Design as Patterns
Posted on December 12, 2013 | posted by:In the Marimekko College Workshop, “Design by Hand”, illustrator and graphic designer Aino-Maija Metsola, fashion designer Mika Piirainen and ceramics and product designer Sami Ruotsalainen separately present how they use patterns in their design work.
There are beautiful patterns on notebook, clothing, plates, cups, bags and so on, which all seem nice and easy to design for.
Then what about patterns on a airplane? When the size changes, everything changes with it. Besides, there is no way to do a prototype of the same size.
We have talked a lot about seeing and dealing with problems in different scales. When having discussions about the debate of “Humanitarian Design vs. Design Imperialism” in the class, the question comes to me: so how do we position design? Maybe not only do we need to consider the scales of problems, but we also need to think about scales of design and our capabilities as designers. Depending on the real situations, sometimes we can be ambitious to design a system to improve the current situation, while in other times we should be supporting actors to help others design.
Design is a lot like patterns. Patterns are seemingly trivial small details of objects, and yet it is fascinating to see how patterns can easily transform objects in a way to have different “personalities”. In this sense, design is the same. Even though sometimes what design does is small changes, it makes a big difference and conveys important statements. As is shown below, it is not only that packages are redesigned, but the whole idea of how we choose materials for design and how we treat our environment is also changed.
One of design’s fundamental tasks is to help people deal with change. Designers stand between revolutions and everyday life. They make innovations manageable and approachable, so that they can be embraced and assimilated. Therefore, design is also mean to be tangible and easy to apply just like patterns.