ID in the World - finding the right balance

I often find myself intrigued and fascinated at looking through images of the new “ID” creations of famous designers in magazines and websites. Their choice of materials, colors, carefully thought out forms, and “guess what, it can do this!” kind of exciting facts pleases my eyes. My ambitious and selfish ego tells me, ‘I want it’ or ‘I wish I could make something like that’. The new nifty iPhones, Frank Gehry’s wiggle chair, or even the bowling pin lamp inspire me to design my own valuable products. I feel purchasing and having those kinds of products will make me happy and more confident as a contemporary “designer”.

Then through the screen of the sleek Apple computer screen, I witness an image of a young boy in Sudan drinking water out of a dirty puddle remaining on the ground. Suddenly I realize there is a clash in my fantasy being an industrial designer and it brings me back to trace how industrial design originated. What is now known for more for its luxurious and fancy products, industrial design really started from experimenting new ways to provide for the needy and their often encountered problems.

The Industrial Revolution was caused by the need to increase manufacturing while eliminating labor-intensive work. With increase of population and the slowly advancing technology, it called for more efficient food production and resources. Astonishing inventions such as the steam engine revolutionized the power of technology and designers began to see a potential for replacing other labor-intensive work with a touch of a button. Yes, it allowed convenience and operating machines to be valued for their easy and successful result to produce mass productions; however, I feel the convenience we seek from industrial designers today is far more unnecessary luxury compared to the convenience provided then that existed for the sake of fulfilling our basic needs.

Dr. Bruce Beck’s lecture covered the refugee’s fundamental needs for survival – water, sanitation, food & cooking, and shelter. It is essentially what Europe and America had gone through previously causing the Industrial Revolution. The western and the more developed countries managed to come this far, while the less unfortunate countries still remain in the same condition with same tragic problems. While we seek inspiration from computer graphics and multi touch screens, the rest of the world is seeking to find clean water for their family and themselves. The gap between the two worlds has widened and will continue to increase as long as the “industrial designers” continue to only invest and value the advancing technology of their familiar world and ignore the other half (now homeless refugees) and their unfulfilled needs.

The cause of their suffering is something that can easily happen to anyone of us; through natural disasters, financial crisis, wars, we too can become helpless wanderers lacking the most basic necessities to live. As designers, having learned and witnessed their hardships, I consider it is our duty to participate at least a small portion to reach out to them with our granted knowledge and talents. Focusing their profiles as our user groups and creating more “stuff” to save a life, I believe, will allow other forms of assistant – doctors, volunteers, educators…etc – to involve themselves more actively in Saving the World Soul by Soul.