This very pictogram was in the family bathroom when I was a kid. It’s a nice composition. There’s a balance between the weight of the type and the weight of the icon. But I remember staring at it for a good amount of time trying to work out what was going on.

So what’s going on here, exactly? Without the “SHAVERS ONLY” text, I can only guess. Is the guy Frankenstein (looks like a scar)? Is the rectangle a bandage? Is that his chin, because it’s a weird shape. Does he have train tracks across his face, or do the parallel lines represent facial hair? If it’s facial hair, why does the line meet his eyebrow and his nose‽

Wait a second! It also looks like the shape of an electrical plug, or the shaver itself. Hmm.

If that’s not confusing enough, it also slightly resembles an abstract El Lissitzky or Suprematist composition.

Last week I attended a talk by Stephen Bayley at the London College of Communication, titled The State of Design Criticism Today. To put it bluntly – and mildly – the talk was dull. The promise in the title was not fulfilled. The question remained frustratingly unanswered. Just what is the state of design criticism today?

What exactly are the ways we can write about design? and why should we? and how should we?

What is design criticism supposed to provoke?

‘Critical writing about design’ is suddenly quite a hot topic, at least for universities. The London College of Communication is convening a new course in MA Design Writing Criticism for October 2008, and so is the School of Visual Arts in New York. I very much liked Joe Clark’s thoughts on the latter. It’s generally thought that the cream of (the current definition of) ‘design writing criticism’ is published in Eye (I also like Joe’s thoughts on this topic, as it’s extremely rare to hear Eye criticized).

The trouble is the very idea of “criticism”. It implies personal taste, which is fine for art criticism and literary criticism. The “arts” are full of ambiguity and subjectivity.

Design has something more objective about it: something well-designed is something that works. Unfortunately, writing critically about design is more complicated than this. It’s somewhere between something that works (science) and something that appeals to taste (art). Much of the “criticism” I’ve read about design seems to be more along the lines of historical documentation.

The talk at LCC confirmed my suspicion that, along with all of its other troubles, perhaps the main trouble with “design criticism” is that many of the writers are art historians, not technologists and designers.

And another interesting question is: how closely should design follow technology? Since graphic design – which deals with the organization of information – was born out of the industrial revolution, perhaps it’s quite important that it does follow technology. It is tied to information proliferation, and in 2008, it’s tied to the Web.

This leads me to feel that the history of the Graphic User Interface in software, pioneered in Xerox PARC in 1981, should have been included in my graphic design education along with the history of the printing press and metal type.

In conclusion: the trouble with design criticism is that it’s really confused about what it is. And I still don’t know.

To be honest, I’ve had my doubts about the value of a graphic design degree. But weighing the good with the bad, I’ve decided that going for a degree in graphic design is definitely worthwhile (if your heart is set on becoming a graphic designer). Here are some of the things I’ve felt were beneficial from having completed a three-year degree (B.A.) in graphic design:

1) Learning about stuff I just would never’ve learned about otherwise.

When else would I have learned about Italian handwriting and Venetian printers? The history of the book and the history of printing is fascinating, and really helpful to understand why the internet is so popular today. Even learning about papermaking machines was interesting (really!), especially when you tie it in with how difficult and expensive it actually was to produce books. We take accessibility to printed words for granted these days, and the internet is a real information machine. Information never used to be so easy to access, and the chance to know about my subject beyond the modern state of things really enhanced my appreciation of what I do, and also my appreciation of what I have. I love being able to access information so easily, and from so many different sources. It’s really fantastic!

Learning about the history of printing, and even theory of legibility, helped me to put graphic design in context and has given me unique skills. I gained far more as well; I learned about the industry of communication and business. In addition to this I gained research skills and had an opportunity to get involved with an AHRC research project in my final year, which not only gave me research skills, but I was paid for the work.

Writing a dissertation in my final year (12,000+ words on the history of the broadside ballad) was also a valuable experience, and I learned skills I would never otherwise learn. How to really concentrate, for one(!); and also how to skim stacks of books and make notes. Writing a long essay is far more challenging than a short piece of writing, as you are forced to learn how to fit and connect small ideas into the jigsaw puzzle of a large gestalt.

2) Meeting people of the same age who are facing the same challenges.

Most, if not all of my coursemates, have graphic design-related jobs now. It’s interesting to see their choices and learn from their experiences as well. Not only this, but I have a network of people to turn to in future.

Having a network of people I know, all with something in common, is really helpful to have. Some people abhor “networking” because it implies superficial interest in other people for selfish gain, but I think it depends entirely on how you look at it. Networking is something I’ve always done without thinking, before realising there’s a word for it: just by following up a genuine interest in other people and what they’re doing. (Being interested in people is a good career move!)

The industry of graphic design, as I’ve said before, is tied closely to business. I think it’s essential that graphic designers remember why their profession exists in the first place (it was born in its modern state, after all, during the industrial revolution). It’s necessary to keep on top of industry developments and trends, and also to meet other people working in the “industry”. The industry, a somewhat dehumanized word, actually means a vast international network of human beings.

3) Gaining knowledge about the industry (in the comfort of student-status).

Working with real human beings is always a difficult and delicate business, especially when they’re involved in critiquing your creative work. One client actually tried to design the work for me — and get my feedback on their work, true story! — when I failed to pull off their vision. Pulling off someone else’s vision is never easy to do, especially if they’re not clear what their vision actually is (and of course it’s no easier when they do have a specific vision).

In early 2007 I got to work on a “real-life” project as part of the course, along with coursemate Nathan Crawley. The design is here, and the live site, which I didn’t develop, is here. Working with a client on a project is a much more organic and iterative approach than frankly sterile studio projects.

Studio projects were helpful for one thing: the absence of client’s whims meant I could focus solely on designing. But the reality is that design exists in the area between the designer’s skills and the client’s desires, and the sensitive business of working with a client must slowly be mastered in the real world. This calls for empathy and great social skills.

5) Having a specialism.

Something to set you apart from the sea of other designers is always helpful. This depends where you study. I specialised in typography and information design. Since graduating, I decided to specialise even more, by working as a mobile designer. So: “typography” and “mobile” rather than a jack of all trades, and that suits me. It gives me an identity as a designer and an area I can really get to know well. I wanted to find a niche, which drew me to typography in the first place. Mobile is interesting for lots of reasons. The ironic thing is that mobile isn’t really specialised, as its possibilities are so vast.

That’s it. I could write a piece arguing why you shouldn’t do a graphic design degree, or the benefits of going straight into the working world. There are many, I’m sure. Having an income larger than a student loan is an obvious benefit, and having hands-on experience in a studio is really quite invaluable. But as I’ve argued, the benefit of focusing on design, rather than pleasing a client, is clear; and depending on your level of interest, the chance to learn about legibility theory (and even modernity and modernist literature of the fin-de-siècle) was enriching and enjoyable, and fed into everything else I was learning.

Design is at once personal and impersonal. Design is catalysed by, let’s face it, Bobby at Bobby’s car reselling business. Design works closely with business, and it’s not surprising that people like Nussbaum at BusinessWeek are excited about “design thinking”. At the same time, design is personal: driven by an intangible mix of the emotional and cerebral. No wonder there’s so much confusion on both business and design sides.

I’ve long respected Poynor as a writer and critic, and found his recent article (’Down with Innovation‘) in International Design Magazine troubling on one level, and on another, comforting. Comforting because he raises the value of what designers make. So why do I feel troubled? I’m not sure: perhaps because I feel he’s right, and perhaps because — in my gut — I feel threatened. I will never be able to completely separate myself from the thing he feels is making design, in a sense, impure. Poynor’s vision of a designer’s work is, after all, hard to live up to: “something brilliant and extraordinary that illuminates our perception of what human life can be”. Doesn’t that sound more like art?

Poynor’s views on design thinkers like Nussbaum are clear:

Poynor’s article has been described as cynical. My interpretation is that he is railing angrily against design that is degraded, stripped down, and tossed around as a funky new business toy. He’s railing against design that forgets both the original role of graphic designers and the “inherent intelligence” in the beauty of design. He simply doesn’t want to forget what design is (something tangible, an elegant book jacket design) with something airy, intangible, and transient (an elegant business strategy). So: “Give me something tangible, something brilliant and extraordinary that illuminates our perception of what human life can be. For that, we still need designers.”

“Making things look nice”, “stylizing”, “colouring in”. Design is often sneered at as trivial work. Apply whatever logical process to design you want. There is no framework or formula to arrive at a great design. I wouldn’t call it emotional and I wouldn’t call it cerebral — it’s a bit of both — and it’s definitely personal. The way I solve a design problem is totally different from the way another designer solves a problem. It is not easy work: I’m often tearing out my hair. In the end, I find myself in partial agreement with Poynor. Let’s not forget the aesthetic value of what we produce. Business moves on to the next goal; aesthetic value lasts. Who’s going to queue to see a business strategy in a museum in 2108, after all?

There’s more discussion about Poynor’s article at IxDA. Here it’s pointed out by a clever commentator that we shouldn’t confuse conscientious designers with those who believe “design is too important to be left to designers”.