What Design Means To Me
- Something genuine
- Design is communication
- Design is a language that people know, although they don’t know they know it until they start speaking it.
- Design is letting down our biases and opening our minds to new ideas.
- The ability to take a vision and bring it into focus as clearly as possible.
- Good design glues all the pieces together: the concept, the message, the product (website)
I think of these things as I redesign this atrocious looking site. Rundle usually comes in and says “I shit out better designs”.
What does design mean to you?
Once I found this classroom session between Paul Rand and students of Arizona State Univ.
http://www.mkgraphic.com/paulrand.html (the classroom session is near the middle of the document; search for “Part Two”)
The main point of the talk is that design is actiually from one point of view “the manipulation of form and content” and from another - “system of relationships”. Relation between various forms, patterns, ideas, people and whatever else.
By George on August 25, 2005 6:49 am
Design has to be aesthetically pleasing; some may say good design and bad design are both still design but for me, design has to look good. If it looks unappetising I would prefer not to call it design at all.
By Blair Millen on August 25, 2005 8:03 am
Design is service.
You need to get rid of your ego (ignore your own personal preferences) and try to honestly come up with the best ways of serving the needs of your client and the users of the product.
Good design is design which has served this purpose.
By David Barrett on August 25, 2005 8:10 am
Design is intuitive
BTW: They’re too big. My first impression was that they were date boxes from a calendar
By Mark on August 25, 2005 9:12 am
Creativity, Consistency, and Useability. A design is worthless if it is missing any of the above.
What’s wrong with the design of this site? Its simple, clean, and straight to the point. The only odd things I notice are the remnants of the old light blue site (check the favicon).
By Kyle Posey on August 25, 2005 9:26 am
Well the new site (which I am guessing Mark saw) has a different IA and totally different viewpoint on what this site is about.
By Scrivs on August 25, 2005 10:00 am
Yes, I did see it. It was linked in my referal logs.
By Mark on August 25, 2005 10:17 am
Well for future reference wouldn’t it make sense to email me instead of commenting on something nobody knows what the hell you are talking about? Just a wild guess ;-)
And you can never have too big!
By Scrivs on August 25, 2005 10:22 am
For me, design is facilitation of the message. In my opinion, content is your branding, so design for design’s sake is a mute point without something to say. That’s why I feel that we as designers serve a two-fold role: 1. Facilitating the message of the client, and 2. Quality control - keeping people off the internet that have nothing valuable to say. :)
By Nathan Smith on August 25, 2005 10:29 am
Ok. Sorry everybody (Kyle) that I apparently led you astray.
Good design is responsive
Given that, I look forward to having you read and respond to my emails, Scrivs.
; )
By Mark on August 25, 2005 11:03 am
Design to me means expressing what u have in mind to screen…in a very colourful manner.
Sunil
By Sunil Shenoy on August 25, 2005 1:26 pm
A way of showcasing content.
By Andrew on August 25, 2005 2:29 pm
About 6 figures a year…for someone else other than myself.
Design is to me is no more than what it is; a way for the user to interface with something. A microwave was designed for a user to interface with it, a car, a bottle.
Design is finding the ultimate balance between form and functionality. Because unlike form which can exist by itself, functionality cannot exist without form.
By Ryan Latham on August 25, 2005 3:12 pm
Bullshit.
By Prabhath on August 26, 2005 2:07 am
Tell me, i cant make a proper design for my “main site” but for other stuff it justs flows…
Making that someway frustrating…
By Cicloid on August 26, 2005 5:25 am
For me, Design is Art’s nerdy brother.
By Chopper on August 26, 2005 12:27 pm
two words… original & simple.
Original and simple are the only 2 i would describe it as for reasons as follows:
So many people think “design” is a uber-graphical clutter of ‘cool shapes’ and just confuse the shit out of people. It may be a nice desktop but design, pffffft. (target audience pending of course!)
Simple leads to useability (usually), flexibility, and always keeps the audience calm and not overwhlemed with garbage. (target audience pending of course). Also, people love columns (faux?, perhaps) or some sort of “letter” typography. Keeps them feeling ’securely strapped in for some information?’ I cant explain that, but i’ve always noticed people love the fact that there is a side column on either side and what they’re reading is actually in some square format that isnt too wide that it seems like you’re about to walk through a desert without any water.
By trevor on September 12, 2005 9:24 pm