Unit 1.2
Design rules:
-Unfollow us, if you can.
Research Methods (Visual Research)
Student: Elena Tereshkova
Tutor: Russell Bestley
Course: MA Graphic Design
Group P
Where design rules begin?
• ‘Rules create a framework for design without determining the end results.’ (Lupton, E. & Cole, J. 2008. P233.)
• ‘Breaking rules may seem simple, but it isn’t. Any designer can do it, but he or she needs the benefit of experience to do it right. One has to know before one can break them, and understand what kinds of solutions have been applied before for similar projects. Then one must have a reason for doing what one choses to do. Application of color, clever format or line without form or function make excellent experiments, but can make poor graphic design.’ (Supon Design Group. 1995. P5.)
By the beginning of the 21st century graphic design and visual communication have been represented as a holistic system with the exciting history. Contemporary design theory includes numerous styles, models and structures of literacy, rules, methods, which are closely linked to and supported by powerful theoretical base, including terminology and extensive literature.
This essay aims to determine the fundamental points where design rules begin, because though the formulation of design rules often varies, the main ideas and basics are still similar. Its purpose is to explore the factors which determine the formation of these rules. First of all, it explains what will be implied by the notion “rules”. Also, it observes different approaches to graphic design rules and examples of cities, showing the importance of critical evaluation of the context and time. It concentrates on the ability to explain a design process, equate it to design rules and consider it as one of the crucial factors while assessing rule breaking design. Finally, the essay sums up different approaches to design laws, overviews the models of exemplary and rule breaking design and presents the personal opinion of the author.
Design epistemology and design rules – are they the same? Are such design principles and approaches as a system of grid, AIGA’s designing framework, law of gestalt, ‘rule of thirds’, ‘golden section’, and research methods as a whole related to design rules? Most of them refer to design process, are tested by time and accepted by professionals. However, the aim of these principles is not in imposing a strict plan of actions on designers ‘but in providing a rationale or explanation – a tool and a guide for understanding.’ (Noble, I. & Bestley, R. 2011. P28.)
A summary of accumulated principles and methods together with total experience form the basis of fundamental concepts and “laws”. In this essay I would like to review the rules of graphic design as the totality of principles, methods and theories, existing at a particular moment, as design does not live ‘in a vacuum of its own making; it responds not only to the client and product, but also to the situation within which it exists.’ (Noble, I. & Bestley, R. 2001. P16.)
Breaking the rules of graphic design, typography and other design areas does not always lead to significant and serious changes. It often comes to subtle nuances, such as using an unconventional underlining that rather emphasizes than overwhelms the space between lines in typography, or applying barely noticeable modifications of the type font elements etc. ‘Simple innovation, when moderately applied, can satisfy the definition of breaking the rules.’ (Supon Design Group. 1995. P5.) One thing remains unchanged – for the complete final project those actions should be motivated and oriented to the audience, because the result of any experiment will be considered in the context of human abilities and the level of visual literacy of a particular audience in the current time. ‘All audiences have expectations with which they interrogate…’ (Noble, I & Bestley, R. 2011. P100.)
While specialists from other design disciplines, such as architecture, industrial or interior design play according to the rules of human size and proportions (ergonomics), many rules of graphic design or typography originate from the human physical ability to perceive and assess visual information and focus on the level of visual communication and informational literacy for particular group of people.
Besides the laws, related to the design process there exist rules applicable to product content, message and ethical side. But determination of the principle of the Golden Rule related either to ethics or reciprocity is not monosemantic as the definition of Golden Rule related to proportions and composition (either golden section, or golden ratio). (Roberts, L. 2006.) The boundaries and measures of ethical principles applicable to the product of design are vague, but the importance of motivation and human-oriented approach is constant. ‘In order to work out policies and an ethical system, you also need to apply reason.’ So another determining factor, which may be considered to be a design rule or a framework is developing an ethic message of a product in the context of particular time and place.
The next set of general rules or boundaries is predetermined by the client’s brief. When it comes to commercial project the framework of the clients brief appears to be of major importance. ‘I don’t consider graphic design to be an opportunity to advance art forms. It has to advance the brief of the client’s interest’. (Chermayeff, I. 1980. P47.) ‘Design does not have a subject matter of its own – it exists in practice only in relation to the requirements of given projects’. (Gunnar Swanson cited by Noble, I. & Bestley, R., 2011. P71.)
In addition, some rules are conditioned by technological opportunities existing at a particular moment. In graphic design this may be clearly illustrated by the rules related to the recommended use of a four-colour palette (CMYK) while developing a logo. Most of the main factors, underlying graphic design rules are related to the whole design industry, it being customer-oriented.
The example of rule breaking design related not to the composition or technique, but to the message of the product. Some kind of a ‘game’ with the ethical rules or principles. The content and the message are ‘strong’ and there is a part of a risk in this project. But the visual level and information literacy of the audience had been appreciated in a right way ,and the campaign brought fame (together with controversy and criticizm) to the client and to the author.
United colors of Benetton (13 issues of Benetton’s Colors magazine edited by Tibor Kalman and Oliviero Toscani’s campaings.
Ignoring the conventional accepted standards, proportions and primary requirements of the object as a beginning of numerous disputes and ethical contradictions:
Here are two expensive design products: Mesa Table (4050 x 1650 x 700 mm) and Aqua Table (L305 cm x D135 cm x H76 cm) designed by Zaha Hadid.
Before the presentation at the Milan furniture fair it is required to use a crane to get Aqua table inside the building, because its door and window openings appeared too small. The roof had been disassembled than, and the table were placed insight.
From one side the intriguing unusual size and shape of the product are interesting. Whereas one of its basic function, such as being optimally convenient for human use is ignored in favor of innovative shape. Provided by famous modern designer this approach is questioning the fundamental generally accepted standards, which may be equated to design rules. ‘…it has an impact and it has a place in the world… But it can be dangerous because it gets so much press. This is particularly misleading for impressionable students.” (Marriott, M. cited by Roberts, L. 2006. P116.)
To break the rule today means to follow it tomorrow? Understanding and evaluating a context as a design rule.
• ‘Artists must organize their ranks… It’s wrong to think the things learned through school are a means for the expression of personal freedom, but rather our own philosophy. Today, anyone who wants to create something must first mould a new consciousness; anyone who wants to participate in the process of creation of the new culture must study the elements of current experience.’ (Lissitzky, E. cited by Monguzzi, B. 1997. P68.)
Rules of graphic design are not clear and univocal as, for example, existing terminology. Judging by numerous statements in related articles, they are not measured by set of principles and considered most of the times in the context of a particular time. Thus violations of rules does not mean breaking any specific set of declared truths proven over decades or centuries. The emphasis is often put on the ability of critical evaluation of the current tendencies, preferences and boundaries. The most impressive cases of rule breaking were caused by and based on the ability of a designer to evaluate changes of his or her times. The progressive technological achievements, changes of political and social climate influenced the needs of the audience, their level of visual communication, informational literacy. The designer’s intention to break through the old frames is not new, as well the gist of numerous received briefs. But not each protest suggested a rational solution. The ability to distinguish the problems on the agenda, to assess them critically and to apply the solution into the design process can make rule breaking design a problem solving strategy. In this case the basis for new crucial foundations or rules may be discovered.
A good example of breaking the established conventions of old frames is Piet Zwart’s practice. In the beginning of his creative work in the early 1920s he used a square grid as a layout, while developing early projects. But soon he gave up this approach ‘because of its resemblance to the anti-classical but nonetheless ornamental typographical work’, introduced in 1918 by H. Th. Wijdeveld in the Wendignen magazine. Later Zwart mentioned: “When I started my typographical work Wijdeveld was the number one man. Only later did I realize that my way of doing things was a protest against the spirit of the times. I didn’t consider Wijdeveld a reactionary: his work was the expression of that period; he was part of an old technical world with its old methods. We, on the other hand, tried to give a concrete basis to the ideas of avant-garde – an avant-garde that had started well before the World War. The universal Exhibition in London in 1851 … demonstrated how a man’s product is largely determined by the technology available to him.” (Zwart, P. cited by Monguzzi, B. 1997. P67.)
The ability to distinguish the most significant changes and tendencies in society, to apply this knowledge into the design process and develop a product which provides the opportunities to solve problems of the time can be assessed as high professionalism and equated to the design rule. Understanding of design principles is different for each particular period and situation. Let us consider two examples:
1 One of the examples in design practice, showing ambiguity and mobility of the regulations in graphic design is Steven Heller’s assessment of postmodern design climate and Edward Fella’s works and future collaboration of both. At the beginning of 1990 the reaction to the artists, who celebrated postmodern design, was controversial. ‘It was alarming to see rules of craft that had underpinned whole careers tossed aside so casually. At the other times, postmodern design’s critics framed arguments which have never received an adequate reply.’ (Poynor, R. 2003. P148.)
In the essay ‘Cult of the Ugly’, published in Eye Magazine in 1993, Heller argues about the definition of the ugly in the postmodern design, where ‘existing systems are up for re-evaluation, order is under attack and the forced collision of disparate forms is the rule?’ (Heller, S. 1993. P53.) Heller’s personal position was ‘that rule-breaking experiments that might have some validity in design schools would be taken up and misapplied by impressionable young designers in the world outside, spreading the confusion and chaos…’ While evaluating Edward Fella’s works, he permitted its value as an artwork or self-initiated experiment, but ‘as a model for commercial practice, this kind of ugliness is a dead end’. (Heller, S. 1993. P53.) However, a few years later, being an art director of The New York Times, Steven Heller entrusted to Fella developing illustrations for the summer books review in the newspaper. (Poynor, R. 2003.)
2 Apple Macintosh was introduced in 1984 and an immense digital space with countless opportunities became available for designers. ‘The new technologies, in particular the Mac, have challenged the accepted ‘rules’ of design and we have been forced to consider what the resulting new rules might be.’ (Noble, I & Bestley, R. 2001. P10.) The unexplored field of opportunities and techniques was free from any clichés, subtext and lows. At the very beginning it was almost impossible to determine rules for digital graphic design, because of the lack of experience and tests of any theories. But it was clear that to apply traditional methods and principles, ignoring a whole spectrum of new opportunities without even trying them out them was irrational. And the experiments began.‘The fact that accidents need not have lasting or negative consequences means that these chance occurrences and ‘mistakes’ can potentially be used to provoke unexpected directions in the design process.’ (Poynor, R. 2003. P97.) The ‘primitives of the new technical era’ and their works played an important role in the further development of digital graphic design, but can we consider their primary steps to be rule breaking design process or as a complete design process? Can we say that it comes to rule breaking when the rules are unknown?
There is a great number of examples showing the flexibility of designer’s reaction to a social or technical perturbations: vernacular-inspired design as a ‘way of reacting against the cloying, impersonal slickness of so much professional design’, modernism as a response to the modern industrial society’s development, the rapid growth of cities and the reaction to World War I, grunge ‘as a seductive method of self-identity for designers who want non-Modernist and individual portfolio’ etc. (Poynor, R. 2003. P85.)(Ferre-Jones, T. 1994. P32.)
Examples of re-comprehension of the established conventions of archaic frames and rules in the context of particular time:
Piet Zwart’s works from early 1920s: the content is ordered by the squared grid. Poster designed in 1923 and a page of the catalogue created in 1922.
Reflection of the ability to communicate social and technological changes through design.
Compositions of those examples are expressive, comparing with earlier works. Its content arranged by numerous guides from different angles. Design for a printing company developed in 1930:
Design for a radio-cable advertisement, 1930:
Poster for Netherlands PTT, 1934:
Dutch film periodical cover, 1931:
Broken rule may become a new one, if it is repeatable. ‘Word’ as a design rule.
• ‘…we are learning to consider new visual languages, ideas, methods, while creating a new design vocabulary.’ (Noble, I & Bestley, R. 2001 P11.)
• ‘In cases where the designer does not have control of the words – that is, in most cases – authorship remains, at best, a questionable concept.’ (Poynor, R. 2003. P128.)
• ‘Designers shiold write not in order to bacome better writers, but to become better designers.’ (Burdick, A. 1993. P4.)
Another approach, that may be ranked to fundamentals for laws in design, in my opinion, is related to design process and comes from the definition of the word ‘experiment’:
An experiment is a methodical trial and error procedure carried out with the goal of verifying, falsifying, or establishing the validity of a hypothesis. Experiments vary greatly in their goal and scale, but always rely on repeatable procedure and logical analysis of the results. (Wikipedia. 2012.)
‘Repeatable procedure and logical analysis’ of the result are the key words here. As long as a designer is able to explain his innovation, to repeat it or to make steps forward, he is playing according to the rules. As long as an innovative design method is clear to the creator, possible to describe with words and to repeat, it is valuable. ‘Research and exploration are the key elements in the growth of a discipline.’ (Nobel, I. & Bestley, R. 2001. P10.) In case when a designer exceeds the limits of discipline, being knowledgeable about discipline’s subject and distinction of his innovation, current design process and technologies, both success and failure are precious. Being the results of conscious work, they can be evaluated, understood and tested. In this way there are no failures as such.
It is high time we asked the following questions. How to make this innovative approach consistent and repeatable? Is it possible to establish theoretical foundation and to explain the stages of a project, which is based on intuition without references to conventional theories? Does designer needs to be familiar with design theory, terminology and existing experience within this field, to explain and to develop the innovation? To make discovered process repeatable means to clarify its stages and methods to others, to describe and to be able present the information. On the way to the final design products, designers develop methods and rules. If their subject and structure are well-developed and declared clearly, ‘other designers will be able to interpret them to produce their own unique and unexpected layouts.’ (Lupton, E. & Cole, J. 2008. P233.) The ability to explain an innovative method, which leads to rule-breaking design, to organize its phases logically, is the professional capacity where many design rules come from. So, the answer is a plan, and its main component – a word.
‘Apple’s brand depends a lot for it’s distinctiveness on the importance of ‘good design’ to its products’ (Rose, G. 2012. P136)
Nowadays production, provided by the company, which ‘making products that become icons, win design awards, and inspire customers’ may be considered as exponential. (Technologyreview.com. 2007)
Numerous debates and praise related to the technical benefits of Apple’s production (however their ethical principles are often left unattended). And one of the main design rule of the organisation begins from the thorough knowing and understanding of already created analogues, technologies and existing market. A few month ago Sir Jonathan Paul Ive, the senior vice president of industrial design at Apple, mentioned, that most of competitors of the company aimed to produce something really different, want to ‘appear new’, to wide existing boundaries, using impressive alternative examples of existing products. He evaluated those aspirations as incorrect purpose. ‘A product has to be genuinely better. - he argued. - This requires real discipline, and that’s what drives us - a sincere, genuine appetite to do something that is better.’ (Ive, J. 2012)
Ellen Lupton and Jeniffer Cole in their book ‘Graphic Design: The New Basics’ exemplify models of design products with the emphasize on ‘organic’ design process. (Lupton, E. & Cole, J. 2008. P233)
The ability to formulate, apply and arrange effective appropriate methods and tools marked as one of the basic rule in design in the chapter ‘Rules and Randomness’. The authors assess designing of a system of design project, which arrange random input, as an important component of the process of design. Using the plan together with developed methods the designer ‘controls and manipulates the system rather than the final outcome’.(Lupton, E & Cole, J. 2008. P234)
Here are two examples by David Carson. Inspite of his radical and ‘ground-breaking’ approach, designer developed a successful commercial career, collaborating with such clients as Yale University, Microsoft and Quiksilver. (Noble, I. & Bestley, R. 2005. P27.)
The first poster developed for the project called ‘Guardian Gives Shape To Obama’s Words’. The second poster created for the Gallery of Yale University.
Being the examples of Postmodern approach, those works ignore some of design rules, related to composition and principles of commercial design. However both examples communicate clearly, in part, because a context was evaluated in a right way. The poster, dedicated to Barak Obama, was represented at the beggining of 2009. This work introduces Obama as somebody new and really different, communicating ‘that everything is gonna be just fine’. (Galal, A. 2009. www.davidcarsondesign.com).
But today’s image of the President is different, comparing with 2009th. If this project was introduced today, the message of the poster would be treated in a new way. Probably through the prism of irony.
To break the rule today means to follow it tomorrow?
The example of innovative ‘rule-breaking’ design for the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, that would break from the usual tendencies for sport graphics of that time.
‘For the first time in the history of the Olympic Games, the symbol chosen to represent the event is neither geometric in nature nor referenced any symbol or architecture from the candidate city.’ (Supon Design Group. 1995.) Very likely, that this project initiated further experiments within this field, led to radical changes and expanded existing boundaires.
Conclusion.
To sum up, many rules and boundaries in design are applied into design process and a final product (its message, proportions, composition and structure). Many of them refer to the ability to evaluate both, the human visual capabilities and the needs of a particular audience, communicating with them through the final outcome. As many laws related to design process, ability to describe the design method in order to make steps back or to explain approach is exponential.
Design history is rich in bright examples of going beyond the rules andboundaries of a particular time, based on a critical reflection of those frames. After analyzing examples from the essay, I asked myself ‘What knowledge or principle is motivates those people for such a progressive and productive design activity?’. I would like to add an important factor, which helps to detect the connection between aesthetic form and function, between audience’s needs and the final product message and helps to describe an intuitive approach. The phrase may sound trivial and boring, but its meaning is crucial - The designer should be inspired by the design practice in general and by the particular project. That is what helps to react quickly and express the new trends and social moods through design, to describe the unexplained, to follow and break existing design rules successively and to create the new ones.
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