Over used word of the week - revolutionary

I have previously lamented the use of the word 'Genius' being bandied about far too often and used to describe things that are about as far away from Genius as I think it's possible to get.  This week I feels I cannot read through a product description in a catalogue without encountering the word 'Revolutionary'. Whilst I accept that products have to be described to help them to be sold and positive words are far more likely to aid this goal, very few of the products I have recently seen described by this term get close to being revolutionary.  Just drop the 'R' and you will get what most products actually are, evolutionary.  Taking a product that has existed in various guises for over 100 years, making a change to the material or tweaking one design element is not revolutionary.  The products are too numerous to mention here, but you know who you are!

good things take time

I bemaon the ammount of time it takes to do anything good or worthwhile.  Everybody wants everything faster and I'm no different to the next person.  I guess its because what ever it is, human nature is to want more of it, for me at the moment it's more views on youtube, better ideas, to build more designs faster. For good and bad reasons, I'm glad that this is not possible, I have 1000's (well, definitely 100's) of ideas, just sat in sketchbooks waiting to be realised. But I know they would only be considered half the idea and that I would be doing them a disservice if I didn't spend lots of time developing the design, making the model as well as I can, presenting it properly, telling a good story to go along with it, showing the thought and the implimentation.  Like all good things, this take time.

I design when I get a chance on weekends and evenings as during the week I have a full time job. Currently I am trying to not rush to finish: a set of kitchen utensils, a fridge, a bicycle lock, and a wheel barrow, whilst trying to learn to be more patient.

The office cup

One of my colleagues has bought a new mug that has a spoon that slots into the handle. I thought the mug was a bad design, but she and everyone else in the office loves it (they are all ladies who are not from a product design background).  So numerous discussions have been had; I have tried to convince them why this is a bad design and they have defended it, not surprisingly, Product Tank has been outdone by lady logic.

1. The handle could be weaker than a standard design.

Response: I'm not swinging it around the room, it will be fine and if not, I can just buy another one.

2. The spoon when used and returned to the handle will drip liquid down the handle and over your hands.

Response: Just lick the spoon or preferably, wash and dry it.

3. When you drain the cup, by tipping it back, the spoon will fall out.

Response: This hasn't happened so far.

4. The inside of the cup is black, so you can't guage the strength of the tea you are brewing.

Response: She's using coffee sachets which are already pre-measured, or if you are making tea, you could just put the milk in first. (I did argue that putting the milk in first will reduce the temperature of water, which will effect the quality of the brew when putting a bag in the cup)

The killer blow was the argument that spoons go missing in the office, so having a unique spoon that you can keep with the cup is a really good idea. Shows what I know!

If I was designing another mug, I would have dismissed this idea very early on.  Its a useful reminder about how important it is to know and understand the needs of your customers prior to commencing a project.  It's also a reminder that no matter how bad something is, if someone loves it, they will not see or will adjust to cope with its faults (or they just like an argument!).  When making tea for my colleagues the other day, I used this spoon to stir the coffee, then placed it back into the handle and on picking up the mug, scolded myself on the spoon.  Ladies 2 product tank 0.

One reason its getting harder to find a product design position

We product designers (even though it's not what I do to earn my crust, I still have a product designers heart) are a relatively rare bunch, that is to say that compared to graphic designers etc we are in the minority, but we are still here.  So when searching for jobs, how irksome it is to look at lots of job listings that say 'designer wanted' to then visit the description to find the company want a graphic designer or a costume designer or any other designer other than a product designer.   The latest is jobs advertised for NPD. Not so long ago, NPD (New Product Development) seemed to be mainly focused on product design. Now NPD seems totally related to designing and working within the foods industry, creating the latest ready meal.  Since when did the food industry bag it and why can they not call it something like NPDF.  There are so many disciplines that have designer as their following word, costume, set, graphic, car, lighting, to name but a few.  Why can’t the people writing the job descriptions not be more specific.  Surely this would achieve a better hit rate in terms of applicants as people scanning the job listings would know exactly what the job advertised was for?  Ok rant over.

learn from mistakes: a final review of my car design

When I started designing my car, I researched the market and what was already available and researched the functional problems elderly drivers experience with cars to inform my design.  I consciously chose not to address these problems using electronics, mainly because I believed that mechanical solutions could work as well with less chance of breaking and at a reduced cost. (In particular the wing mirrors).  I was wrong, the solutions to the problems already exist in a much better way, electronically, with parking sensors and cameras that give you a 360 degree view of the vehicle, they are currently only available in top of the range vehicles, but they are the ideal solution to the problem.  So, should I be designing  the best solution, or the most affordable one.  I suppose that depends on the brief, but who am I to say whether people can afford things or not, there are plenty of payment schemes available.  Why should I be diluting the strength of the design at answering the problems I've identified, based on my experience of how wealthy the elderly people I know who would benefit from such a design are.  The answer is I shouldn't, I should have used the latest technology, as long as it is of benefit and not gimmick, because it will surely come down in price but most importantly because it is the best solution.  That was lesson number 1.

Lesson number 2, I don't mind the exterior, I think it's different to what everyone else is doing, but its not going to blow minds, it's not pushing the boundaries enough and the interior totally sucks.  The seats could have been really beautiful and the whole dash area should be redesigned to be really fluid, in contrast to the exterior.  It could have been amazing, except it isn't, why?  There are two main problems, one is that when I'm too close to a project I can't step back an analyse it properly, the second is the danger of becoming complacent.  There were times during this project, when I thought that will do.  It's not a great detail that has been well resolved, but its ok and it's not one of the things that I wish to focus on in my video, so it will do.  I may also have subconsciously done things because I knew I could make them quickly.  Do that enough times, accepting ok details and soon the whole design will become diluted.  This is a huge problem.  It's funny how sometimes I know all this, I may even realise it at the time, but there's nothing I seem to be able do about it.  I'm a big advocate of taking the right amount of time with the design, not rushing things but also not taking too long, so things can and did go stale. I have seriously thought about how to avoid this, how to not get too involved in the design, so that I am able to step back and analyse effectively. But as I design on my own and don't work in a team, I don't think it's possible, maybe I should start publishing work in progress on websites like Behance, but I believe there are drawbacks to this approach.  The whole point about design for me, is that I get caught up in it, otherwise the design lacks passion. But it is also about iterations, this was the first car I designed.  What I should have done is not published it, taken it apart and built it up again..  You cannot imagine what I can see in my head and how much better version 2 would be.  This has happened with many other designs.  I have said it before, its better to go too far, becuase you can always come back a few steps, than not go far enough.  I know I didn't go far enough.

I'd like to say that this design was a step shift, a game changer.  Not because of what it did, but for this designer, what it didn't do and what he learnt or was again reminded.  It is never enough.  Product tank is changing, the quality is about to go up a gear.  Forever learning, never satisfied,  trapped but comfortable in the constant state of being fleetingly happy when a project is finished, but then unhappy when I realise how much further I could have pushed it. 

is product design dead?

Surf Board shaper Neil Randall (if6was9) at work

Recently I keep stumbling upon debate about the death of product design, not in terms of definition, a change of name or description, but in terms of people,  it is claimed that product designers will be replaced by computers and machines.  This is not a new debate, but it has got me thinking.  If a computer can generate randomly or selectively, a thousand different skins for a product in a matter of seconds, what need for a designer?  I always took comfort in the slim hope that computers would not be able to understand or incorporate into the design the human aspect we currently take for granted.  For example, I recently watched a program about women designing products for women, with greater understanding than any male could bring to the table.  Could a computer grasp the subtlety that potentially a male designer may not?  Yes a computer could generate aesthetically pleasing exteriors to products, but will it ever be able to link in the human centred design elements that demonstrate the deeper, intangible aspects that humans intuitively bring to their designs.  

A few years ago I visited an old University amigo who was shaping surf boards in Australia.  I spent a few days in his work shop and had a go at shaping a mini board.  Whilst I was able to replicate the shape of a surfboard what i didn't understand was why, because I wasn't a surfer.  He was an excellent surfer and would feel the board and know what an extra millimetre off the thickness would do to the handling, how altering the curve would subtly affect the way the board carves through the water allowing him to tailor the board to an individual or making each board subtly unique.  Having hardly ever surfed, these are things I could not appreciate and thats the thing, products are designed by humans to be used by humans.  

A computer will be able to do subtle things to shapes that I can only imagine, but will it understand the humanity of the reasons why?  Probably not, but I don't think it will need to?  Due to advances in scanners etc in the future a human could walk into a booth (or through an airport) and within seconds the machine would know everything it would need to about that person, their grip strength, how much arthritis they have in their hands, underlying medical problems, their balance etc, then it could print products specifically tailored to their needs and they'd be ready for them to collect on the way home.  It could also monitor sales to work out which objects are aesthetically pleasing to each geographic area, age, sex etc, so that it can produce designs that will have a much higher chance of appealing.  A few years of statistical data build up and advancement in this area and it will probably have us all figured out. Maybe if/when this happens, product design as we know it will be dead, but by that time, based on the teachings of many science fiction films (Terminator, Matrix, I-robot etc) the death of product design and industrial design, will be the least of our problems!

Product colour of the future

My parents recently repainted their kitchen and my mother, who is famous for her lack of artistic talent, chose the paint colour, a cool grey (although can it be called a colour?).  I have to say, she's pulled an absolute blinder, as the grey she has chosen seems to compliment everything put against it incredibly well.  So it got me thinking, as I have said in previous posts, eventually our current obsession with black or white products will wane, so what then?  I would suggest this and will be using it in the not too distant future.  The future is bright, the future is grey!

Advice to product design students - you won't realise how lucky you are.

The university I went to had a fantastic wood working machine shop, with table saws, lathes, bandsaws, thickness planers, mortisers, circular sanders, routers etc you name it, it had it.  There was a metal working shop with 3 different types of welders, various saws and tube benders, metal cutters and metal lathes. A huge ceramics area with everything for slip casting, throwing and glazing, with a kiln our tutor rather worryingly told us could fit the body of a large man standing up! It had vacuum forming machines, an enormous ply laminating machine, a spray booth with water wall (that I managed to flood on 3 occasions). The list could go on and then, I graduated.  I was fortunate enough to get 3 months in Italy working for a design consultancy as part of an exchange scheme.  Their office was in an apartment block and they didn't have a workshop.  In stark contrast to university, cardboard, wire and a pair of scissors was about as good as it got.  Then I worked in a consultancy in the uk and was lucky that they had a work bench and a bandsaw in a garage.  

My point is, if you are in university and like making models, make the most of your time there as unless you are very lucky, you will probably never be able to get your hands on as good or varied equipment again.  Also, what I didn't appreciate whilst I was at university was the amount of time I had to use and gain experience on these tools.  The majority of students in university have soo much time to focus on design, even if they think they don't.  What a luxury having the amount of time I had then would be today.  The older you get the less time you have, even if you are employed in design there isn't the time to spend days playing around making models.  I don't yet have a wife, kids or a dog and finding any time is still a struggle.

Oh no, Another blog post about a chair design

I am in the minority here, but I cannot believe how many people press the ‘like’, ‘appreciate’, thumbs up, high five, secret handshake or any other form of positive rating button used on industrial design websites for a mundane chair.  I cannot believe how many of the product design websites I regularly visit blog about chairs, we are drowning in posts about chairs (ironically, this is another one).  My initial beef was with the plethora of similar chairs being designed.  On an almost daily basis there is another image of the latest and greatest chair design, I’d look at it and think – ‘4 legs, seat, back, wood..yep it’s another chair, similar to the one I saw yesterday (slightly different colour, slightly different shape) and yawn, the day before and the day before that and Zzzzzzz.’ 

Then I looked at my own chair designs and realised…. ‘4 legs, seat, back….ah.’   I remembered how much I learnt designing and making the chairs I’ve designed and how useful those lessons and the chairs themselves have been.  So I changed my mind, we should not stop designing chairs, just stop blogging about them and stop liking them.  The thing is, chairs are not difficult to design, Phillipe Stark claimed he could design a new one in 2 minutes.  Imagine if all the design effort across the globe that has been put into designing chairs was channelled into solving real problems, would we be further on? 

I’ve seen amazing product design concepts on websites that have ‘appreciate’ buttons, that are used as a gauge of how the public rate the design idea, styling etc.  There are some absolutely brilliant ideas that only get a handful of ‘likes’ yet a plain 4 legged, 1 seat, 1 back rest, wooden chair gets thousands of appreciations and if you stick an arm rest or two on it - wow.  I cannot understand why these designs receive so much attention at all, where is the demand coming from.  Don’t get me started on tables!

Almost turning 'Hulk' and Peter Dormer

The button on my I-pad stopped working; I tried pressing the button a few times, nothing.  My father, having seen all this, thought he could do better – despite his age and technical incompetence, it appears it’s a parent thing.  ‘Give it here’ he said, stabbing his thumb onto the button until the skin under his thumb nail went white – twice!  He turned it around, looking for something else, the ‘push here to fix everything magic button that only appears when something goes wrong,’ but unsurprisingly it wasn’t there.  He shook my I-pad and stabbed the button again.  ‘Nope, it’s not working,’ he said handing it back.  I’m beginning to experience the same feelings as Peter Banner, just before he rips his shorts, turns green and destroys the house. ‘Oh, so having watched me, you were somehow under the illusion that doing exactly the same thing, after a 5 second delay, but twice as hard would somehow be the ideal remedy – brilliant!  If it wasn’t working before it probably won’t now!’  On calming down, I was reminded of an extract by the late and great Peter Dormer, from his book ‘The Meanings of Modern Design’ in which he describes how we used to feel the need to bash the top of the TV when it went on the blink even though there were no mechanical parts and how interestingly this often worked, enforcing the behaviour.  These days you can’t do this because TV’s are becoming so thin, you’ll cut yourself as it rips off the wall.  Our relationships with objects are changing. I wonder if this behaviour is inbuilt, that the less we understand how something works, the more we resort to shaking it.  Or, having grown up with mainly mechanical items, this is a generational trait that will be phased out in subsequent generations.  Regardless, Peter Dormers book remains an interesting read, even if like everything else it will go out of date.  Despite the lack of a magic button, plugging my I-pad in (even though it was charged) seemed to fix the problem and fortunately, no shorts needed to be torn.