What does it mean to be taken “into design,” its process and challenges? The first annual Core77 Conference, held on June 19, investigated this question, and more, under the topic for 2014: Object Culture, and Yeh IDeology was there to witness an unfolding of ideas. It also played host to the Core77 2014 Design Awards where the winners of the Consumer Products and Interiors & Exhibitions categories were announced. The day featured an impressive gathering of speakers who discussed the processes behind their work, being a designer in the present day as well as the value of the modern object.
Jordan Brandt - Technology Futurist, Autodesk, San Francisco, CA.
Technology Futurist, Jordan Brandt, in his talk on “How do we teach our machines to Design?”, said that “the world is just asking for design.” There are a multitude of situations in our everyday lives that require designed solutions so how then do designers practice within the field to achieve this?
Heather Flemming - CEO, Catapult Design, New York, NY.
For some practitioners, like Heather Flemming, CEO of Catapult Design, it comes down to designers participating and sharing their skills within global development. Her belief was that “It's a rich formidable time for designers to engage in social challenges.”
Carla Diana - Designer, Writer, Educator, New York, NY.
And what about the designed object? What meaning does it hold and how do we improve on it? Carla Diana, explored this in her presentation “Bringing Meaning to Objects Through Storytelling” where she used narrative to express the capabilities of 3D printing to our younger generation of future designers. “We should be taking what exists in the world and applying emotions to relate with it… stories are reality + emotion.”
By the end of the day, the conference in itself was a narrative of design: piecing together water filtering pools, bike culture and wearable technology to illustrate the vast space that design occupies in our innovation driven world.
Here are more of our highlights:
"It's about giving people access [to bikes]" to raise awareness and change cultural behavior and mindset - Ethan Frier, Cult of Bike.
"If you only aim for perfection and skip the process, you won't go anywhere" - Michael DiTullo, Design in the C-Suite.
"We cannot build new systems on old models" - Marta Salas-Porras, Neomaterialism.
"Designers should think about the unintended consequences of their work, the environmental, and just as important, social impact" - Colin McSwiggen, Design and Work.