18/03/06

The Tyrrany of Good Design

Adrian Shaughnessy, whose How to be a graphic designer without losing your soul was a great, quick read along the lines of Running a Successful Design Practise also writes for the great Design Observer.

What’s great about Shaughnessy is that he is quite iconoclastic and enjoys rubbing things and people (and convention) up the wrong way. I met him a few times and always liked him.

Anyway, he wrote a piece, provocatively called ‘Google and the Tyranny of Good Design’, which suggests we’ve reached the long-sought-after point in the world: where design is an imperative so commonplace, so understood to add value, that it’s become boring. Or even tyrranical.

I think there’s something magnificent about Google’s lack of design. There’s something defiant, almost obtuse about its reluctance to indulge in the sort of oleaginous branding and design that is now the corporate norm. We’ve reached a point, in the homogenized West, where good graphic design is everywhere. The battle has been won: every business knows it needs good design —you don’t have to tell them anymore. It’s enshrined in the business schools, established in the corporate HQs. Even small businesses understand that good design is good for business. It’s a universal truth, like “customer service” and “value for money,” and all the other boardroom nostrums that drive modern commerce.

The article in full.

Posted by Peter Collingridge in Design, Google print.