Appreciating Design
Design is often first considered as the practice of combining physical traits such as shapes, color, and textures to become objects or any visualization we see around us. These objects may be a spoon or a car. It may be TV ads or posters at the bus stop.
When we see these objects, we use each of our personal lenses and evaluate whether what we see is ugly, beautiful, proper, repelling, or any other adjectives. Based on that, we value whether what we see is a good thing (or a good design). Then the questions arise, who defined the aspects that make those characters? Is it the creator first or the audience first? Who decides the combination that makes those characters? What factors are stacked behind the term “good design”?
Who?
Of course, designers or creators come into the picture when we talk about “who.” We usually blame the designers if we look at ugly and dysfunctioning objects. We praise the creators when they move us emotionally. The creators indeed have a role in it, but they are partly working as the aggregator of the myriads' values that the public has. The public environment or information exposed to the creators significantly affects what would be created.
On the other hand, the public will respond to the objects created, and those responses create a new direction of values that creators can follow and respond to. It’s a cyclical and somewhat symbiotic relationship. But this relationship also produces constantly changing and somewhat unreliable standards of what’s beautiful, proper, good, etc. Then how can we be in the consensus of what is good beyond our own lenses and for society at large? To know how we also come into the question of “what.”
What?
First of all, there is an aspect that functions as a hardline on objects that are considered as good or bad. That aspect is safety and function. If we designed a chair, is the chair prone to break? Does the chair have sharp edges that can easily cut the skin? If we designed a train station, is the space enough for the volume of people expected? Does it have an emergency system? There are questions of safety that we, as the designers or the audience, must evaluate.
If all safety aspects can be answered and proven well, we can then value the objects based on the most exciting yet more difficult lens, the culture.
To value this on the cultural level, we have to view an object with multiple lenses. Because good design on a cultural level is more than just a good combination of physical traits like we mentioned above. We can see what a good or well-designed object based on this is:
1. Understanding the goal of the object
Whether as the creator of the audience, understanding the goal of why the object is created is necessary. Because then we’ll understand the function it wants to fulfill and the people it intends to serve.
For example, when we see AlvinT Linger Bench, we should understand the goal of the object is not to be a practical object. If we use the lens of practicality, the bench size and shape will fall far from the characteristic of practical objects.
But if we understand that the goal of the object is becoming the platform for connection between human and nature, and human to human, then we’ll begin to see it and value it with a different lens.
2. Understanding the process it took to create the object
Most of the value of an object is hidden or overshadowed by its physical properties. There is a supply chain that is meticulously managed and considered in creating an object.
For example, we think that the wooden table from brand A is just merely a dining table with a wooden surface. But it actually was built with a responsibly-sourced engineered hardwood veneer. Responsible sourcing has taken huge effort from many stakeholders, and it wasn’t done in a matter of days but decades. Knowing this, the audience will then value the objects differently.
It’s also the same with valuing processes that focus more on the idea or innovation—for example, the Yves Klein blue. In a glimpse, this is just a blue color. But if we consider the fact that there was no such blue before it was created in 1958 and how the color has seeped into our culture ever since, we will think of this color differently. We’ll not easily go past it if we find an object using the color on the street.
3. Understanding the value it wants to convey
Some objects, like Magno's wooden radio, were designed to communicate how we should form our relationship and loyalty with objects. Some others speak of speed, lightness, and practicality, such as disposable straws, plates, and other disposable things.
If we understand what value it wants to convey, we will know if they’ve succeeded in conveying it. If yes, it’s one step moving in the right direction despite if some audience doesn’t agree or like the objects.
4. Considering the impact the object can trigger
When we put something out to the world, it will create a ripple of impact, however small or short the ripple is. It can be as short or immediate as impacting our personal space, or it can be significant and affects society.
As the audience, we can judge an object’s impact by understanding the function or using it ourselves. Then we consciously consider what kind of impact the object can give and whether it succeeded.
But we must also remember that not all things can be born out of deliberate plans or design. Some things came to being spontaneously and out of anomalies. Simply, there are uncontrollable aspects of things. Some impacts are like this; we can’t instantly decide if the object is poorly designed because not everything can fall as planned. What one can do is to keep an open mind and stay informed.
