Dieter Rams and “as little design as possible”
PAPER X — DESIGN · QUESTION 13 OF 40
In plain terms: The free authorised statement of the principles, kept by the company Rams designed for — the primary source.
The question as set
Is good design as little design as possible? Decide whether Rams’s tenth principle is a principle or a taste, and say what evidence could tell the two apart.
The question in Paper X · Its section on the reference page
The question in context
This is question 13 of the 40 set in Paper X — Design of The Truly Hardest Exam in the World, the examination of The College of All Minds. In the College’s subject index it is filed under Aesthetics of the artefact and Design and its status. Like every question of the College, it carries three references of record, verified live at publication and described twice — technically, and in plain terms — so the ground can be judged before it is walked. The response required is an argument, not a survey, of at most three thousand words, as technical as the question demands and no more.
The references of record
The power of good design — Dieter Rams’s ten principles
The tenth principle in its official wording, with the nine that give it content — the text under examination.
In plain terms: The free authorised statement of the principles, kept by the company Rams designed for — the primary source.
The rival codification: ten laws attempting to make “less” operational — reduce, organise, and the rest.
In plain terms: The free companion site to the MIT book that tried to turn taste for simplicity into testable rules.
Simplicity is highly overrated
The evidence that could tell principle from taste: preferences for features, and complexity managed rather than removed.
In plain terms: The free contrarian essay reporting that people buy the machine with more buttons — the tenth principle put to the market.
Background: Dieter Rams