Design as Conversation/ Interaction

       Some people see design as a process of problem solving. For me, it is also a process of story telling. However, telling a story through design is different. Instead of receiving the story through listening with just one-directional, it requires them to think, to ask questions in mind, to participate in the story, and to have conversation with the story teller. In other words, the story that is display by design is multidirectional, it starts from the designer, but ends in different ways as far as the conversation and the audiences’ imagination goes. It is the different conversations happening in the minds of the different audiences make a design meaningful.

       Looking for the root of the word “Design”, in ancient Greek, the definition of design is close to the meaning of “nearly” and “almost” that it has the linguistic connections to “incompleteness” and “imperfection”. From my personal understanding, design itself is always incomplete. It will never be a finished work without the participation of the audience. The connection, interaction, and conversation between a designed object and the audience is the actual purpose of design. That’s why I would considered the word “design” as a verb instead of a noun. Because a designed object itself has no meaning unless there is interaction happening. The interaction, the action, happening at the moment when we look, feel, or use a designed object is what I think design truly is.  

       After all, thinking design as an interaction and conversation instead of a physical object helps me understand more about how to improve a design. As I say, design is like a multidirectional story, we as designers should always be thinking about what kind of interaction we would like to see whenever we are designing things. We have to remember that what we are designing is not a physical object, but a conversation and an interaction we want our audience to experience. A good design provides a great experience of interaction which the audience can involve themselves into the story. It connects the audience with the designers’ initial ideas and allows them to tell the story in their ways. The reason that I think a design object itself is always incomplete is because that there are endless possibilities that followed which one can’t define.    


image from: www.choszczno.info