I’m joined by Andrew Kim, a good friend and one of my favorite young designers. Together we discuss the importance of harmony and attention to detail in design.
You might know Andrew from his branding exercise redesigning Microsoft. This 3-day project garnered remarkable traction online and eventually helped him land a job designing hardware at Xbox. Microsoft recently profiled Andrew shining a spotlight on some of his earliest work, including the Ecocoke project, and how it has flowed into his excellent blog Minimally Minimal and recently, 90°, his book on knolling.
One of the things I’ve always appreciated about Andrew is his keen sense of observation. Spend a few minutes reading his blog and you’ll begin to understand how he visually deconstructs a product into lines, shapes and colors, the sum of which can be called form language.
Why is form language important? Our conversation was a reminder that participating in mass production is a responsibility to create elegant, harmonious designs that contribute to society, rather than add to the cacophony.