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Ordinary Objects and Their New Design Overlords
Author(s) -
McCracken Grant
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
design management review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1948-7169
pISSN - 1557-0614
DOI - 10.1111/drev.10318
Subject(s) - hammer , meaning (existential) , convention , white (mutation) , aesthetics , advertising , engineering , computer science , architectural engineering , art , law , political science , business , epistemology , philosophy , mechanical engineering , biochemistry , chemistry , gene
Commodities were once designed by convention. Now that they are designed by designers, ordinary objects, from a man's watch to a woman's bicycle, give off an extraordinary amount of meaning. Once upon a time, all refrigerators were white. All bicycles were designed for 5′9″ men. All hammers were brown. It was the convention that mattered. Now, it's the choice