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The
Language of Things: Understanding the World of Desirable
Objects by Deyan Sudjic
W.W. Norton, 2009
Paperback, 208 pages
Man of many hats in the realms of
architecture, design and urbanism (museum director, critic,
magazine founder, editor, educator and author can all rightly
be used at some point in his prolific career), Deyan Sudjic's
writings are marked by a clarity, accessibility and a diversity
of subject matter, all centered on the role of design in
shaping everything from tea kettles and buildings to cities.
His latest book, coming after the popular Edifice
Complex, targets the "world of desirable objects."
Yes, architecture is found in these pages, but the focus
is on more inexpensive, mass-produced fare, what could best
be described as industrial design. As the cover indicates,
this includes lamps, cars, phones, chairs, typewriters and
those objects that have displaced other objects. One needs
only think of the irrelevance of the last in the age of
word processing to start to understand the complex relationship
between us and the objects we own and/or use. Sudjic's book
illuminates these relationships while making us question
our insatiable desire for more and more stuff.
In five chapters the reader is taken
on a voyage through the world of design, looking at how
objects are designed but also the mechanisms that make design
an integral part of how objects are sold to people. Would
the tea kettles of Michael Graves sell so well if his name
was not associated with them? Can IKEA's success be divorced
from its means of packaging its cheap furniture? Can boutiques
the likes of Prada and other fashion designers take a chance
by not showing their wares in high-design venues,
without a name architect associated with them? The answers
to these questions is a resounding NO. Design permeates
the objects we acquire and use, from their functionality
and packaging to their marketing and context.
Architecture in Sudjic's book is
viewed in the context of fashion. The co-option of architecture
by fashion houses has spawned some well-designed spaces
by Tadao Ando, Rem Koolhaas and others, but fashion's planned
obsolescence can be seen as architecture's arch-enemy. But
instead of bemoaning how architecture serves a more shallow
force, Sudjic makes the reader realize that fashion is a
strong cultural force that must be contended with...somehow.
This makes his book read as an abbreviated history of industrial
design and a snapshot of its current state, with critique
bubbling under the surface, popping up from time to time.
One such instance focuses on MoMA's treatment of design
as art, instead of as functional objects; his disagreement
with this point of view is clear. Not surprisingly, a critique
of the Design
Museum in London, Sudjic's current home, is nowhere
to be found.
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