What is Good Design?
In designing a product, tradition tends to focus on performance and aesthetic. Both are important. Our point of view, however, is that good design is so much more.
It must also involve purpose. An element often overlooked. How will this product make people feel? What are the intended and unintended consequences of what we create? Will it inspire others to consider these consequences when they create something new?
As early as the concept stage, after an idea is brought to the table, we take a step back and consider whether it’s actually needed. Often it’s not. So it’s scraped. Yet sometimes, even for product categories seemingly saturated with existing options, there tends to be room for a fresh approach. This then becomes the need. It’s where the comfort zone ends, and those of us focused on creating something purposeful pick up the baton, and fundamentally change what was once considered a commonplace product into something new and vital.
We then consider what it should be made of, rather than what it could be. The materials selected are essential to capturing good design. While some may opt for extravagant and luxurious, others go with streamlined and standard.
Our preference is natural, sustainable and post-consumer. Thankfully, we live in a time where suppliers and manufacturers can be pushed to their limits in order to take materials with less impact on our planet and develop reliable products that meet or exceed the functionality of an original design.
This is perhaps more critical than ever when it comes to product packaging. One of the fastest growing sources of waste on the planet. Believe it or not, minimal and compostable can be beautiful, protective and desirable. In a society hellbent on drowning in our own waste, it’s also more necessary than ever.
Collectively, we can choose to ignore wasteful packaging with no practical purpose by demanding better from the brands we use. For those of us designing and producing it, introducing new ideas for potential materials and bringing those concepts to life in a way that evokes genuine emotion from consumers will only work to encourage others to do the same.
“Design is a powerful force for change and motivation, and it is everywhere.” - Katie McBroom
When producing anything, an honest and thoughtful discussion about what the final result should be will inevitably benefit the product, and its users. This is how GOOD DESIGN is achieved, from start to finish.
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