3rd Designer: Dieter Rams

    
 

I stumbled upon Dieter Rams partially by accident as I was investigating Jonathan Ive because he was listed as one of Ive's bigger influences which I found interesting.

Rams was born May 20, 1932 in Wisbaden, Hesse.  He is a German industrial designer who did extensive work for Braun and the Functionalist School of Industrial Design.  He studied architecture at the Werkkunstschule Wiesbaden as well as learning carpentry from 1943 to 1957.  After working for the architect Otto Apel, he joined the electronic devices manufacture Braun where he became chief design in 1961, which was a position he kept until 1995.  Dieter explained his design approach as "less is better."  He and his team had designed many famous products for Braun, which included the  SK-4 record player and the high-quality D-series of 35mm film slide projectors.  Many of his more popular designs; such as coffee makers, radios, audio/visual equipment, and calculators have become immortalized in many museums all over the world.

According to Dieter good design is: 

• Is innovative - Rams states that possibilities for innovation in design are unlikely to be exhausted since technological development is always offering new opportunities for innovative design. He also highlights that innovative design always develops in tandem with innovative technology and can never be an end in and of itself.

• Makes a product useful - A product is bought to be used. It has to satisfy certain criteria, not only functional, but also psychological and aesthetic. Good design emphasises the usefulness of a product whilst disregarding anything that could possibly detract from it.

• Is aesthetic - Only well-executed objects can be beautiful. The aesthetic quality of a product is integral to its usefulness because products used every day have an effect on people and their well-being.

• Makes a product understandable - It clarifies the product’s structure. Better still, it can make the product clearly express its function by making use of the user's intuition. At best, it is self-explanatory.

• Is unobtrusive - Products and their design should be both neutral and restrained, to leave room for the user’s self-expression. Products fulfilling a purpose are like tools and are neither decorative objects nor works of art.

• Is honest - Honest design should not attempt to make a product seem more innovative, powerful or valuable than it really is. It should not attempt to manipulate the consumer with promises that cannot be kept.

• Is long-lasting - It should avoid being fashionable and therefore never appears antiquated. Unlike fashionable design, it lasts many years – even when the trend may be in favor for disposable products.

• Is thorough down to the last detail - Dieter Rams states that nothing must be arbitrary or left to chance in the design of a product since care and accuracy in the design process show respect towards the consumer.

• Is environmentally friendly - Good design should make an important contribution to the preservation of the environment by conserving resources and minimizing physical and visual pollution throughout the lifecycle of the product.

• Is as little design as possible - Dieter Rams makes the disctinction between the common "Less is more" and his strongly advised "Less, but better" highlighting the fact that this approach focuses on the essential aspects thus, the products are not burdened with non-essentials. The desirable result would then be purer and simpler.

Less and More in Frankfurt. Vitsoe.com. 2010-04-19

Less and More - The Design Ethos of Dieter Rams. Designmuseum.org. 2009-11-18