Perspective on design (1)...

I sometimes ask myself, what constitutes good design. Is it the aesthetics of the piece, the pleasing proportions, the balance of form and function... or all these characteristics combined? Taking a step back, the aesthetics and pleasing proportions are definitely at the forefront. I'm usually drawn to a piece of furniture that stands out with respect to the "look" of the piece. This one characteristic causes me to stop and further examine the piece by trying to understand what has drawn me to this particular design over another design on the same page. This analysis helps me in my own design process as I better understand what characteristics of a piece of furniture I am drawn to. Of course, we all have different styles of furniture that we are drawn to, but the common theme is good design. I am convinced that even an admirer of period styles of furniture will stop at a well-designed modern piece of furniture to further analyze it.

We've all heard the saying that everything has already been discovered or invented. I have even heard of this saying applied to furniture design. After all, we're re-shaping the same objects over and over... adding curves, changing proportions, adding ornamentation, removing the ornamentation, using darker or lighter woods, utilizing curves, replacing curves with straight lines, utilizing thicker or thinner components, etc. It is easy to come to this conclusion, however, I regularly see new pieces of furniture that make me sit back and say "wow, that is an interesting design".. or "that is a cool design, I wonder if it's been done before". In light of this, I think the boundaries of design are limitless, one just needs to think outside the box. Also, I feel that often using pre-existing styles as templates for a new design sometimes handicaps the designer , the designer subconsciously has the existing style in mind and cannot get past it. Sometimes it is better to begin with a clean slate, in our case, a pad and pencil and begin to sketch without any existing furniture designs to influence our design. All for now...