Continuing from last weeks musings regarding my chosen assignment topic, I have decided upon my exact assignment title and focus:
'Is good design only available for those who can afford to pay for it?'
The saying ‘buy cheap, buy twice’ is often used, but people living on the breadline often don’t have a spare £100 lying around to buy a new pair of shoes when theirs suddenly break, effectively forcing them to buy a lower cost alternative, and buy another pair in 6 months’ time when this new, cheaper pair inevitably fails. Why is it that many designs that are considered the best in their respective fields usually have a high price point attached? Are those that don’t have that kind of money solely restricted to shoddy products with a planned obsolescence? And why are designers obsessed with making ineffective products that seemingly serve a social mission but only serve to objectify those living in poverty? My assignment will seek to answer these questions and underline the inherent problem of classism in design.
This is a topic which I am very passionate about in all aspects of life, but I believe it to be especially prominent in the field of design, which is predominately made up of white people from middle-class backgrounds (with a skew towards male). Good design can not be achieved by designing for one type of person, and my assignment will discuss this further.
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