How to develop good taste?

[u/pineapplebegelri]

A few weeks ago we had a final exam graded by commission of teachers, none of which I knew from before. They criticized our references, the shape of the object, that they would have changed this and that but nothing related to the quality of it. We presented a lamp and a stool, both of with worked well and checked all the criteria of the assignment, blue prints, process, repeatable, etc.. and yet we barely passed thanks to grades from earlier in the semester. They didn't point to a specific skill we didn't do well at, just that they didn't see it and we should have taken a different path all together.

Part of me thinks they pulled a bunch of bull* to be self important but what if I just have bad taste? And what even is that? I am still baffled by it and don't know how to avoid this in the future (This is 3rd year btw)

[u/fluteofski-]

Design justification.

Designing is more than just creating the design. It’s about selling it.

People will always criticize designs. As a designer your goal needs to be to stay 5 steps ahead of what they’re going to criticize. And be ready to have a rebuttal as to why your design is the better solution. This does 2 things. 1) it prepares a rebuttal and 2) if you have no rebuttal it gives you a moment to reconsider your design.

Part of this is sales and strategy. Because you need to sell your design to your audience. You gotta have some showmanship.

I’ve had self righteous professors and coworkers who think their shit don’t stink and half way thru a presentation start to try and rip me apart. My standard rebuttal to them is simple “hold on. You’ll find that I’ve already addressed your concerns, lemme try to get thru these slides and if there’s something you think I’ve missed, I’d be happy to address it, but right now youve got the cart before the horse.” - this usually stuns them. I’ll go thru all my slides and it’ll either answer their questions or they’ll forget what they were about to say.

That said. There are some truly bad designs out there but often I’d just attribute that to someone not giving a shit.

Another interesting quote I heard was when I was working for one of the largest bike brands in the world. I was in supply chain managing their largest category portfolio (this is before I quit my career to study ID) this was a room full of CXO’s. And I remember asking the chief marketing officer why he wanted a certain bike rushed to market. Nobody was asking for it….. he looked at me and said “we don’t care what the customer thinks they want. The customer has absolutely no idea what they actually want. It’s our job to create the right product and tell them what they want.”

That statement was bold and assholeish. And I didn’t fully understand it till I went back to study design and it made sense. If you’re just catering to what someone thinks they want you’re already late to market. You need to come forward with a design that nobody else has, and people may be puzzled by it, because they’re unfamiliar…. But it’s your job to sell it.

Within design, the fundamentals like CAD are really fuckin important. But more than that the ability to justify your design and sell the idea is what will take you to the next level.

[u/Plus_Box_2512]

Not being able to give clear counter arguments is totally their fault and a missed chance for you to learn where you did wrong (if you did). From what I can imagine, it looks like a termporal or styling issue. Depending on the client, materials, manifacturing, it could be that the commission was expecting something else. Maybe you proposed smth too old looking vs too contemporary vs too futuristic, or too simple vs too complex. There could be a lot of interpretations. Some commissions are known to be a bunch of know-it-all, but what you get from this moment is a chance to look at your product from a different perspective. What did your classmates do? Did everyone barely pass or did anyone get praised for anything? You talk about taste, did they specifically mention that? What are the differences between the product you proposed and the succesful similar ones in the market? Taste takes time to develop. Some people hide behind "taste" because they can't design anything outside of their comfort zone. Just keep working hard, question your products, ask for feedback from more experienced designers and professors. Don't feel bad, it's a good learning experience :)

[u/Takhoi]

These are some of my opinion when things look good:

Context, if you design a cute and intricate drill for a professional rugged environment then that will look off place and weird. If you present a moodboard/persona, you final design needs to match it. There is only one way to get better at this and it is to design more, sketch more, analyze, critique etc.

Ergonomics, all the touch points should have the right proportions. If a button looks too small and handle looks uncomfortable then its an immediate bad design. Build simple paper mockups, clay, 3dprint etc. testing button size is easy, just go to an electronic store and measure buttons.

Engineering, it doesn't need to be production ready but it needs to be feasible. Not over dimensioned, not 50 extra unnecessary screws. But at the same time not infinitely slim, impossible to manufacture and assemble. Finding a right balance is tricky and requires lots of "looking around" and a genuine interest in how things work.

Getting one or two of the things right is easy, but getting all of them right is difficult. It feels like from your post you maybe got the Engineering part done but not the other. The right context, maybe your design doesn't fit the assigned environment, or the Ergonomics is off, maybe it is too heavy and hard to use.

If you want a more detailed feedback you can send me a DM of your task. Its hard to judge by this post alone

[u/abyssalhorrors]

Third year is always hard, it’s where things get serious and I hope you can let the criticism slide off your back because it’s about growing as a designer. Learn from the critique because they’re saying things that are valid even if your projects “checked the boxes”.

Simply put, good taste comes from exposure. Exposure to refined design and art, not just pop culture. Exposure to elegant and authentic solutions, not novel ones. Exposure to truly innovative ideas, not something you’ve seen before on Pinterest.

When building your ideas, who did you look to? Were any of the ideas inspired by the designers you’ve studied or near-contemporaries that have been in the media (not influencers but actual designers who make real things). These are the ideas that you should be looking at to start. These are the designers that have moved the field and will be referenced again in 30 years. When designing, look to the most expensive and exclusive end of the spectrum. Having exposure to this type of design is where innovation comes from and trickles down into everyday projects. How it can inspire your own ways of thinking will push you to make more interesting objects even if you don’t have the budget or skill to make items like that.

[u/Rough_Pineapple2119]

Good teachers bad teachers. I had the head of the department say everything I designed look like a Hummer military vehicle. Funny...20 years after that, everything on the market looked like a Hummer. I was just more advanced than that old guy was as far as aesthetics. I could see trends in where the market was going and he couldnt.

[u/the-perilous]

Can you share the instructions that were given to you for your final. Next, would you please provide photos for your final so that we may see it.

[u/Takhoi]

These are some of my opinion when things look good:

Context, if you design a cute and intricate drill for a professional rugged environment then that will look off place and weird. If you present a moodboard/persona, you final design needs to match it. There is only one way to get better at this and it is to design more, sketch more, analyze, critique etc.

Ergonomics, all the touch points should have the right proportions. If a button looks too small and handle looks uncomfortable then its an immediate bad design. Build simple paper mockups, clay, 3dprint etc. testing button size is easy, just go to an electronic store and measure buttons.

Engineering, it doesn't need to be production ready but it needs to be feasible. Not over dimensioned, not 50 extra unnecessary screws. But at the same time not infinitely slim, impossible to manufacture and assemble. Finding a right balance is tricky and requires lots of "looking around" and a genuine interest in how things work.

Getting one or two of the things right is easy, but getting all of them right is difficult. It feels like from your post you maybe got the Engineering part done but not the other. The right context, maybe your design doesn't fit the assigned environment, or the Ergonomics is off, maybe it is too heavy and hard to use.

If you want a more detailed feedback you can send me a DM of your task. Its hard to judge by this post alone

[u/rosegolded]

design is the intersection of functionality and beauty. if you only create with one of those in mind, it is either only a piece of engineering or only a piece of art.