I do agree with most of what you are saying. I think that this year is especially a big chance for design to raise and show the world what we can do to solve most of the problems that we face. As IDers that what we do, solve problems, right???

To the comments around corporate, I think it goes much further that just us as designers. As corporate designers we face many challenges. We need to be innovative, consider the identity and directions of our brand, constant cost constraints, and most of all deal with political BS and personal opinion with other functions with in the business. This can take a toll on a designer and I think the comment around corporate design being bland comes from these constraints. I find myself constantly try to prove why design can help marketing, sales, or even finance’s goals. It seems as if they think that they know the answers and we are just there to give suggestions that they may or may not take. I can see how this may cause a corporate designer to finally break down and just give marketing what they want. This is not the right answer though.

My wish for 2010 is to try to change this style of thinking. This is actually on my objectives at work that is how committed I am to it. I am so tired of designing a package, presenting it to marketing, hand it off to engineering only to find out that marketing has made a change that makes no sense and ruins the design. And if I have to hear the word “Busy” one more time I am going to go crazy!!! What is it that we have to do to close the gap between marketing and us? We all have these thoughts and discussions and we all have these problems. How do we solve it? Is it a problem in their education? Is it a problem in ours?

I will get off my rant now. This may be an issue that may need to go to a new discussion, but is one that I think we should think about in the New Year. We have struggled with this for a while we need to fix it!!


Edit: I am sorry I don’t normally pull stuff off the home page and critique it, but this is exactly what 6ix was referring too. Why do we give these guys that make products, branding, packages, ect… recognition when we know the product is crap and would never be produced. What the hell is this? A cell phone you pour you Coke in? Really??? Are we serious here?? I know it runs of the power generated from the soda, but still…Seriously??? I would love to see more real world design education on the front page. I know I point coke out all the time, but they had a phenomenal year when it came to branding and did it with minimal interruption. That to me should be on the homepage for packaging excellence, not some cell phone I can pour my coke into.

I would like to point this out to ask the question if we are really portraying real decent ID, or even further than ID sense we have ventured into branding and packaging, graphic design, shouldn’t we portray real examples of what is working in the market. I also want to point out that our readers are expanding. Packaging and Branding used to be thought of as a 2D guys job, but now it has expanded into us, which means our readers have expanded. This means that we need to expand and invite more into the loop.
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I had to post a this article. I put a link earlier in the post, but I thought I would just through it up here. This agrees with everything from above and uses Coke as an example. I think you all know how much I love coke.

Turner Duckworth’s work for Coca Cola deserves every accolade it receives. Just recently it picked up a Benchmark Best of Show Award to go with its Yellow Pencils, Cannes Grand Prix for Design and many others.

It is a great visual identity system and a superb example of how creative and clever design for mass market products can be, if you try really, really hard. It’s brave and it’s beautiful, which are not words one readily associates with multinational corporations.

But perhaps the most remarkable thing about it is that it has won so many awards despite inhabiting territory that turns many judges off. Mass market products rarely make it to the shortlist of some of the most prestigious awards let alone the winners’ podium and it is not because they are not good enough.

I’ve judged all sorts of awards and time and time again design for mainstream brands gets overlooked in favour of tiny, boutique brands. The sheer number of entries that one normally has to get through means that each candidate has about seven seconds to impress you, so naturally the more shocking executions make the greatest impressions that’s just human nature.

And it is easier to create radical designs for new brands because you start from a blank sheet of paper with no brand heritage to protect and evolve and no loyal consumers to retain. Also start-ups and boutique brands tend to be small companies who are better able to take riskier decisions their brands have to make a massive noise through packaging because they can’t afford to market themselves in any other way.

I love the weird and wonderful, but I am also passionate about mainstream, mass market, every day brands. It is harder to sell extreme designs to them; not because they lack courage or are weighed down by process but because those sorts of designs are often inappropriate for the product. There is a great deal of creativity in the mass market arena and one doesn’t have to be satisfied with a little tweak here and a slight change, there as Turner Duckworth has demonstrated so well.

I can’t help feeling that many judging panels look down their collective noses at mass market packaging ­ that it is dull be default and sometimes overlook good, creative solutions in the process.

The Coca Cola identity is a lesson to us all: it should inspire designers and design judges alike.
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I agree with the posts above. The vast majority of the work posted, isn’t about problem solving or improving on things, it’s all about variations, one offs and mostly gimmicks. The problem is, this seems to be the stuff that’s seen as cool/desireable and it’s the easiest thing to do. I find it much harder to make problem solving based products than I would to make a table with cast human legs (something I saw recently). Doing design gimmicks is easier, much quicker and is more easy for a viewer to instantly get in 1 photo, than trying to show how clever a new medical product is. Everyone needs a table, not everyone needs or wants to see the design improvements made to a key hole surgical instrument. So I imagine the submissions Core gets will be largely in favour of one offs etc as just more people are doing it. I do feel that Core, as one of the oldest design blogs on the internet, should champion more problem solving/need based design.

I’m also aware, that many small companies (possibly just making tables) really rely on core and other design blogs as part of their marketing/business. So I still think one off/gimmick design should be posted, but I think more questions should be asked about each design (not just - does it look cool) as currently IMHO there is an imbalance.

Hell yeah!

Is Core77 an industrial design site or art? Seems more like art since that’s primarily what they do articles on.

For 2010, I’d like to see more emphasis on designers making a change in the corporate world. I know that’s seen as the boring part of industrial design, but that’s where the money comes from. This whole “design can change the world” mantra is ridiculous in my opinion. We can make a small difference in how we develop new products, but the end result is still producing products that will inevitably end up in a land-fill somewhere. Sad, but true. We are no different than engineers or people working hourly in front of a 500-ton injection-mold machine. We simply design the product that is mass-produced.

Now that said, I think there is serious room for improvement, but however much the designer struggles to create something that is more environmentally friendly, they still have to get it past the bean-counters and upper-management. That’s nearly impossible during this particular economic climate. Everyone is struggling and unfortunately, protecting the environment is only a marketing pitch, not an actual course of action. I have some pretty somber examples of this but can’t go into details because of contractual issues.

It’s really sad but we have to get it through our lofty heads that industrial designers are simply a part of the equation and not necessarily the solution. Sure, we are there to produce solutions to problems but more often are there to simply to develop a new design. A new design that is better in some shape or form that than the predecessor. Sometimes, that’s not saying much.

In 2010, I’d like to see more emphasis on promoting the products that corporate designers come up with. These one-off companies can pretty much create anything they think of with little regard to how much it will sell, to how well it fits on store shelves, to how the sales person interacts with it, etc. With a corporate design, there are so many challenges set in front of them to get past before the first pencil sketch is even drawn up. Corporate design is full of road-blocks that one must pass or simply react with. That’s the nature of the challenge and for me, is one of great triumph when something does go against the grain and become successful in the marketplace.

This is going so OT, but good conversations. I think the discussion forums are a great counter balance, I’m I’m super proud of how you all have fired up the level of conversation in here, from cradle to grave macro design approaches to speccing a mold texture. Sometimes great design is that provocative art one off, sometimes its that s3xy sketch, and sometime it getting a draft angle just right.

On the forums we’re not afraid to get down into the nitty gritty and I love that. We are also not afraid to disagree and argue out a point or play devil’s advocate. I love that. It’s also a more democratic way to share and share alike, instead of the one way channel of a magazine, or even the two way channel of a blog with comments, this is going every which way and a student can argue against a vet, and everyone in between.

My wish for 2010? That we keep this going! (like how I brought that back around?)