Wondering about what seperates a good and a bad one, how it is created, which criteria it should fulfil?
The evolution of art is itself a design as art and design are inextricable. Art and design work shoulder to shoulder for the betterment of society. A good design always comes intending to serve the purpose with efficiency and enhancing the function. It might be innovative or just to get the job done. One must be inspired by Dieter Ram’s “Ten Principles of Good Design” while designing. Holistically design is the reflection of the various eras connecting the old with new & vice versa. Design helped in shaping our culture from French Revolution to World Wars to Independence to Globalisation. The design evolved itself with time and need accordingly.
What is a Good Design?
Good Design is omnipresent with or without being consciously sought after. It is communicating and aesthetic in nature. It is designed to increase efficiency and decrease human efforts but not limited to it only. A design acts as a bridge between creator and entity, so it should be user-oriented. The main aim of a good design is to provide comfort to the user by solving their problem, saving their time and making life easier. A good design is obvious whereas a great design is transparent. It is simple & understandable and is something that users always tempting for.
What is a Bad Design?
Any design which serves its purpose partially comes in the category of a bad design as it failed to win the confidence of its user. A design that is not self-explanatory is also bad as it is not understandable, the moment you realise that output is not what you desired means that design lacks worth. Any complicated design will lose its user’s interest. It is short-lived due to its drawback of being obtrusive. It will not be user friendly which in turn decimate the user experience. But it is always important to give feedback for a bad design because the design of the present is going to fuel your future.
Here are some examples of a Good Design and a Bad Design.
Let us start with some of the good designs of the digital world as well as of the physical world.
- Digi Locker — Digi Locker is an initiative of the Ministry of Electronics &IT under the Digital India Corporation(DIC). It is a cloud-based platform for storage, sharing and verification of documents and certificates. One platform to carry every document without any fear of getting lost or of pickpocketers. It reduces paper load and you can access any document anywhere, anytime. It provides a digital document wallet to users.
2. Google Maps — Google Maps helps people to reach their destination easily on time by providing the direction. It provides the layout of roads, locations, state boundaries and satellite images. It also tells about the jam which you are going to face in your route and to save you from that as it redirects your route. It is a reliable and accurate application.
3. Backpack — It is a good design as weight is evenly distributed on both shoulders. It is light in weight, easy to carry your belongings, waterproof & dustproof and has various compartments. It protects the inside products. It is long-lasting, washable and affordable. It is best to carry fragile items because of extra cushioning and padding. It is available in different colours and textures.
4. Inbuilt Locks — It provides safety to our home and belongings. The biggest advantage is convenience. No need to use any lock separately. It saves our time and is also a style statement these days. It is long-lasting and rust-free. It also comes with a warranty. Most people prefer it because of its aesthetics. It provides excellent excess and usability. It is available in various designs and brands due to its high demand.
5. Water Alarm— Its main purpose is to save water from overflowing. It is affordable and easy to maintain & even installation is very easy. It comes with a compact design. It is extremely long-lasting. It also helps in saving money by using less electricity and less water. It is automatic and requires no human effort. This is simple, efficient and reliable. It can work in both temperatures -cold as well as hot. It is user friendly.
Here are some Bad Designs of the digital world and the physical world.
1. Meesho — This is the mobile version of meesho application. This application is inelegant. No proper background is maintained to provide ease to users eyes. Products are not arranged appropriately. The main interface is so messy due to bad font selection and it lacks proper spacing. The main disadvantage is that you can only keep the items in the cart which belongs to the same retailer and if you want to order from another retailer then either you have to purchase the earlier retailer’s order first or remove that from the cart.
2. Inshorts — It is a news app that selects the latest and trendy news and presents them in a summary of 60words or less. In this app, the same notification keeps popping up every hour. It uses a lot of caches which is thumbs down. The images used in news is not contextual. It is flooded with advertisements. It has jerky swipe animations which break the user experience. Read contents get repeated in unread feeds. If by mistake you swipe down, it refreshes itself and you won't be able to read the same news again. No proper refresh button is given.
3. Earphones — This earphone is uncomfortable to wear. It is not waterproof in nature. The quality is limited to the audio file only. It is not sports-friendly and of gym use. There is no much variation in design. The noise cancellation feature is mostly unavailable. It sits right in your ear or even deep inside which may cause ear damage or hearing loss. The wire stays with you as long as you keep listening to audio. It will be tangling in different objects coming in your way & hinder your mobility. You have to carry your device with you to make a move.
4. Maggi Ketchup Bottle — This is a glass bottle due to which there is a risk of breakage while handling & to those who are recycling and injuries may cause. These bottles are expensive and heavy to lift. Even the grip is not so good. These bottles have wider mouth openings due to which ketchup spills most of the time. It can break without any significant strain. The transportation of these bottles is also expensive. If glass shards mix with the contents of a food package unnoticed, they can do internal damage if swallowed.
5. Lamp — I consider this lamp as a bad design because it is of glass and has to be handled with care. Once the bulb is fused, it is of no use. It is heavy to use due to its wooden base. It is not long-lasting and not easy to carry. It is also dangerous to lift because of its sharp metal sides. It heats up so quickly. It is costly & brittle and even corrosion can take place.
A good design is a life saviour whereas a bad design is a decimator
With the aforementioned, we can see that design evolved with the passage of time and need accordingly and it is impossible to sum up the design in a single defination. A good design can survive ages with a bit of innovation and creation. As Albert Einstein said: “The best design is the simplest one that works”
Happy Reading :)
Warm Regards,
Swati Jha
