Design is everywhere! Your toothbrush was designed by a professional designer, so was the image on your toothpaste and the tube in came in. Your kitchen chairs were professionally designed, and your shoes were made by a very good designer. (fun fact: designing shoes is a very sought after job in the Industrial Design world, so only the very best designers get the gig. If you ever meet a shoe designer in real life, it’s kind of like meeting a professional athlete of the design world)
Anything that is created is designed. That means anything you sew, you also design.
I studied Industrial Design in college (designing 3-d objects like toothbrushes and shoes). I got sick just after my Junior year, and so did my Senior projects with an emphasis in Graphic design (designing 2d items like posters and business cards) knowing that it would be easier to do Graphic Design as a freelance designer (aka from home in my bed). While the final products are different, the design rules followed between both types of design are the same. Since college I’ve worked in both fields and find that my work in one area not only influences my other work for the better, it typically finds its way into making everything I create more beautiful. The better you get at Design, the more beautiful your projects will become.
Last year I participated in a mystery block of the month club. Each month we were given fabric and a pattern to make a couple blocks. We wouldn’t see the final quilt until the last month- a year after we’d begun. I was so excited. The quilt squares were pretty complicated and to be honest, I couldn’t see how they went together. ‘Wow,’ I thought, ‘ They’re really serious about keeping this a mystery! No one could possibly guess how this thing will come together.’
Well, no one could have guessed because no one in their right mind would have known how ugly this thing was going to be! I walked in that last week and almost cried. I worked a whole year… for this?! (I’d show you a picture of the quilt, but I’d feel horrible if the person running the BOM ever saw this post… so just imagine something bad!). None of the fabric matched at all. None of the blocks were the same size and they didn’t fit together in any specific way (in fact, we were supposed to sew random bits of fabric onto them so that they’d fit together….). There was no overall look or design of the quilt. It was just a bunch of random squares sloppily patched together.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve envisioned myself walking up to the lady who designed the quilt (who, by the way, owns her own quilt shop and has her own line of patterns!) and explaining why this quilt didn’t work. I wouldn’t be mean, I’d just explain some design rules that she needs to be aware of.
Creating is designing. And Design has rules. If you don’t follow any of them it will show in your final project, no matter what that project is.
Today I decided to stop envisioning myself going to that lady and telling her what she needs to change and start acting. I’m not going to actually go in an talk to her about now (almost a year later…). Instead I’m going to share what I know with you in what I think I’ll call Craft Design University: a series of blog posts where I’ll explain basic design rules and help you learn how to apply them to your own projects. I hope it helps you add a touch of elegance to your own DIY projects to help them be cherished for years to come.
I would love to know more about design rules!