John Pawson’s Sackler Crossing at Kew Gardens has won the 2008 Stephen Lawrence Prize for projects under £1 million. Prize judge Marco Goldschmeid praised the design, calling it “a masterly conjuring trick playfully deceiving the eye with light and water as its props. It is one of those rare designs where less truly is more”.
The bridge takes an intentionally low profile, giving its users the impression of walking on water. Its deck is made from bands of dark granite laid in parallel like railway sleepers. The balustrade is formed from close-set disconnected bronze cantilevers worked smooth at the top. These flat fins combined with the sinuous path of the bridge create differing optical effects depending on the position of the viewer, appearing in some parts as a solid wall, in others almost transparent. The materials are designed to age gracefully through the years as they take on a patina of use.
The Crossing dignifies its setting rather than dominates it, conveying a sense of harmony, calm and beautifully measured restraint that is sadly lacking from most of our contemporary culture, not just architecture. It is in sensitive settings like these that real design skill shines: Knowing when to stop, knowing how to add without taking away.
View the video on Pawson’s site
Posted by Adrian Short at 10:01 pm on October 19th, 2008.
Categories: Architecture, Simplicity. Tags: bridges, John Pawson, Kew Gardens, minimalism, Sackler Crossing, water.
As my own small contribution to the literature on featuritis, here’s a personal illustration. My mobile phone isn’t anything fancy. It’s cheap and very basic by today’s standards. No internet, no camera, no MP3 player. I bought it because all I wanted to do was to make calls and send texts.
So here’s a list of what my “simple” Nokia 1100 can do, and what I actually do with it.
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Posted by Adrian Short at 11:14 pm on September 12th, 2008.
Categories: Design theory, Product design, Simplicity, Uncategorized. Tags: iPhone, mobile phones, Nokia 1100, phones.
(Back to part 1)
Getting to Less is all about helping designers decide what to keep and what to throw out of their designs. Whether you’re designing software, websites, products or cities, you need to choose what to include and what to omit. But how?
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Posted by Adrian Short at 9:57 am on November 24th, 2007.
Categories: Design theory, Simplicity.
Just twist and go.
No low-contrast LCD display.
No instruction booklet.
No learning curve.
No fiddly buttons.
No modes.
No batteries.
No battery cover to snap off or lose.
No battery changes.
No weedy digital beep-beep-beep.
£3 delivered.
This is simplicity. Does it really need to be any harder than this?
Posted by Adrian Short at 9:31 am on November 24th, 2007.
Categories: Product design, Simplicity. Tags: 11, 9.
Simplicity is becoming an increasingly important trend in design. As life becomes faster-paced and we’re deluged with more choices, more information and more stuff, users and consumers are demanding that designers do the heavy lifting of making things more focussed, easier to learn, more refined.
The question for designers is “How?” How do we know when something is just right, and when it’s too much or not enough? How do we separate the essential from the peripheral? When do we stop?
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Posted by Adrian Short at 1:59 pm on November 21st, 2007.
Categories: Design theory, Simplicity.
You’d have to get up pretty early in the morning to put one over the system management software that comes with the Acer Aspire 9300.
A jack has been plugged in!
A jack has been unplugged!
Do you think I don’t realise already? Who’s the one doing the plugging and unplugging?
An important usability principle is to conserve the user’s attention. Let them focus on what matters most. Emphasise the main event, quieten the minor details and remove everything that simply doesn’t need to be shown.
For pity’s sake, don’t pop up a balloon just because I’ve plugged my headphones in.
Posted by Adrian Short at 1:56 pm on November 21st, 2007.
Categories: Simplicity, Software design, Usability.