I had a glorious moment regarding the power of successful design yesterday.  It’s something I’ve known about – even used as a pithy aphorism when talking up my own work and the work of others – and know I’ve experienced, but could not point to a specific incident.  And lo!  Such a moment has come upon me and I caught it.  It has to do with this simple phrase: people do not know what good design is, but they will respond to it – meaning that what makes a design strong is some kind of underlying purpose or structure that is not necessarily apparent to the audience.

The moment is simply this: the magazine The Atlantic was redesigned.  The redesign was spearheaded by design heavyweight Michael Beirut and his cronies at Pentagram.  And I found myself reading the magazine.

I know – it sounds ridiculous.  But I have subscribed to The Atlantic for over a year now, and I’ve bought copies of it off the newsstand in the past.  Prior to this issue, I’ve skimmed articles, cherry-picked things to read, stared at the cover, positioned it prominently in my home when guests are scheduled to arrive, etc., but I cannot honestly say that I’ve delved into the thing with any kind of commitment.

This newly redesigned issue?  I’m halfway through it and it arrived three days ago.  I can’t put it down.  And it was this that hit me, just yesterday.  The content of the magazine has not changed; it’s presentation has.  That’s what’s different, and it’s finally made me into The Atlantic reader that I’ve pretended to be for a good while now.

Beirut writes a short but sweet article about the redesign, and has this to say about it:

Unlike a logo or a poster, the design of which can rely on blunt simplicity, a magazine is a complex organism, the result of an intricate interplay if words and pictures.  Any single issue represents thousands of minute desicions about typography, layout, photography, and illustration.

Clearly there was something in the previous iteration of this complex organism that was making it impenetrable to me.  Yet Beirut and his team found a way to invite me into it.  What was it? Choice of typeface?  Column width?  Kerning?  Hard to say.  Again, I’m not sure what the change was that opened the door; I’d be hard pressed to find it even if I sat down and looked for it.  And I’m not sure I want to find it.

This experience, however, has galvanized my faith in good design.  So frequently the choices we make on a daily basis – fretting over typeface, minute adjustments to leading, color color color – go seemingly unnoticed.  Our work gets released to the public, and the significance of that extra 5 clicks of cyan that you inserted into the background and sweated over for 2 hours seems like a huge waste of time, because nobody notices.  But if this little experience with The Atlantic has taught me anything, it’s this: they notice. On some level, that information is getting across; that extra care and attention you put into your work does indeed make it to the public

Take heart colleagues!  Design is not dead.

Much more to say, soon, about the experience as complex organism.  I think Beirut is dead-on when he refers to the magazine as an organism; I think that analogy applies to a surprising amount of design challenges.  More later.

It is a portrait of two women – but it may end up being a landscape.

– Willem De Kooning, when asked the subject of his next painting

Often in discussion when design is distinguished from art, the line is drawn at intention.  Things that are designed have a purpose; an ad campaign is designed to sell more widgets, a better mousetrap is designed to etc. etc.  That purpose is frequently defined by someone who is not the designer – the client, for example, has goals for whatever it is.  The end-user helps define the product also; many parameters for any project are set by the user’s comfort level with accessing whatever it is.  Useability is paramount in many design decisions.

"Excavation," Willem de Kooning, 1950

ART may adhere to some or all of the above restrictions, but it is not bound to it.  The intent of an artistic product is fluid; in many cases is it subject to interpretation by the viewer, the “meaning” left shrouded by the artist, who merely presents the work.

Many of us, myself included, consider our work artistic, or as having an artistic bend to it.  But where IS the art?  What defines and separates the design process from the artistic process?  Where are those two processes parallel?

I find it in discovery.  Work, work, work, put the pieces in place, move things around, and suddenly – pop, there is something there that was not there before.  Something fell into place, and a new facet was created.  Something new appeared; the project has changed, grown, moved, become something more than it was.

I face difficulty sometimes in that new direction; not internally, but externally.  Internally, I am at my most ebullient; externally the reaction might be quite different.  If I am part of a team, or beholden to a client, the new direction may not be what they expected, or need, or want.  For those people out there who consider design to be an engineering process, whereby a plan is set to make something that is a known quantity, this kind of artistic evolution can be a disturbing turn of events.  “But I thought we were going to do this,”  or “didn’t we agree that we would be producing this?”

As much as I would like to encourage these people to put aside their misgivings and join in the artistic process with me, I have to give them credence; they have expectations, it is part of their jobs, and they have a right to expect that those design goals be met.  If my changes cause them to question the direction of the project then I have to reassess whether my process has shifted the product away from the design goals or whether it is still on track.

So it is a tricky dance; managing the balance between fulfilling client expectations, meeting the needs of the end user, and allowing a little of that evolution that de Kooning was talking about into every process.

I have questions about this, and I bring them to the collective: where is the line between art and design?  Where do you find art in your work, and how much of that do you let in?  Have any of you had experiences where you set out to make a portrait of two women, ended up with a landscape, and didn’t end up getting fired?  I’m sure that these stories depend entirely on the people around you; in theater, for example, one is liable to find that sort of thing more well received than in the boardroom of SAP, most likely.  But I’d like to hear about your thoughts on this line between art and design, process and product.  It’s something that I – and I suspect we all – wrestle with on a daily basis.

More to come.  Thanks for listening.

… that I have every reason to believe will ensue.

Hello!  If you’re reading this post, odds are I have invited you to view it.  I have full confidence that this will someday become a truly public forum, but, for now, it’s us.

We’re here to talk about design.  Many of the most memorable moments in my career have been discussions with colleagues; conversations in assorted settings that have been incredibly inspiring, galvanizing even, propelling me back to the tools of the trade with the cockeyed excitement of a kid in a candy store.  I cannot imagine that this is a phenomenon that I alone have experienced.  Collaboration is one of the cornerstones of what we do, and gleaning ideas from dialogue an integral part of the design process.  So hopefully all of you have experienced that particular elation, and will participate with me in this venture.

I look forward to this growing.  Many of you have probably heard me talk about the need for some kind of design collective, an entity that brings us together and provides us with resources that individually we cannot support – conference rooms, workspaces, administrative assistance, sure, but also access to other professionals who may have a specialty that we need for a job but do not have.  I also feel that this design “ensemble,” for lack of a better term, will bring out ideas long laid dormant in each of us and get them out into the world.  It is difficult, sometimes, to find time to work on a personal project.  Paying work always comes first.  But, with this ensemble providing support, encouragement, and collaborators, hopefully those projects will be given the time they deserve and finally see the light of day.

This is my dream: to build an ensemble of designers who come together to do good work – for clients, but also for ourselves, and build projects that we own. You folk invited here are the most talented, smart, resourceful people I know; there is no reason why our ideas should not be out there, changing the world for the better.  So, let’s get to work on them.  the discussion starts here.  This is my personal project for the time being; to bring this entity to the world.

So let the discussion begin!  No topic is out of bounds.  Real, practical discussions of problems that are on your desk today; abstract thoughts, philosophies, notions; talk of books, influences, current trends; anything that is bouncing around inside your head looking to get out can be brought to the group.  I have a few seeds that I will be throwing out in the next couple of days; as I learn how to use this blog technology, the shape of this place might change, and hopefully we’ll be able to add videos, photos, sound, etc. into all these discussions.

Welcome!  I look forward to hearing from you.