Very nice site! [url=http://aieopxy.com/osoxvtv/2.html]is it yours too[/url]

Very nice site! is it yours too

My favorite talk was Edwin Chan’s. I liked it’s spiritual and environmental aspect of it.

Another project that reinforces the notion, that DESIGN IS A VERB.

WONDERFUL !
looking forward to hearing more.

i think edwin chan has it right. clarity and an understanding of the essence of that we / a client / design as a whole needs is key.

The guy that inspired me most is Martin Pyper from http://www.mestudio.info in Amsterdam. Martin is the must funny Dutch/English bloke I know and his creations are rock solid top notch.

And he maintains a really sweet blogdiary.

Inteligente la opinión de Eddie Nunns. Coincido en que el diseño debe ser inclusivo.

Very smart point from Eddie Nuns. I agree that design must be inclusive.

very nice ideaq
http://www.scalehousedesign.com

-You can’t really put it any more straightforward than that.

Great idea – I am very fond of the designers thoughts represented here. Thanks.

Common sense comments from Ellen Lupton. Only one thing…you can loan your first book to a friend but can you loan your friend a book from your Kindle system?

Excelente idea y esfuerzo. Los felicito.

http://www.oscarestrada.info

Great content here. What about implementing a function on the website to watch all movies in a row, or in predefined order? Also, would be great to have some area to comment on specific videos. Some opinions open very interesting questions that could benefit from other person’s point of view.

Anne, great comment. I gave this considerable thought, i.e. Declaration of Independence versus Constitution. Yes, the Constitution is the document that serves as the design of the government, but the wording in the Declaration of Independence is the core that binds us together.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The idea of the “pursuit of happiness” is the seminal concept that led to the success of our revolution.

I’m with Linda Tischler and Patrick Whitney – they make critical points about central park, housing of the future, and sustainability.

Dear Joe,
This site turns to be great inspiration. It’s amazing how many approaches are collected in such a small range of people.
It was a great idea.
Thanks for inviting me

Have you given any thought to moderating your comment section? Perhaps offer video in some open format?

great interviews and thanks for sharing the inspiration!

rebecca @lovelivesmall

what a happy surprise to see this video with kiko, specially because he was my boss and always pushed me to pursuit inspiration from great references! great inspiration source!

Love the collection here and yes very inspiring, great stuff!

Very cool to hear different views on design!! Thanks.

I think Charlie @AC has misunderstood the meaning of the word ‘comment’

With respect to Sean Adams, having just visited The Constitution Center in Philadelphia, it sounds like he is describing the U.S. Constitution, not the Declaration of Independence. The Constitution is the document that designed of the government. The Declaration was more a litany of complaints against the Crown.

However, I am enjoying all these conversations, and I thank you.

such an amazing collection of inspiring videos

Ingenious. This is an incredible project, and a tremendous contribution to the design space. Thank you.

We’ll try hook up again with Brian in the next round.

Great stuff! Thanks for putting this together.

What happened to the Brian Collins video? I thought he was supposed to be part of the last group on here.

Absolutely brilliant…

Happy Anniversary Monica and everyone at L&C !

Linda Tischler said it all.

Thanks for capturing these philosophical moments.

And Happy 30th Anniversary to Little&Company!

That is just beautiful.

nice!

I’m definitely gonna wait for Chip Kidd.

Would’ve been great to hear from more european designers. US is definitely not the ‘busiest’ place when it comes to design, and Erik, while a joy to watch, is surely not the only one worth interviewing from the Old World.

Best regards.
iancu

Guess I need me a pair of those wayfarers seems

Thank you for such an inspiring project. Very well done!
I can’t wait for more!

Lovely. Nature is a great source, just like Duffy seems to think. Mattias – Wikman & Friends.

In my previous comment I presumed that I could include some html code to distinguish the quote from my own words. Not so, apparently, unless the editors fix this.

the focus on craft by Spiekermann was actually quite a shock to the system.
It seems that I created the impression of speaking on behalf of craft. That printing press in my house, however, is a little indulgence, a hobby, not a serious business, let alone a philosophical statement. My work involves computers, coding and all the tools required to survive as a communication designer. I also dabble in type-design, but that is totally digital as well. Not an ink smudge in sight.

bravo l&co.

Hello! My new classroom :3)

Pat, it says “30 conversations on design” not “30 answers to your design problems”. This is an amazing project that evokes an insane amount of insight and thoughts on design as a whole. I loved every minute of them. Got some new quotes on design I need to remember!! “Minimalism: Just one thing, if you get it, great. If you don’t, sorry. ” Absolutely amazing. Thanks so much for all if this, much better than television!

Nice talking heads. Why is the sound so terrible?

All I’ve listened to so far present more questions than they answer.

Ric Grefe says he’d like to see designers design their place in the world. To design a place for designers.

Doesn’t this present obvious new questions?

Great project! I Enjoyed each and everyone of them

Great interviews.

You should allow RSS feed of the post and not just the comments.

interesting concept…why 30? (a question i get asked a lot, too!)

Thank you for this compelling and provocative documentary. I hope that some day you will aggregate the videos into one film.

I’m not a professional designer (geologist\ecologist) but I want to thank you for this repository of hope and inspiration. I am keenly looking forward to the next twenty (++?)

Nice to have these interviews all in one spot. I wouldn’t complain if you kept the series going past 30…

Second time lucky….

The narrow focus of these talks is disarming, the focus on craft by Spiekermann was actually quite a shock to the system. It shows that there is a place for a wealth of knowledge and focus within design, from thinkers and strategists right down to the crafts people who focus on the beautiful details.

Charlie @AC (comment above) sums it all up wonderfully, thanks for sharing – a great contribution to this site.

Very incredible addition to the design dialog and the overall study of design as an academic discipline. However, I would like to hear more from young designers and rising stars that are in the trenches battling it out everyday.

The videos are inspirational and thought provoking. Thanks for sharing them.

Like the site design too. It is very elegant. Column heading and comment font could have been brighter

VERY Inspirational ….
thanks for sharing

delighted to find this site – inspiring. thank you.

i cant wait for Chip Kidd, i think the world of that guy and he has been a solid source of inspiration to me both visually and mentally.

I love that this site was created. It’s a great idea.

From a technical standpoint, some of the videos aren’t recorded in stereo audio, I only get audio in one channel. Maybe you could fix that in future recordings.

Thanks.

Very interesting to watch these videos. Much appreciated.

A suggestion: the title for the “menu” column should read something more like “navigate”, to keep parallelism intact.

It also worth noting that getting good design commissions is mainly determined by two factors – connections, and luck. In the words of Michael Graves – ‘Kitchen extensions beget kitchen extensions, and art galleries beget art galleries’…or something like that!!

Well said Mr. Dawson, my observations exactly.

I have been trying to find a reason to sustain energy levels to fight for a piece of an increasingly commoditised market. It feels sometimes that its not a business any more, but a job creation scheme for narcissistic and self involved ‘creatives’ who have little or no understanding that design is at best a tactical exercise. The evidence is that products get redesigned every 2-3 years..which is ridiculous in the history of brands. It is a function of job shifting amongst brand managers at an ever decreasing rate, who then wish to ‘make their mark’. They are generally allowed to do this by Marketing Directors as a way to massage egos in the full knowledge that it is generally harmless.

The problem is also partly to do with designers themselves. There is a level of expectation that they will be respected, paid well and lauded in all manner of ways. This in turn is a mark of 15 years of relatively constant growth. The old title was more accurate and a bit more truthful about the reality of what it is at the end of the day – Commercial Artist.

Running a graphic design business for 30 years, it’s still inspiring to hear my old hero Massimo wax on… that being said, I tend to feel that design is a conversation only designers are interested in.

Seemingly, designers continue to whine about not getting the respect they deserve from their corporate/marketing patrons. Or put another way, not really getting a big chair at the strategy table where decisions are made. Many simply decorate things under the false pretext of solving problems. I agree with Ms. Scher, we really don’t solve problems we just react to them.

Now of course,most of us are designing for the screen, not the innocent white paper craving for meaning as Spiekermann outlined. The design business is now a commodity.

Speaking for myself, I struggle to find meaning and significance late in my journey being a collaborator to the myth of sustainable consumerism grinding out words and pictures to sell more stuff…

These conversations are becoming cliche and tiresome…not unlike my designasaurus point of view.
BTW I miss Paul Rand and Saul Bass!

This is a wonderful project. Let’s do more to build platforms that will allow more people to interact socially on the web. Something that will bring about a platform where poor people can greatly benefit from the likes of Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. We need designers who can shape the world’s thinking and politics.

All the best,

Jay
Chief Storytelling Officer
The HungryPeople Team
http://hungrypeople.posterous.com

thank you for sharing all of these beautiful videos.

@AC,

The conversation is always about economics. Design considerations cede to business imperatives not because they are frivolous and idealistic, but because there is an absolute lack of understanding of what design is and ought to be. Designers tend to be viewed as didactic, self-righteous, elitist. This is not an undeserved perception; good designers are by nature eccentric and misunderstood by the masses. However, in whatever drives them, they know as well as any MBA or CEO the value of good ideas. We see this seeping over into business imperatives now—greening, innovating, user-centered design—but the truth is that good design has always been about sustainability, rethinking, and the receiver of the designed object.

Apple is the de facto example of how design can succeed in a superconsumerist economy, but it does not necessarily define the parameters for design. Before Apple, there were Charles and Ray Eames, Henry Dreyfuss, Ray Loewy. Before them, the Bauhaus, the Vienna Secession. Before that, Frank Lloyd Wright, and so on. Each entity managed to defy popular inertia and sustain the thoughtful creation of designed objects and spaces without a reductionist thrift mindset. Design thinking applied to thrift practices is an enormously wasted enterprise.

Designers are burdened with an awareness of incalculable problems that need to be solved quickly with the resources available to them. Bringing ideas to market is and always will be a challenge, but not the greatest. And not because ideas themselves are fanciful or impractical. Where the vast majority of design fails is in execution—a designer who can’t articulate an idea well enough to the producer, poor project management, or increasingly likely the thorough lack of authenticity. Monetization is a mere product of a good idea executed well. But authenticity is the key to conflagration.

I am of the opinion that superconsumerism is not sustainable, and I don’t think I’m alone. With such rapid advances in technology, with no precedent for how to act, we venture aimlessly into the fray and are overwhelmed by the need for cheap, desirable, viral, simplistic. The vast majority of designed objects are force-fed, mass-marketed, meant to be consumed rapidly and turned over in a few short years or months in order to capitalize on the latest flash in the pan with no regard for its impact, be it environmental, physiological, psychological. With each slight to design, with each nose-up at the customer base who ultimately supports the enterprise, we lose a sense of craft and thoughtfulness, we chip away at the cornerstones of our humanity. Consider the adoption of green (coming soon: blue), this user-centered design nonsense, this vile disrespect for the complexity of the human experience into the marketplace undermines the humble origins from whence we came and how far we have traveled. We continue to produce waste objects without consideration for what else is possible.

The conversation is always about economics. We are all capable of being so narrowly focused on what drives a great product to market and into the ready hands of consumers and attributing its success to how many people consumed and how cheaply we produced it. What we don’t respect anymore as a society is craft, ingenuity, selflessness. These conversations invite us to think broadly about what design is, to explore new economies, to consider how our lives are mutating into a bastardization of the phenomenon of life and what role design plays in it. Design is not simply another commodity to be raped by the greedy and indifferent.

Take a look at everything happening in the world now, everything we have achieved up until now, the challenges beyond the market that still linger, try to comprehend it. Consider the designed object and the impact it has on the collective human experience.

For the record, we are trying.

Edwin Chan = respect

notold: no, but i guess it’s easy to think you’re really smart when you’re young

View from the consumer electronic industry – Interesting but how do you monetize these ideas – I believe it was Mr. Grefe who said designers need to sit at the table where problems are solved, not be outsiders. Makes sense, but the problem is that at the end of the day it comes down to money. Can you make that design for $X at an offshore factory so we can move a bunch of units…design loses out to cost, buyer specs and reality of low cost manufacturing. This is the greatest challenge for designers. How to bring consumers back to appreciating products with great design and be willing to spend more for it. The niche stuff is easy. Designing for a niche segment of the population who embrace superior design is not a challenge. Enough of Apple…is anyone else out there trying? Can anyone bring design to Wal-Mart level and impact the masses?

i guess you have to be old and decrepit to be able to talk about design

gordon kaye’s argument that to much unfiltered information is bad for democracy and business … mind-expanding.

yeah, wash-up is a bitch

Edwin’s satiret on Green Design was indeed an eye opener. We all know what can happen and what need to be do…but still we shrug it.

in awe. paula scher.

Gordon Kaye
a voice in the wilderness

So glad to see that he pressed with Akzidenz Grotesk. Helvetiwho?

Erik Spiekermann’s interview reveals beautifully what makes a great great designer: obsessive, a little touch of arrogance, a great degree of humility and a sense of humour.

i am enamored with linda tischler’s beautiful description of her design inspiration, the populist envisioned central park… riders, readers, sunbathers, rollerbladers, bikers and birders.

Thriving on constraints – a lesson for all of us. Well put, Mr. Spiekermann.

Very diverse perspectives. LPs, childhood obesity, the Kindle, Central Park and the alphabet. It’s amazing, the things that inspire people, and the possibilities that live in the minds of great designers.

So cool!

Cheers to not assuming anything, Kiko. I love it.

An interesting thread I hear in these videos is that the next problem design should solve involves the way we live. It’s not just about designing a thing, it’s about designing our entire lifestyle. How do you redesign a mindset? Design has evolved from print to web, and now to something even more intangible. It’s an exciting challenge for us all.