Culture also has an effect on the products of design. There is no guarantee that the Shakers would have found the Eames’ chair desirable to make, even if they had the technology needed to produce it. The relationship of design and culture presents another two-way bridge where influence goes both ways: culture creates design’s target by defining what is desirable. Simultaneously, the best design recalibrates what we think and how we feel about what surrounds us. The two shine on one another: culture changes what it expects from design after design changes culture, meaning that when our work hits the target, that target moves out from underneath it.

The shifting bullseye suggests that we should reconsider our conception of design as a problem-solving endeavor. Hitting the bullseye is only ever a temporary state, and rather than seeing that as a problem, we should pull another arrow from our quiver and celebrate the moving target as the way we inch toward better circumstances. We should embrace the subjective nature of what we do and allow for the multiplicity of responses to thrive, because the mixed pool represents the diversity of human perspective. That diversity fortifies us, makes us strong. Most of all, we should build movement into our definition of the craft and its successful outcomes. The best design acts as a form of loosely composed, responsive movement, and seeks to have all the adjacent elements sway together.

This is a generous definition, much greater than just problem solving, because the best design has to offer much more than making problems go away. Design can also build up good, desirable artifacts, experiences, and situations that are additive forces in this world. It helps us live well by producing and elevating new kinds of value, such as engagement, participation, and happiness. These are design’s true outcomes, because the practice, at its root, is simply people making useful things for other people. It’s life-enhancement, and we can make it for one another, so long as we act responsively and keep our momentum moving forward.

Frank Chimero.