Week 1 What does design mean?

We reading The Eames Lounge Chair and watched excerpts from Frazier, and Helvetica. In Frazier, Frazier and his father battle out tensions of authenticity, class and gender over some key design objects, a Le Corbusier lamp, a "Wassily" chair, an Eames Lounge, and a battered vibrating recliner. Frazier sees his furniture in aesthetic terms, as named "pieces", his father sees his chair in terms of physical comfort. We spoke about the complexities of the idea of "function".  We also read an essay that opened up some of the differences in status between anonymous design and named design using the Eames chair. This is an ongoing debate.

I gave out the readings for discussion in next class meeting: No Logo, Branding the Individual, Fabien Baron. 

Please check out the links related to the class on the right, including the Bauhaus exhibition site. The Ideal Book is an talk by William Morris that lays out the principals of functionality and truth to materials that inspired modernist design. For next class you need to set up your blog and post responses to the readings.

Week 2 No Class 

Continue with readings, set up blog, post responses.