Good Design Principles (Dieter Rams)
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What it is
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ten principles articulated by industrial designer Dieter Rams, widely treated as a canonical definition of "good design" across industrial and digital design alike
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The 10 principles
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good design is innovative
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good design makes a product useful
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good design is aesthetic
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good design makes a product understandable
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good design is unobtrusive
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good design is honest
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good design is long-lasting
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good design is thorough down to the last detail
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good design is environmentally friendly
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good design is as little design as possible
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Context
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popularized in the documentary Objectified, which also frames objects as a form of communication — every object we see immediately triggers assumptions about its function, weight, price, and quality, and reflects choices made by its designer
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Related takeaways
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physical form isn't enough — once a device's hardware is finished, the experience often shifts to what's on the screen (interaction design)
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design for sustainability matters — much design serves a small fraction of the world's population while ignoring the rest, and should consider the full lifecycle (sourcing, production, distribution, end-of-life)
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Related
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