Trenitalia, travel writing and total design

Traversing the distance between the ideal and the real

The latest issue of Granta is devoted to travel writing. There are some fantastic pieces but one stands out thus far: Tim Parks on Trenitalia, the Italian state railway system.

Parks writes beautifully about the details in the system’s fabric. He also manages to write about the entire social framework its canvas is stretched over. In reinforcing why I enjoy travel writing so much, ‘Trenitalia’ also made me think about ‘the total experience’ and how that relates to design work.

Where possible, design addresses a complete experience, including purpose, function and representation. For this, skills include observing, researching, modeling and conjuring. This includes helping transform the program. Creating the physical form is part of the job, but increasingly, thanks to addressing services and interactions too, it also means shaping the fundamental idea, the function, the meaning, the organisation. You might call this experience design, but you could just call it design. Or another word altogether. The name doesn’t really matter. You could call it marketing, strategy or writing without words for all I care. I’ll call it Total Design, as a nod to an earlier thought. (Ed. this was written before I knew about Ove Arup’s conception of…