I would agree that there isn't a lot of interesting product design coming out of anywhere at the moment. The West coast US companies seem to have developed a generic look which doesnt seem to have developed much in the last couple of decades. Some companies like Sony and NEC are using a Bauhauist minimalist with silver paint which look to me as if they no longer employ people to design their products.Each year of IDSA awards looks more like last years. Products coming out of Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong are increasingly hard to distinguish from West Coast US products. There haven't been any new designers I can think of who have appeared in the last decade with the origniality of Colani, the postmodernists, Stark or Newson. The New Modernists like Morrison seemed for a while to be offering something new but that movement seems not to be going anywhere surprisingly new now with many imitaters following. The return to nationalist iconic design like the Beetle, Mustang and Mini  and 60s nostalgia in furniture may be the nostalgia of the end of a century as existed in design at the end of the previous century and it is difficult to see how these designs could develop into something surprisingly new.

In my view the world is tired of bland international design, it is not touching people's souls. I do not think that it is what the Bauhaus designers intended with the exception of perhaps Meyer.

I think that the best hope for Asian design is to exploit the rich iconic nature of their traditional designs and decoration blended with new materials and technology in interesting ways and to get off the international bandwagon. There is an Indian Designer based in the Netherlands, an Art Center Europe Graduate who is doing work along those lines.

______________________________

R   o   b     C   u   r   e   d   a   l   e
Chair Product Design
College for Creative Studies Detroit
201 East Kirby
Detroit MI 48202-4034

Phone: 313 664 7625
Fax:      313 664 7620
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>>> Karen <[log in to unmask]> 07/12/03 14:52 PM >>>
Hi all,

Been reading the responses to the thread, and thanks for the comments.
I think there is one aspect that no one hasn't touch on and that is the
identity of Asian
Design. Perhaps it may be a touchy issue. But I really sincerely hope that
some feedback
could come out from this discussion. I think it will benefit everyone in
understanding what
design identity is about. I must admit, though I am an Asian myself, that a
lot
of designs are not original enough. That is why I have always been stressing
the point on originality
and identity. I feel there is a problem somewhere that we have to indentify
them positively.
The root problem lies where we focus too much on producing something quick
for the industry that most products lost their own cultural semantics. Few
people have
the time to reflect on what we need as far as culture is concerned. Then the
next eerie
thing happens when everyone starts to appear
to come out with similar looks everywhere. If its a thumbdrive with MP3
capabilities, then
it has to have 'that' look and they usually churned out from South Korea.
Those designs that stood out
from the pen drive forms are few and they pay off by looking different by
addressing needs of different
people in different cultures. But even with those products, they rarely
break free to identify themselves
as "me" myself made in a different country. Only a few broke out from that
typical form.
As a result, your product looks similar to mine, and mine looks somewhat
the same as yours. At times, the uncanny twin product could appear
around the corner and give you one hell of a scare.---- they just look too
alike !
Its a typical problem when it comes to electronics products. Though the
internal
architecture is very much the same, the exterior could be assembled
differently. But
it seems to be that daring to be boldly different isn't apparent enough in a
lot of product
catagories.

There are some very good designs in  architecture which reflects a strong
modern
Oriental semantics. (one example is the Chinese embassy in Singapore
designed by
a local American trained Architect Liu Tai Ker) Some are in the fashion
designs.
However, I've not really seen much of a breakthrough in Product design.
So far what I can see is a good identification of North East Asian designs
like those from South Korea and Japan. That is one point I am concerned.
Probably because the product design process is a whole shorter to bear
enough time
to think about the culture behind. All you are asked to do is to run after
time and
throw out the product to the market before someone takes that slice of
profit away.
But even if one were just concerned about profits, it would still make a
huge dollar sign
profit sense that similar product appearance throughout the range exisiting
in the market will not pay well in the long run. That is unless one could
'soul-fully' differentiate itself good enough to earn a long term profit.

That doesn't seem to ring bells in some people who are over emphasized in
the
value of profit making. In the end, one would loose both one's sense and
sensibitility
in products. That would be one hell of a disaster after failing to be just a
humane humble
servant to the grand universe of humanity.

Karen Fu