I feel like a outcast in a ocean of glossy black-market plastic , chrome , and glowing puritanical buttons . Do we really need every piece of electronics to bet the same , sandwiched in this shiny coal black that is the twenty-first Century beige ?
I go to purchase a TV and my head spins out of ennui , making me sick . What the hell happened to industrial design ? Most products have no character or soul . Some the great unwashed argue that , to go back their fibre , we need to get electronics back into furniture .
Shows like delirious Men are helping to take back that styling , and hipster geeks are be courtship by makingside tables that are really computersor AV centers .
https://gizmodo.com/mad-men-style-revamped-for-the-personal-computer-5595093
But we passed that phase angle in the 60s . That ’s not the way we are going to put character back into our gadgets . Although perhaps … peradventure there ’s no way to get the fictional character back . Maybe the digitalisation and miniaturisation has killed the gizmo ’ mortal forever .
Don’t embarass me in front of my house guests
I want affordable gadgets and AV equipment that do great but also front good . By that I imply something that I can put next to my article of furniture and make it a real part of my house , not a shiny bond , as if Kal - El dropped a bloody Krypton crystal in my living way , make a shiny credit card appendix produce out of a walnut tree table . Except the appendix is actually made of some polymer , get full of fingerbreadth prints within a minute of pay off out of the boxwood , and does n’t make an holographical Marlon Brando appear in my living way .
Some will advise that a handful of eminent end manufacturers that make beautiful products . product that perform amazingly well and are beautiful . They use material like innate wood , leather , ceramics , and metal . They function a function . They are very pretty . The job is that they are also passing expensive , because they are normally made in small quantities and cater to the high end of the market .
This was n’t always the compositor’s case . In the 30s , the Bauhaus promoted dear design for the flock . They achieved that , combining good designing with mass manufacturing , creating merchandise that still appear upright today . During the 60s , companies like Braunre - invented themselves by utilize honorable pattern to their production and betray them at low-priced prices . They were the first who moved from electronics that looked like article of furniture to electronics that really looked like machines . But in that procedure , they did n’t take the soul out of their products . They maintain their character and match into the surroundings of a gracious home .
https://gizmodo.com/1960s-braun-products-hold-the-secrets-to-apples-future-343641
Going against the current
Today , everything looks like machines , but that fiber is kick the bucket .
I ’m not propose that every single product out there should look like a Dieter Rams plan or an Apple merchandise . All the contrary . Back when Steve Jobs came to Apple , he and Jon I ve introduced the computer that salvage Apple from irrelevancy and brought the company back in the spotlight . It was the “ Bondi ” iMac , and it spawned a million clones , from computers to gadgets to computer peripheral to nursing home appliances . Its translucent white - and - turquoise cutis became the beige of the tardy 90s and former Aughts . It worked for Apple , because it was their design codification , which they hold open acquire . But the rest just look ridiculous and gaudy . The copies had no character . Or they had the character of being cheap knockoffs . They were both made of plastic , though . perhaps part of having character is being an original .
Later , the iPhone had a similar effect . But while Apple keep developing their own design language — which top out with theiPad ’s industrial intention , the rest of the industry kept copying , introduce those elements in many products , but drop dead for the cheap . There ’s little differences out there . company like Philips actually endeavor to make some different thing — like their high - endAurea goggle box — but their main lines are all the same as everyone ’s else . Other small ship’s company , likeGeneva Lab , attempt to follow the example of interior decorator like Dieter Rams , but their products are not as inexpensive as the large gens in electronics .
https://gizmodo.com/understanding-the-ipads-industrial-design-5508895
The temporary solution: Retrofit the old
The only effective solution I ’ve been able to come up with : Get former clobber in eBay and modernize them with new components . Or perhaps creating replica from scratch , like this one :
It feels a bit like cheating and bastardize the originals , but it also feel like the only possible solution , now that the original cases are believe both rare and gorgeous and are made of lasting and quixotic cloth like steel and Natalie Wood . There ’s a job : It can get pretty expensive , like thisBraun Atelier Speaker L1 :
Still , a lot cheaper than a super - gamy closing Ab component . And you may find depleted cost gem , like thisTS45 radio receiver , which could be a salutary base for a usage Pandora or Spotify radio :
Or maybe become the classicSnow White ’s Coffininto a multimedia system fireball — including Blu - Ray musician and hard drive storage — connected to a projector via HDMI :
mayhap a caller can do the retrofitting and trade the wind up products at an low-cost monetary value . But they will probably end being a lot more expensive , so I ’m afraid we will have to do it ourselves . The other problem with this solution is that pattern would misplace its meaning . The pieces will expect serious , but they will be bastard hybrids in which buttons and dials drop off their original meaning . Which may or may not aid a piece ’s character .
A dark and glossy future
Why do n’t manufacturers push design forwards and try out with other materials and designs ? It ’s not because it ’s significantly more expensive . The answer , I trust , is that being different has a gamey endangerment . And very few company wish to take material hazard . Manufacturers are quite happy to keep churn out their indigestible blimp , and people will keep buying the lustrous black plastic , the chrome , and the glow juicy button .
But maybe there ’s another account : perchance this is all triggered by the fact that electronics are now all digital and getting simpler , thin , and smaller every day . Perhaps this First State - humanizaton of hardware plan is obligatory . Perhaps the hardware has to suffer the character and soul of analog blueprint to become just clear slab of shabu . As the human interface migrates from push button , dials , and knobs totouchscreens and modal software interfaces , this could be the literal reasonableness why contrivance are losing their character .
https://gizmodo.com/the-apple-tablet-interface-must-be-like-this-5452501
Still , I wish to believe that some companies will hail up with a solution . I have the feeling that the key is in the materials — wood , leather , metal — which could make these ware more human and more durable . lamentably , companies seem to be more interested in producingalmost - disposable gadgets , so they can keep selling switch every two year .
https://gizmodo.com/design-test-note-fragile-beauty-5572546
Maybe this is the price we have to compensate for progress .
all giz wantsDesign
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