An appreciation for the craftsman

I don’t remember where I heard this phrase (in the title), but it’s one of those phrases that made it onto my list of interesting things to think about.

Recently, I’ve accrued some items from a particularly design-driven product company and it’s all makes sense to me now.

It goes like this:

If you truly love the item you are making, whether it be a knitted hat, a toilet brush, a computer, a Web service, or a mobile phone, you will want it to be beautiful.

That doesn’t mean that it cannot be functional. Indeed, that intersection between functional and beautiful is where product designers want to be.

An overworked example:

Many of the Windows apps I’ve used have krummy UIs, their progress indicators are annoyingly ugly looping graphics, and they seem to love complexity. And my (recently relegated to the reserve list) IBM laptop was downright angular engineering- and feature-driven.

No appreciation for the craftsman was visible. Pure function, no beauty.

In contrast, OSX icons are inviting, the progress indicators calming, and the beautiful hardware (even the styrofoam in the shipping box) shows attention to the total experience from purchase to first use to full use.

There is clear appreciation for the craftsman, an appreciation for the fine melding of form and function and beauty.

I’ve been fortunate that my work has brought me closer to designers, especially the amazing ones we have here at Nokia. I think exposure to them has rekindled my love of structure, a love I had in spades as a molecular biologist designing proteins.

Back then, we called something ‘elegant’ if form and function came together in a surprising, clever, and beautiful way. Now, I’m more aware of the elegance of the objects and services we use and create, not just visually, but that elegance of something surprising and clever, something that makes it easy for me to appreciate the craftsman.

Do you make surprising and clever beautiful things?