I have watched the video “Design for life (episode 3)”. From the episode, Philippe Starck gives these designers a broad brief, which he asked them to design something that are ethical, ecological and non-electrical, without giving them an area or object to design on. I realised as a designer, we don’t only speak about design, so we are not only asked to design a product, like toothbrush or tray, but we speak about creativity.
As a designer, we need to design new stuffs, not only “redo” or work on the existing product. Existing product is to help you to understand more about the brief and to think for design that fits the brief. From the video, I understand that a new idea needs a great level of self belief and confidence, sometimes it is tricky. In design, we don’t only design the product, but we also need to make our design functional.
Inspiration is also a very important part in the design and there are many different ways to get inspiration. From the video the designers used brainstorms to get their ideas. They also went to shopping to get inspirations by looking into what they like and dislike. Another method they used is to personally experience the situation of their design area.
These three methods are good for a designer in order to get inspiration and I think experience on the situation is a crucial part in design, because as a designer, it is important to immerse your self in the world and people you are design for and to understand them. People will talk about what they want, but design is about meeting the unmet needs, which the people don’t know that they want it yet. That is why we need to immerse ourselves, to observe people and to find out things they want, but they don’t know that they want it yet.
From the last part of the video, where they presented their idea to Philippe Starck, one of the designer said that design sometimes is one man opinion, I agree with it to a certain extent. Because he/she may not like a certain design, but if the design is shown to a different person, he/she might have a completely different view.
In conclusion, I understand in design it is important to think, feel and experience rather than lead straight on single product idea. Also in the current market place, capturing client’s attention is the crucial parts of success.
