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Imagining what the client is imagining


Photography in the old days when film was still a medium involved “previsualization”. When looking from a design perspective, this is also a viable thing. Those working in design would often find themselves in a scenario where they attempt to extrapolate clients’ way of thinking. This further adds to the imagining threshold. In other words, designers must “picture what clients think”, meaning they must realize what their clients describe to them. A so-called description can be words, language or reference images. Regardless of which, they are all abstract combinations. However, a designer must succeed in turning the intangible into tangible results.


Though a designer is trained to integrate multiple resources, clients typically prefer everything addressed via a one stop solution. For example, when it’s a case commissioned by a plastics-related plant, they’d have the designer select a single material (plastic) and method (injection molding). The same with metal press factories as they prefer that designers go with metal pressing techniques. From here, we can infer the differences between designer and client in design ideas and implementation.


Design encompasses the conception, construction, and co-realization of dreams. But, in an environment where orders are taken followed by service, how should designers maintain their ideals and principles? Different personalities have different approaches. In ODIIST’s case, when it comes to project proposals, we would normally propose several ones. These include: 1. client’s ideal product, 2. designer’s ideal product and 3. ODIIST provides improvement suggestions according to client’s mindset. The aforementioned methods tend to draw decent reception. This would also prove simultaneously thought-provoking to the client. There are times when we would often hear clients announcing their decision to attempt more than one option.



Flexible persistence strengthens execution


Designers think more than just pure art. Art can be developed at will of the individual. However, design is a service industry that integrates information and involves multiple parties during development. Despite that most designers insist on benign intentions, if one is a hardliner of respective ideas, projects would barely progress and communication as well as linkage would deteriorate between design and industry. Ideas or directions cannot be sole criterion for product conception. Execution is the key to designers bringing products to life in addition to establishing their presence and influence.


Flexible persistence is superior to one perspective’s insistence. Thus, when it comes to designer persistence, it’s about being able to take aesthetics, functions, cost as well as other factors into account and achieve a balance between designer and client. To integrate both parties’ ideas involves acknowledging each other’s thoughts, multiple considerations and incorporating them into the final decision. It is by no means an easy task, but it is the important link to creating a win-win outcome for both parties.




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