"designing networked objects" entries
The changing nature of design is coming full circle
Matt Nish-Lapidus on the evolution of product development from pre-industrial through post-industrial eras.
Design is entering its golden age. Now, like never before, the value of the discipline is recognized. This recognition is both a welcome change and a challenge for designers as they move to designing for networked systems. Jon Follett, editor of Designing for Emerging Technologies, recently sat down with Matt Nish-Lapidus, partner and design director at Normative Design, who contributed to the book. Nish-Lapidus discusses the changing role of design and designers in emerging technology.
As Nish-Lapidus describes, we’re witnessing the evolution of product development from one crafts-person, one customer; to a one crafts-person, many customers; to a one craft-person, one product that many people will customize. He explains how the crafted object and the nature of design has changed, beginning with the pre-industrial era:
“If you look at a pair of glasses from the pre-industrial era — anything from Medieval up through the 1700s to 1800s — what you’re seeing is an object that’s the direct expression of a single crafts-person and was made for a single individual to use. It’s a representation of that crafts-person’s view of what glasses should be. They create one, and they sell that one pair. It was often, at the time anyway, also made on commission, so it was rare that they would make large quantities of the same thing and have them sitting around. Pre-industrial, in this way, is an expression of the individual crafts-person involved.”