I learned about Dieter Rams via my frequent reading about Apple design methodology. I love his “ten principles for good design”. I first started studying Dieter when I learned about a book called “Less and More: The Design Ethos of Dieter Rams” and ordered it. While I was waiting for it to arrive I did some web reading on Dieter and realized that I had actually seen him before as one of the first interview subjects in Gary Hustwit‘s “Objectified” (a 2009 documentary on industrial design).
Here are Dieter’s ten principles.
- Good design is innovative
- Good design makes a product useful
- Good design is aesthetic
- Good design makes a product understandable
- Good design is unobtrusive
- Good design is long-lasting
- Good design is thorough down to the last detail
- Good design is environmentally friendly
- Good design is as little as possible
I enjoyed these principles so much that I even made it into desktop wallpaper for my computers:
Sometimes when I am feeling creatively stifled I reveal my computer desktop and look at the ten principles for inspiration.
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