To Be or Not To Be

Trying to find a new perspective on things, i decided to see how professional designers are seeing things in our world. How they interpret things within our environment into design that would not only fit into our world, but also stand out in its place. I went on www.ted.com to look up talks from designers to see what they had to share. Most of the talks didn't really stick to me but there was one designer who's opinion or point of view really stuck to me. Unfortunately for that designer, it didn't stick in a good way.

That person is Rob Forbes

Rob Forbes is the founder of the Design company Design Within Reach. Simply put, what he does is he will go out into the city with his camera and take photos of everything that seems the tiniest bit interesting to him whether it be a pattern or a structural marvel, he will take a snap shot of it. He talks about taking over 5000 photos in a year. He will then go through each of these photos later to see if there really is anything he likes in them. He will also look into the meaning of them such as why a flag was hung outside a building, if there were any historical meaning to it. He will also go to the most common of places such as supermarkets and take pictures of the way produce is stacked and why people will go to that stack of oranges to pick one that they like.
Although they do seem interesting, many argue that he is really just stealing other people's design and putting it in a different context. Putting a pattern you found on the side walk onto the surface of a car doesn't justify design enough. His reasoning behind patterns is that they hide bad forms which i agree to a certain extent because i did look at some forms that had patterns on them and realized without that pattern, it would really be nothing.

This picture was pretty cool though because Mr. Forbes rides his scooter to work everyday and parks it here with all the other two wheelers. On this specific day, he looked across as he finished parking his scooter, that all the other bikes were red. That must've been a special day.

He claims that everything looks the same in the modern world which is why there are designers around. His perspective is a way of looking at simple things that appeal to character and personality. I don't think he's really done that because the forms and patterns he took have already done their job in their respective locations, he is making money off people by giving them that exact same impression with nothing added.
I do however like his look on the simpler things in life. We may not look much into it but construction sites are full of interesting wonders both in past and future. Forbes says that he is capturing the art of construction sites because they are a sign of progress and in the end, all we see if the finished piece, we don't see what happened. So he captures this still picture to remember what has been put into it, and the design of it all before the final structure has even been built.

Those were the most interesting points from his talk even though i may disagree with them. There were comments from others that i agreed with such as one person who said he can't believe that Forbes is getting paid the salary that he does for pretty much doing nothing.
But then again, he's well off for doing what he's doing so what can i say about it besides good job.

Book/Wine/DVD/Toys shelf. It can pretty much store anything that will fit into the slots. Made with expanded Polypropylene which is the same material as bike helmets and car bumpers.