Taller Excerpt: Methods of Testing, Evaluation and Validation
When I hear the words “fearful symmetry”, I think of Blake’s tiger brightly surrounded by the idea of the concept of visual symmetry. The words are alive in my mind and visual language. Poetry has long been a part of my dialogue, that both inspires and directs me. There is a romance in poetry that informs a particular way of thinking, that allows me to think of design as not just a function of need or want, but as an evocation of emotion. Poetry exists in everyday language and so, has the capacity to become a function of design. As words can create and direct my design in this way, they become an integral part of my conceptualisation process. This grounding in language drives my methods by informing the nuances and details that evoke a poetic response. These responses can be created through material choice, with their perceived value, memory and tactility. The details in the finishing of materials can evoke a response; smooth, sharp, curvaceous. How materials meet is also very evocative, and again can be driven by an overarching direction from written language. Not only materiality, but form can be viewed through poetry: Brutalism through the Beat poets, Abstract through Cummings and Gothic through Plath. With Taller, I have a chosen timber as the main material. The structural integrity of Vic Ash along with the warmth it evokes creates a sense of homeliness - the same way that seeing a lit hearth evokes feelings of home in a intrinsic sense. Materiality can convey meaning simply through shared visual language. Not just timber, but Taller uses metal inserts and bolts to finish it’s construction. The flushness of the inserts and clarity of the metal thread feels strong, safe and underpins the security of the home. The perfect way that the bolt finds the thread through the warmth of the timber itself is a one of the small details that poetry has driven for me.
When I begin to conceive of ideas, I find that poetry helps to drive the way in which I think about the design. In this sense, Taller’s poetry is about evoking the individual’s own idea of poetry, or broadly, their inspiration. When we see lived space, we are emotionally influenced by the choices of objects that we see, by the occupant’s lives displayed in material choice. How might this drive a greater picture of the individual? How might we access a way in which we can create a narrative around someone’s life in a poetic way? In each object that we choose to nurture or keep or store, there is a story behind why it is kept. In providing a way to display these objects on a lived space, we invite the user to consider their own narrative in terms of their own living space. In this sense, the driving force behind Taller is not only a necessity behind the shrinking sizes of dwelling, but an opportunity to create meaning through a visual language, inspired by the romance of poetry.
In my pursuit of design conceptualisation and understanding not only of external form, but of myself, I use drawing to explore meaning. The way that I interpret my environment is as much a part of my design process as it is a part of myself. I find inspiration through romanticising a scene through watercolours. Sketching and painting are ways for me to imagine possibilities and to think. I can actualise a space in an idealistic way, and attempt to find what a design can be. Sketching and drawing are a much a part of my language as poetry is. It is, for me, visual poetry. When I paint, I am able to interpret the world around me through different lenses. I can omit, add and alter the way that something might be construed. Sketching provides a way for me to visualise the emotive content of a design and to fantasise about it’s impact in an artistic sense. I am an artist in this regard, as much as I am designer - finding the beauty in necessity and attempting to design a product through both lenses; that of what may be in an ideal world and what may be in reality.
With Taller, I sketched the way I thought of how the form and materials came together. The sketching process for me, was as much a way to think simply about the product, as it was to find the artistry in the project. Sketching the elements and the scenarios of Taller allowed me to find the parts of the project that would hold the most significance for myself and for the aim of the project. Thinking of Taller in an artistic way, of how it might inhabit space and create an environment that allows the user to celebrate their own objects, was borne out of sketches devoid of engineered thinking. This meant that Taller could be based on visual poetry, emotion, and the opportunity to create an ideal space for the user, as opposed to working from existing concepts and attempting to improve them. Both poetry and sketching are the ways in which I find meaning in my designs, where I find my passion for them and what drives my inspiration.
Finally, model making is where I start to think physically. Often, the reality of a product sets in here and parameters based on conceiving of construction and physical problems that need solving are identified. I began model making on a 1:5 scale with Taller, using a timber dowel grid to identify how elements might relate to each other. My initial model had me frustrated, I spent hours using the model making pieces to try to achieve clarity on the way that I would construct Taller, but kept hitting dead ends. What model making did help me resolve was the scope of the project. Initially, I had imagined that Taller could expand on both the x and y axis, but after working through this process, I realised that the design would need to be extremely technical for this to be possible. Taller needed to be assembled easily by the user, if I couldn’t conceptualise how to put the elements together, it was likely that the final construction would be very complex and that the time dedicated to designing the connections would detract from other important areas of designing Taller, such as prototyping and designing finishings. So, pursuing workable parameters, Taller would instead, extend along a single axis and the height would be reduced to strengthen the design and reduce the risk of it being top heavy.
Now that I had clarity on what the design was, 1:1 prototyping could begin. I discussed building a prototype with my colleague who has over 20 years experience in cabinet making and joinery and we decided to begin with the carcass. We would establish how best to connect the uprights to the carcass and the best way to construct drawers that could run both ways, i.e. reducing Taller’s limitations in the user’s environment. The first step was drawing out the base of the carcass 1:1 to determine internal sizes, rebates and best material thickness. We worked to standard thicknesses based on my material sourcing; 30mm Vic Ash shelving, 45mm hardwood posts, 16mm hardwood dowel and 19mm Tasmanian Ash veneer board. Taller’s prototype used pine uprights, an 18mm MDF carcass and 16mm pine dowel.
Next was clarifying some of the technical production aspects. My colleague showed me a way to rebate the outer panels so that we could create an internalised base that didn’t show the veneer board’s MDF interior on the panel saw, a technique that I was unaware of. Consulting my colleague has definitely been one of the greatest experiences I’ve had when designing. To have expert knowledge from specific fields applied to your design helps to elevate what the product could be, and in Taller’s case, create a much cleaner connection with the uprights. Making a fully working prototype has been one of the best ways for me to understand and improve my design.
Working through Taller’s as a project has helped me more clearly realise my personal design process. I need to romanticise the concept through poetry and imagery to become attached to it. To move forward, modelling allows me to understand the restrictions of not just physics and materiality, but my capability for a given time frame. Finally, it is imperative for me to create a fully working prototype. This prototype allows me to understand the technical details and improve where I can. However, once the prototype is complete, it allows me to re-enter the conceptual thinking space; I am able to return to the romance behind the design and reconsider different aspects of whimsy that can now be easily constructed around, or integrated into, the design.
It’s very exciting to establish a design, however I have found that it has been even more rewarding to establish my design method.
With Taller, language and art inspired what the project could be, model-making helped reduce the concept to a realistic structure and prototyping 1:1 allowed me to start reconsidering what else Taller could be.
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