Jackie Chow, born and raised in Toronto, is a recent graduate from the York Sheridan Program in Graphic Design. She is dedicated, passionate, hardworking, and allergic to squid balls. Besides design, Jackie loves to eat cake, collect boxes, and play video games.
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Good design is something that is aesthetic, functional, yet unobtrusive. In some ways, good design is as little design as possible. Design is also something that helps a product to be understood; it transforms a conceptual idea into something that may be tangible.
However, this is not to say that design is strictly a descriptor of a commodity of some sort. Design can also be defined as a rather abstract process that greatly determines the social experience of life.
For some, the word ‘design’ may often elicit thoughts regarding objects and their functionality, beauty, or durability. To me, however, design invokes thoughts about every day life. Design is everywhere and everything. Anything that is man-made is “designed”, but what I am particularly interested in is the power of design and the implications it has on every aspect of society.
Ultimately, design is a language in which entire civilizations are rendered. In this sense, design determines the very experience an individual has within all environments. Whether it is a classroom layout or an informative brochure, a subway map or a handheld mobile device, it is often taken for granted how much impact design really has on every day life.
Like Philippe Starck said in his Thought Economics interview with Vikas Shah in October 2010, design is a very ‘human’ thing. There is an extremely strong correlation between design, society, and civilization. Design exists to create a better world, and as a new professional designer, I aspire to help people live a better life.
As a new designer, I must employ new ways of thinking about design and the world. As Starck says, being a good designer requires having an awareness of the final goal. The final goal of a designer is not materiality, but rather, it is us. We must always remember that in any design process, the final goal is us.