Do you make things look nice? Do you spend more time worrying about nuance and aesthetics than substance and meaning? Do you fiddle with style while ignoring the big picture? If your answers are yes, yes, or yes, then you are a decorator.
Being a decorator is not how graphic designers necessarily want to perceive themselves. But what's the big deal? Is anything fundamentally wrong with being a decorator? Although Adolf Loos, an architect, proclaimed ornament as a sin in his essay, Ornament and Crime, an attack on late-nineteenth century Art Nouveau, in truth decoration and ornamentation are no more sinful than purity is supremely virtuous.
Take for example the Psychedelic Style of the late 1960s that was smothered in flamboyant ornamentation (indeed much of it borrowed from Loos' dreaded Art Nouveau). Nonetheless, it was a revolutionary graphic language used as a code for a revolutionary generation which is exactly the same role Art Nouveau played seventy years earlier with its vituperative rejection of antiquated 19th-century academic verities. Likewise, Psychedelia's immediate predecessor, Push Pin Studios, from the late 1950s through the 1970s, was known for reprising passé decorative conceits. In the context of the times, it was a purposeful and strategic alternative to the purist Swiss Style that evolved into drab Corporate Modernism, which had rejected decoration (and eclectic quirkiness) in favor of bland Helvetica. In their view, content and meaning were not sacrificed but rather illuminated and made more appealing.
Anti-decorative ideological fervor to the contrary, decoration is not inherently good or bad. While frequently applied to conceal faulty merchandise and flawed concepts, it nonetheless can enhance a product when used with integrity and taste. Decorators do not simply and mindlessly move elements around to achieve an intangible or intuitive goal: rather, they optimize materials at hand to tap into an aesthetic allure that instills a certain kind of pleasure.
Loos and likeminded late-19th and early-20th Century design progressives argued that excessive ornament existed solely to deceive the public into believing they were getting more value for their money when in fact they were being duped through illusionary conceits. These critics argued that Art Nouveau (and later Art Deco or Postmodern) decoration on buildings, furniture and graphic design rarely added to a product's functionality or durability; it also locks the respective objects in a vault of time that eventually renders everything obsolete. Decoration was therefore the tool of obsolescence.
However, decoration also plays an integral role in the total design scheme. It is not merely wallpaper. (And what's wrong with beautiful wallpaper, anyway?) Good decoration is that which enhances or frames a product or message. The Euro paper currency, with its colorful palette and pictorial vibrancy, is much more appealing than the staid U.S. dollar. While the "greenback" is comprised of ornate rococo engravings, the U.S. bills lack the visual pizzazz of the Euro. Of course, visual pizzazz is irrelevant if one is clutching a score of $100 bills: putting the respective face values of the currencies aside, the Euro is an indubitably more stimulating object of design because it is a decorative tour-de-force with a distinct function. One should never underestimate the power of decoration to stimulate the users of design.
Decoration is a marriage of forms (color, line, pattern, letter, picture) that does not overtly tell a story or convey a literal message, but serves to stimulate the senses. Paisley, herringbone or tartan patterns are decorative yet nonetheless elicit certain visceral responses. Ziggurat or sunburst designs on the façade of a building or the cover of a brochure spark a chord even when type is absent. Decorative and ornamental design elements are backdrops yet possess the power to draw attention, which ultimately prepares the audience to receive the message.
It takes as much sophistication to be a decorator as it does to be a wire-framer. A designer who decorates yet does not know how to effectively control, modulate or create ornamental elements is doomed to produce turgid work. The worst decorative excesses are not the obsessively baroque borders and patterns that are born of an eclectic vision (like the vines and tendrils that strangulated the typical Art Nouveau poster or page) but the ignorant application of dysfunctional doodads that are total anachronisms. A splendidly ornamented package, including the current crop of boutique teas, soaps and food wrappers, may cost a little more to produce but still have quantifiable impact on the consumers with discerning tastes who buy them (and who sometimes keep the boxes after the product is used).
There are many different kinds and degrees of decoration and ornamentation. While none of it is really sinful, much of it is trivial. And yet to be a practitioner of this kind of design does not a priori relegate one to inferior status branded with a scarlet (shadowed, inline and bifurcated) letter "D."
Some designers are great because they are exemplary decorators.
Comments [47]
11.24.07
02:14
VR/
11.24.07
03:12
11.24.07
03:49
11.24.07
06:20
11.24.07
08:26
I've often found myself moving between the poles in my own methodology: from "if isn't not crucial to the concept, and doesn't have reams of rationale, nix it!" to "but this is so pretty!"
My favorite genres are Swiss and Art Nouveau -- I'm at odds with myself!
One conclusion I came to a while ago, that you hit on nicely here, is that setting the "emotional environment" is nearly tantamount to the content. We're so cerebral so much of the time, we forget that a flourish can prick the heart in a way which is not so obvious to our reason.
Great job.
11.24.07
08:27
So my question is, do you determine the level of decoration in your work based on audience expectations, and basically let trends interfere with your communication goals and/or functional specs and usability requirements?
11.24.07
10:55
I feel that we can avoid the nasty "trendy" designation by following the ideals of the concept completely, and making sure that the concept is strong enough to survive the test of fickle times. What I think we can all agree on is that unnecessary decoration, or decoration to "pretty things up" would interfere with the overall value and effectiveness.
I'm graduating university soon, so I'm still in the idealistic designing-for-designers phase. To me, it's all about love for the craft. To use decoration for the sake of decoration seems like such a lazy and lousy thing for an artist to do. However, why do I feel like I'm in line for a very big wakeup call?
11.24.07
11:49
11.25.07
12:21
11.25.07
12:27
Where I am studying, there is this beliefs that designer and artist are very much different. That artist can do whatever they want, and designer solve problem.
David Carsons was always right, these designers act as if artists don't communicate. Every piece of artwork communicate in an creative way. And as long as creativity is involve, it's art.
But what with these labels? Why are there needs to differentiate ourselves from other? To me, even chef designs.
Now we are dividing designer into decorators?
What's wrong with ornaments?
If it is really such a sinful thing for one design something... like their own work desk to be filled with "pointless objects" and not care about what makes them happy... well, then I guess those famous designers should stop making designer toys (urban vinyl) or any ornaments at all, since they are contributing to the problem.
11.25.07
04:00
11.25.07
11:52
11.25.07
12:03
11.25.07
12:34
I'm personally a fan of "decoration" there's absolutely nothing wrong with making something look nice, and that can be done either by eliminating what isn't making it look nice, or by adding something to make it look better. Either approach can have merit in the right situation.
11.25.07
05:26
You are making decorating and ornamenting synonyms. Can't decorating (as you defined it--favoring nuance and aesthetics over substance and meaning) be accomplished in a minimalist aesthetic and can't complex design favor substance and meaning?
Loos may have used functionalist rhetoric but he was making a primarily aesthetic argument.
11.25.07
05:53
First, it seems in the argument that ornament is serving a function, but w/o the responsibility of meaning. In other words, it is acting on the audience - framing their experience for positive or negative - without a mention of what is going on. While this might be fine in capable hands (whatever those may be), it seems troubling in the hands of the ignorant or worse.
Second, the argument for ornament for ornament's sake doesn't square with me trying to be more ecologically-friendly. Is ornament worth the expense and (if so) how much ornament? If the frame is necessary, great. However, if it is just because I or my client feels it, is that any different than me driving a Hummer because I like the feel of it. In the case of deco, where does comsumption factor into production? That religion in me makes it seem like it should at least by a criteria.
11.26.07
08:53
Joshua has a good point too. Decoration suggests excess. And currently, the new religion of sustainability rails against excess as unholy indulgence.
The term "capable hands" is relative and contextual. But we are talking about graphic design here, where in the end decoration and ornament are impressions on surface, not the surface itself. Even the most sustainable products could benifit from a decorative surface - or not as the case may be.
11.26.07
09:55
11.26.07
10:06
I would argue that masterfully-done decoration and ornamentation are inherently sustainable, whether it is on the surface or is the surface itself. One of the oft-forgotten tenets of sustainability is pride of possession, wherein an object becomes a keepsake, thus preventing it from creating a void that must be filled. One could argue that the best-decorated pieces of architecture are sustainable simply for the fact that they won't be replaced, and therefore will not create waste. The art deco movement produced many such pieces, and is arguably more sustainable than equivalent pieces of the modern movement as a result.
The graphic design industry is currently on a sustainable forestry kick, but the problem remains the same: people continuously dispose of our work, but our work is often not designed to be disposed. Meanwhile, original prints and scrolls, the first examples of typesetting as an art, have not been thrown out in hundreds of years despite (and, indeed, because of) their ornamental nature. Perhaps if we focus on ensuring that our work will not be disposed by utilizing ornamentation as the art form it once was, a more sustainable industry will result.
11.26.07
11:03
rhymes with...
book writer
foreign homonymity/graphy/phony permitted.
that's all I got to say.
11.26.07
11:16
That just means it's a bad concept.
11.26.07
11:25
11.26.07
01:55
11.26.07
04:01
11.26.07
05:35
Although I would love for the business card of my local florist and my dishwasher to be designed with Swiss style, I live in the real world, and I have come to appreciate the various degree of design intelligence, aim at different types of targets, made by people from different education background.
Design can reflect the personality of a person, it can sell toys to children, it can helps adult masturbate(designer of pornographic video cover is a designer no matter how hard you want to change the encyclopedia definition to try not to include them).
Design, like love, has started to become something that is trying to be made exclusive by the elitist who studies at the concentrated feel (for love, that would be those PhD poets), when in reality, the word supposed to cover wide range of activities. To me, all it takes to be a designer is for someone to try to communicate something. If it's ineffective, it's a bad design, if it's effective, it's a good design. Nothing doesn't communicate. You standing there saying nothing communicate something.
Like I said in my earlier post, every dish a chef creates, he designs.
Where I am studying, angry teacher who are mad at his student sometime claims "you will never be a good designer if you keep behaving this way." He never said, "you will never be a designer"
11.26.07
09:43
11.27.07
08:09
11.27.07
11:46
"Oh," says the prospective client, "you're an interior decorator."
"No," we were told to respond, "I'm an interior designer. Decorators put vases of flowers on tables: I do real work."
:-)
11.27.07
12:18
-- Ruskin
11.27.07
05:17
ms. lupton and m. kingsley (via ruskin) are spot on; interested parties should look up the writing of james trilling or denise gonzales crisp on the subject.
there is absolutely nothing that is unaesthetic, or arguably, undecorated. even a black and white wireframe contains myriad formal decisions. it is precisely that series of decisions which make design work.
11.27.07
06:21
11.28.07
08:24
While as graphic designers it is our job to portray a message in a pleasing aesthetic that is appropriate and meets the demands and standards of both the client's and one's personal needs. I feel it is how we portray that information to the masses that will determine if decoration is indeed Graphic Design. While our main focus should reside on the ability to understand the information we are presenting quickly and clearly. Sometimes decoration design is what the client may be looking for, it all depends on the target market.
I feel it that the amount of decoration applied is determined by the client and consumer's needs. I follow and compete in multiple "action sports" The trend these days in multiple magazines, and advertisements is basically senseless collages (decoration) that eventually promote the product, brand, or athlete. As we all know, popular image sells. The designers for these magazines and ads must concentrate more about style and aesthetics because that is what the companies are promoting and the consumer is buying. In my eyes this is making them effective Designers, while they may understand all of the typographic rules etc... They choose to ignore these rules in order to meet the needs of the client/consumer
11.28.07
02:41
On the subject of duping the public with ornament: one could say art in general is a way of duping the public to buy something. People like things that are colorful, shinny, evoke imagination, etc, so is it fair to say that the entire world or art and design is the worlds greatest scam to make a buck?
I myself enjoy ornament to a certain extent... Not to make this blurb sound like a tired out rant on how ornament is bad or decoration is dead, and how the perfect designer should be... but purpose is what drives a designer. If I take nothing from my studies, I would take that something visually pleasing doesn't have to mean anything, but as a designer, or decorator, whatever one wishes to call it, I want my audience to perceive a message. Elemental purpose.
11.28.07
03:03
But they are great because they understand design and decoration in context and not for the act of adding curlicues.
Context.
11.28.07
09:06
11.28.07
10:16
Ornamentation can be used like a language of coded signs. It can also add value to an object by being beautiful according to some set of shared values. However, the syntax of the ornamentation (the elements that are used and the way they are organized) has meaning in and of itself in that it reveals the values that helped created it. The Corinthian, Ionic, and Doric orders in Classical Western architecture reveals something about Greek and Roman society, just as Islamic calligraphy and the Arabesque provides some insight into the values of traditional Islamic culture. Furthermore, the fact that some people still use the Classical Order in contemporary architecture reveals something about the people that use it, sponsor it, and admire it. The same goes for all other historic or emerging styles.
If the goal of decorating is to enhance value by making something more beautiful, the way a society or individual accomplishes this will reveal the values of that society:
What materials are used (gold, stone, bakelite plastic)?
What motifs are used (floral, geometric, typographic)?
How is it organized (hierarchically, modularly, randomly)?
To what objects is it applied (objects meant to last forever, object meant to be disposed of quickly)?
What reason was it applied (to inspire, to draw attention, to shock, to overwhelm)?
Who benefits from it (everyone, only the middle class, only the elite class, only the ruling class)?
Whether a designer views themselves as a problem solver, communicator, innovator, or decorator, I think the most important thing is that they have some idea what they are doing, even if their only goal is to make something nicer.
11.29.07
12:28
11.29.07
01:42
11.29.07
10:07
that is meant to be funny right? the euros are, in my opinion absolutely dreadful...
especially to people here in holland, you should see the old
dutch guilder notes designed by 'ootje oxenaar',
now that was pizzazz in money design terms...
or the swiss bank notes... but not the euro!
11.30.07
03:10
Simply put.
Thank you.
11.30.07
11:13
http://www.creativereview.co.uk/crblog/the-money-maker/
12.04.07
12:58
I always found it ironic that in one of his works, Loos ended up building a non structural column just to give symmetry to an interior. Or how Mies Van de Rohe wrapped in steel a group of columns that had to be built in concrete to comply with fire extinction requirements, only to give the columns his signature steel look. So much for form following function.
As the writer of this article points out, all time-periods are responding to their predecessors, usually in a radical manner. Designers are by definition concerned with the aesthetics of things, and have the tendency to want to leave their own mark; to innovate.
But as long as there is no dialogue between content and form, designers are simple behaving like the married couple fighting over wether having a home full of memorabilia and decorative items or having
a "simple" and minimalist space.
Every home is different. And ideally, it looks and feels like home to each one of its inhabitants. It should respond to everyone's needs.
Graphic Design is no different. Think of content (and client, and audience) as the inhabitants of a graphic design piece. The designer should make all these elements feel at home. And, unless you want to repeat Le Corbusier's machine of living, your designs will look different depending on who are the inhabitants.
12.04.07
03:03
I think graphic design is aesthetics that helping to do well meaningful communication. The road sign ages are aesthetically well design without decoration.
12.08.07
12:51
12.09.07
12:12
12.10.07
01:32
It seems to be that what you are referring to as exemplary decoration in a way that could be considered as when decoration becomes "substance and meaning" in which functions and serves a purpose within a design. It is also to be considered that beauty, whether through decoration or not, is created by a Kantian aesthetic moment.
Perhaps I've been afraid to face the stigma of the "D", but I originally felt that like the term decoration does not provide an accurate portrayal of a functional aspect of design. When done well decoration creates an atmosphere to which semantics are culturally posited to help tell a story. However, this is decoration. Thank you for alerting us to what we more specifically should fear from being; only decorators and/or bad decorators.
12.15.07
12:50