The Secret of Apple Design

The Secret of Apple Design
The inside (sort of) story of why Apple's industrial-design machine has been so successful.
By Daniel Turner

Apple, Inc. has made an art of not talking about its products. Fans, journalists, and rumormongers who love it or love to hate it have long had to practice a sort of Kremlinology to gather the merest hints as to what is coming next out of Cupertino.
A case in point is this story, which was to be about the iPhone--about how an innovative and gorgeous piece of technology was conceived, designed, and produced by the vaunted industrial-design team at Apple. Along the way, it would address the larger question of how one company can so consistently excel at making products that become icons, win design awards, and inspire customers.

But the omerta that prevails at Apple proved too strong. Company representatives declined to speak with me, and sources only tangentially engaged with the industrial-design process said that they could not talk either. When I asked Paul Kunkel, author of the 1997 book AppleDesign, for tips on obtaining interviews, he laughed and said, "Go sit outside the design-group offices with a pizza." What follows is as clear a picture of the Apple design process as we could get.

Designers tend to speak about the "genetic code" of products and companies. Pontiacs and BMWs, for example, can be recognized but also distinguished from each other by their split grilles. In some products, such distinctive characteristics serve mainly to aid brand recognition. But in complex objects such as computers, they can also signal operational familiarity: a customer who knows how to use product A will be able to use product B.

To whatever degree Apple can be said to make products with a distinctive genetic code, they can also be said to have inherited most of their traits from a single parent: founder Steve Jobs. Jobs left the company in 1985 and didn't return until 1997. Nonetheless, according to many who have worked at Apple, sometimes in close proximity to Jobs, it was largely he who established the company's emphasis on industrial design. Indeed, some would say that he made design a higher priority than technology.

Mark Rolston bears the title of senior vice president of creative at Frog Design, a product-design and strategic-branding firm that worked closely with Apple from 1982 to 1988. (Rolston did not work directly on any projects with Apple.) The company's projects have ranged widely: retail display systems for Victoria's Secret; websites for Microsoft, Dell, and Yahoo; webcams for Logitech. In publicity pictures, Rolston sports a T-shirt and an indie-rock mop of shaggy blond hair that bespeak his years in Austin, TX.

Even in the early 1980s, Rolston says, "Jobs wanted to elevate Apple by using design." Jobs, he says, not only cared personally about design but saw that it could be a way to differentiate his company's products from the PCs of the day, which often looked little evolved from hobbyist boxes. Ken Campbell, a codesigner of the Apple Lisa, was quoted in Kunkel's AppleDesign as saying that Jobs wanted Apple to be what Olivetti was in the 1970s: "an undisputed leader in industrial design."
Through much of 1982 and into early 1983, Jobs searched for a sympathetic design partner; he finally found one in Hartmut Esslinger of Frog Design. Together, the two companies developed the "Snow White" design language that was meant to give Apple's products a coherent visual ­vocabulary, the appearance of being related.

That vocabulary featured, among other things, lines two millimeters wide and deep, spaced 10 millimeters apart, to suggest precision. (Some of the grooves were functional, acting as vents for airflow.) Case corners were rounded, but to differing degrees: if the curve at the back of a computer had a three-millimeter radius, the one at the front had a two-millimeter radius, reducing the machine's perceived size. In addition, the rounded corners and lines echoed distinctive features of the Mac user interface of the time: rounded screen corners and horizontal lines in the grab bars of windows.

Such precise design requirements simply couldn't be met by the manufacturing processes used to make most consumer objects--and certainly computers--at the time. Most manufacturers cheat when making plastic cases: they use molds with sloping sides called "drafts," which let parts pop out more easily and make for simpler, cheaper production.

Jobs and Frog Design wanted "zero-draft" molding, which yields perfectly perpendicular sides but costs more. No other computer manufacturer at the time was using zero-draft molding, which helped give Apple's products a distinctive look. Also, the more-precise manufacturing process meant that the cases of Apple computers could fit more tightly around the internal components, saving plastic, packaging material, and shipping costs.

Much of Frog Design's expertise at manipulating plastics came from its experience designing cases for home electronics, for clients such as Sony in Europe. "That was the first success with plastics in casing instead of wood," says Rolston, remembering the days when TVs were built into cabinets or encased in fake wood paneling. "That's what moved electronic products away from the role of furniture." And Apple's designs in the Apple II era of the late 1970s moved computers out of labs and basements and into dens, living rooms, and bedrooms: places where people form emotional attachments to the things around them.

The company still works closely with manufacturers, according to Rolston. "Apple takes an amazing interest in material selection and how things are manufactured," he says. "They continually ask what a manufacturer can do for them." Frog Design's experience with PC maker Packard Bell, he says, was much different, given the company's emphasis on economy: "We had to ask what the factory already did and how we could accommodate it. We found out that their case came together at the last moment, so we made that part of our design decision and focused on snap-on faceplates."

But Apple, Rolston says, "will change a whole factory's process." What's more, he adds, the company keeps its eyes open for new manufacturing possibilities, no matter how obscure. One example is the "double-shot" method of combining layers of different or different-colored materials. Apple "saw that a manufacturer had a special process for this on a small scale," Rolston says, and incorporated layered materials into its designs--for example, the clear plastic layered over colored materials in iPods and older iMacs. "[Apple] pushed them to do it on a much larger scale. Apple helped the manufacturers master the process and product."
Robert Brunner says his team pushed manufacturers in the same way during his tenure as Apple's director of industrial design from 1989 to early 1996 ("I just missed Steve Jobs's return," he says, but he notes that before he left, he hired ­Jonathan Ive, who has since become--next to Jobs--the person most identified with Apple's design primacy). "For example," he says, "if a power supply was too big for the form we wanted to use, we told a manufacturer, 'Let's figure out a way to use a new power supply.'"

Brunner, who will leave San Francisco design firm Pentagram this year to open a new design and marketing firm called Ammunition, is no design slouch himself. His work is included in the permanent collections of both MOMA and SFMOMA. In appearance, however, he is the antidesigner. "If Hollywood made a movie about Robert Brunner, the only man who could play him would be Steve McQueen," wrote Nate Voss, introducing a September 2006 episode of the popular Be a Design Group podcast. This is a man whose latest work is a grill that is expensive, beautiful, and carefully detailed--but still very much a device on which men cook meat.

Brunner estimates that today Apple spends 15 to 20 percent of its industrial-design time on concept--far more than most other computer companies--and the rest on implementation. He says that Apple rides herd on manufacturers, sending design-team members to factories for weeks at a time to see what can be done and to push manufacturers to find new solutions. If the designers see a true innovation, they can integrate it into their designs and check the quality of execution at the point of manufacture.

"That's why it's perfect," says Brunner, "and the reason this is getting done is because Steve Jobs is saying, 'Do it.'"
"Pushing companies to innovate is a virtuous circle," says Rolston.

Declaring the importance of industrial design may have at first been a purely emotional decision for Jobs, or he may have had some sense of design's subconscious importance to customers. Either way, those interviewed for this article say the emphasis on design was there at Apple's inception, and it was there because of Jobs.
That emphasis did persist in Jobs's absence. But the company's design process was different, explains Don Norman, who was vice president of advanced technology at Apple from 1993 to 1998. Norman, who now teaches product design at Northwestern University's Institute for Design Engineering and Applications and serves as a principal at the Nielsen Norman Group, a consultancy that focuses on "the human-centered product development process," led Apple teams that developed new technologies and helped develop the company's process for product design.
"There were three evaluations required at the inception of a product idea: a marketing requirement ­document, an engineering requirement document, and a user-­experience document," Norman recalls. Rolston elabo­rates: "Marketing is what people want; engineering is what we can do; user experience is 'Here's how people like to do things.'"

"These three [documents] would be reviewed by a committee of executives, and if approved, the design group would get a budget, and a team leader would be assigned," Norman says. At that point, he continues, "the team would work on expanding the three requirement documents, inserting plans on how they hoped to meet the marketing, engineering, and user-experience needs--figures for the release date, ad cycle, pricing details, and the like." And the team's progress would be continually reviewed as the project went forward.

It was a fairly typical process for the industry, says ­Brunner. "A division--portables, desktops, et cetera--would decide on a product they wanted to do and eventually engage the design group." Sometimes the design group would have early input on the product; but sometimes "we'd hear, 'You have two weeks,'" he says. "There was already a configuration set, and then it'd just be a styling task."
Norman describes Apple's design method back then as "a well-structured process" and says he is still proud of it. But he is quick to point out its shortcomings.

"It was a consultative process," he says; many different points of view and impressions were solicited. But "this can lead to a lack of cohesion in the product, when you find yourself asking another manager, 'What are you adding in?'" Rolston observes that within such a framework, "you'd get a cascade of people responsible for various factors injecting their concerns."

And, Norman adds, the consultative process could take a toll on the product line as a whole. Look, he says, at the 70-odd Performa models Apple churned out between 1992 and 1997--models that varied only in hard-drive size, in whether they had modems, or in whether they were sold directly or through a retailer.

"The businessman wants to create something for everyone, which leads to products that are middle of the road," says Brunner. "It becomes about consensus, and that's why you rarely see the spark of genius."

"Critical to Apple's success in design is the way Jobs brought focus and discipline to the product teams," ­Norman says. "[Jobs] had a single, cohesive image of the final product and would not allow any deviation, no matter how promising a new proposed feature appeared to be, no matter how much the team complained. Other companies are more democratic, listening to everyone's opinions, and the result is bloat and a lack of cohesion.

"The difference between BJ and AJ, Before and After Jobs, is not the process," he continues. "It is the person. Never before did Apple have such focus and dedication. Apple used to wobble, moving this way and that. No more."

One direct result of that sharpened focus is Apple's unique ability to create simple products. Though the idea of a simple high-tech device seems counterintuitive (why not offer more functionality if you can?), it's worked for Apple.

"The hardest part of design, especially consumer electronics," says Norman, "is keeping features out." Simplicity, he says, is in itself a product differentiator, and pursuing it can lead to innovation.

Rolston agrees. "The most fundamental thing about Apple that's interesting to me," he says, "is that they're just as smart about what they don't do. Great products can be made more beautiful by omitting things."

Brunner says that part of what makes minimalist design possible at Apple is the way Jobs structured the design group--and the way he privileged it. "The design leader has to walk a fine line," he says. "He has to be integrated with the company but keep his team members protected from being lobbied by marketing, engineers, manufacturers. They all have viewpoints on design." In recognition of these pressures, Apple has always kept its design team small--somewhere between 12 and 20 people, Brunner estimates.

"They're a small team that takes a very, very hands-on approach," adds Rolston. "We do a lot of similar products for other companies--say, Sony. But the process of approval, and collaboration generally--for everything from shape to engineering--involves tons of people, taking up to 50 percent of the time, watering it down." What makes Apple Apple and not Sony, says Rolston, is clarity of voice and vision.
And the secret to that clarity may be, like Edgar Allen Poe's purloined letter, hidden in plain sight. Sources will say, off the record, that Apple's design mavens shun interviews in order to sustain the idea that their success is the result of having a great team in place. But it may ultimately boil down to who hired and gave power to that team--Steve Jobs as not just an enabler but an active participant.
"Jobs is a dictator, but with good taste," says Norman. "He is good and driven to the perfect experience. He doesn't want good design; he wants great design." Brunner similarly lauds Jobs's "driven, singular focus." And Rolston says, in what is perhaps the best explanation of Apple's design ascendancy, "It's a happy coincidence at Apple that the designer in chief is the CEO. He has a fantastic sense of what people want. And after all, that is design."



Why Design?

Apple's designs are now the stuff of legend--and the object of fascination and envy. But is the focus on design worth it? Why spend time and money making a computer look good? Why do we care what it looks like?

"Attractive things work better," says Don Norman, who was vice president of advanced technology at Apple from 1993 to 1998. "When you wash and wax a car, it drives better, doesn't it? Or at least feels like it does."

Norman cites research in cognitive science suggesting that people's emotions affect the way their minds process information. In his 2004 book Emotional Design, he writes, "Positive emotions are critical to learning, curiosity, and creative thought. ... The psychologist Alice Isen and her colleagues have shown that being happy broadens the thought processes and facilitates creative thinking."

In multiple studies, Isen, a professor of psychology and S. C. Johnson Professor of Marketing at Cornell University, made subjects feel happy through a number of means, including gifts of candy and words or pictures with pleasant associations. The subjects were then asked to perform tasks that measure creativity; over the course of 20 years, Isen and her colleagues regularly found that subjects exhibited much more creativity when they were in a good mood.

And conversely, Norman says, when you're in a bad mood, when you're tense, you tend to be less creative--and less patient with the tools you're using. "Someone in a positive mood," Norman says, "faced with something that doesn't work, might say, 'Oh, I'll get around it.' But someone in a negative mood will get frustrated and have a 'Damn it' moment." That's where design comes in. "Studies tie attractive design to positive attitude," he says.

Dan Turner is a freelance writer based in San Francisco. His work has appeared in I.D., Salon, the New York Times, and elsewhere.

More design articles: Take an inside look at the making of the Ocean, a new phone from a company called Helio (see "Soul of a New Machine"). Read a review of how Apple remains deeply committed to being a computer company (see "The 'New' Apple"). Get insights on the state of Web design from print-design legend Roger Black (see "Help Me Redesign the Web"), and find out what Bill Moggridge, a cofounder of Ideo and designer of the GRiD Compass, thinks makes good design (see Q&A). Take a glimpse at the pieces of technology that the prominent industrial designers featured in these articles say have influenced the way they think about their work (see "Objects of Desire"). Finally, hear from Technology Review's Editor in Chief, Jason Pontin, on the well-designed technologies that are "beautiful machines" in this video.

Copyright Technology Review 2007.

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设计团队的设计策略---IDEO公司创始人访谈

设计师：David M. Kelley
IDEO公司创始人，执行副总。

David Kelley先生是工业设计领域的一个传奇人物。这位斯坦福大学的教授是因为20年前他在Palo Alto创办的IDEO设计创新公司而成名的。IDEO公司曾经为Palm V，翻斤斗用的脸盔，Oral-B的Squish Grip牌儿童牙刷等产品。

IDEO产品开发公司是世界最著名的设计公司。它最大的创造在于创造了创造的过程。对于IDEO创始人David Kelley和他的同事而言，工作就是娱乐，集体讨论就是科学，而最重要的规则就是打破规则。

步入IDEO产品开发公司的办公室，首先映入眼帘的是琳琅满目的新产品设计图。电脑屏幕上细致入微的设计图；会议桌上大图纸上鬼斧神工般的底稿、构思……事实上，在每一种介质中：厚纸板、泡沫、木块和塑料中，设计原型历历在目。
　　
David M. Kelley，IDEO公司45岁的创始人若有所思地欣赏着这一切，这混乱不堪又处处闪现着创造性的一切。Kelley把IDEO比作是“活生生的工作场所实验室”。他说：“IDEO永远都处于‘实验状态’。无论是在我们的项目中、我们的工作空间中、甚至在我们的企业文化中，我们无时不刻都在尝试新思想。”
　　
据说，IDEO是世界最有影响的设计公司。公司办事处分布于旧金山、伦敦、东京，而工作人员只有250名。他们平均每年要开发90种新产品，其中一些产品已经成为我们生活中不可或缺的一个部分：如Levolor百叶窗，佳洁士保洁牙肓，AT&T公司的电话等。另一些产品则堪称数字化时代的象征：先进的膝上型电脑，虚拟头饰，自动柜员机。但是，该公司认为创造就是创造的过程本身。要理解IDEO的是如何运作的，首先我们必须了解IDEO的真面目。
　　
公司总部位于硅谷心脏地带Palo Alto，共有七座低层楼房。员工（共40人）工作压力大，时间紧。但是，作为局外人，你很难体会出这种感觉。Kelley认为，没有一定的自由和乐趣，员工是不可能有创造性的。在IDEO，即没有“老板”，也没有“头衔”。所有的工作都是由临时的项目小组（从几周到几个月不等）完成的。在这里，没有永久性的工作；设计师们只要能在当地找到一位愿意和他们对调的同事，就可以自由前往芝加哥或东京。
　　
“大公司给我的最大教训是：循规蹈矩只能扼杀创造性。”Kelley说。
　　
在IDEO的办公室里，这种精神随处可见。该公司极其微小又极富智慧的小发明小创造无不流露出这种精神。就拿自行车来说吧。IDEO几乎人人都骑自行车上班，所以，停放自行车就成了老大难问题。如何解决这个问题呢？现在，IDEO布满了各式各样的挂钩和滑轮，员工可以将自行车推进办公室，挂在天花板上，需要时随时可以放下来。这纯粹就是空中车架！
　　
还有噪音问题。该公司有20多位音乐迷，他们喜欢边工作边欣赏音乐，而其他设计师根本就受不了这种“噪音”。所以，IDEO为年轻人提供了一个专门的空间。这一专门空间外形宛如一个航天器，机翼横在中间，将一个大办公室分割成了两个小房间。
　　
当然，所有这些乐趣和自由都是为某种有形的东西而提供的：制造新产品所需的激进的新思维。Kelley说，IDEO主要的“创新引擎”是它那种独一无二的集体讨论方式——该公司惟一受严格纪律约束的东西。
　　
集体讨论在集体讨论室进行。在Palo Alto有三间这样的会议室，其外形大致相同。与会者可以在任何地方书写，如挂着写字板的墙上，铺着稿纸的会议桌上……多媒体工具——电视、录像机、电脑投影机——为深入探讨或感性认识提供了方便。为了保持IDEO固有的精神，IDEO集体讨论的五大原则就悬挂在墙上：1、切中主题；2、鼓励奇思异想；3、不妄下结论；4、取长补短；5、每次一个议题。
　　
项目经理在新项目尹始或遇到困难时便召集集体讨论会。通常，与会者为8名，他们分别来自不同的部门：工业设计部、工程部、人力资源分析部。公司通过电子邮件发出邀请，参加与否纯属自愿。但是，每一个人都十分重视集体讨论。
　　
“在你遇到麻烦时，你总希望公司会全力支持你”。Kelley说。“作为集体讨论会的成员，人们感到了前所未有的压力。他们在发出电子邮件时，总希望最优秀的人能够参加。”
　　
这些会议促成了一系列卓有成效的行动。事实上，与会者的积极性营造一种竞争意识：如何才能将所有的点子记录下来？每间集体讨论室都装有一个尖端设备（一种集照相机与复印机之长的混合物），它可以将墙上的每一种图形、一笔一划都如实地记录下来。项目小组斟选出最佳点子后，迅速采取行动，将它们付诸实践。
　　
速度是关键。 Kelly鼓励设计师们在尽可能短的时间内将自己的点子制作成模型（可以用泡沫或纸板这样简单的材料）。如果点子确实相当出色，就设计师便可以在机械加工车间制造模型。电脑控制的机床可以用塑料或金属等材料在几小时之内制作出模型。Kelley认为，创造贵在动手尝试，从尝试中吸取经验教训，而不在于精心筹划。
　　
在IDEO有一条广为人知的口号，那就是“失败能引导我们更快地走向成功。”难怪该公司的设计师们总是把设计图表、模型固定在装有轮子的金属条上。新项目开始时，设计师们就会用特大号塑料袋将他们的东西包起来，推着这些金属条，走过大厅，穿过大街，或追赶他们的同事。
　　
这种创造模式在其它地方是否也行之有效呢？一些世界级大公司认为肯定行得通。在一座高度机密的Palo Alto的独立大厦中，IDEO和三星电脑公司合办了一个实验室。在这里，两家公司的开发者联手开发新产品。1月份，Steelcase 公司（办公用品巨头）投资IDEO，并任命Kelley为执行副总，主管技术开发与创新。
　　
Kelley说：“有些公司找上门来，对我们说，‘我们怎样才能具备创造性呢？’他们希望我们改变他们的企业文化，使他们的企业和我们的企业一样能够不断创新。”

问：设计师在当今社会中扮演了一个什么样的角色？
Kelly：设计师的工作就是为将要投放市场的产品设计一个形象。设计师们会说：“这就是下一种轿车的样式，你认为呢？”

问：设计的价值体现在何处？
Kelly：在商界，设计被看作是能使产品更加有吸引力、更加诱人的一种秘密武器。

问：为什么很多公司会在设计方面进行投资？
Kelly：如今，企业都会试图采取某种方法例行公事般地对产品进行更新。他们不能在很长的一段时间内依*一种思维模式维持下去，而需要不断地创造出新的想法。

问：“苹果”是不是因为设计才取得了很大的成功？
Kelly：很多人都认为美学理论是“苹果”成功的动力。其实，美学只是一部分，产品的成功更多的是*创新。“苹果”不只是包含美学概念，产品的原料和电路方面都有创新的部分。我们力求在产品的每一方面都做到尽善尽美。

问：您能否列举一个IDEO公司的成功的设计案例？
Kelly：例如PALM V,它比其它更廉价的PALMS要好卖得多，原因在于设计，包括它的外观、功能、及袖珍的特点。人们总是希望得到其他人也有的东西，为了追求自我形象并满足渴望，很多人都会购买Palm V。这样看来，产品的外观确实是人们体验产品的一个方面。

问：能否给我们列举一些其它成功的设计？
Kelly：我们利用人造偏光板的技术设计了新一代的I-Zone照相机。用I-Zone照相机照出来的小相片的背后都有粘合剂，孩子可以将相片贴在图书或相册里。第二个例子是现在普遍使用的一次性照相机。第三个例子是Kinko's所提供的服务。经过重新设计后，人们不再把Kinko's简单地看作是复印室，设计师将它设计成可供那些愿意在家中办公的人享用的办公室。客户可以在Kinko's做很多事情，包括发传真、发送电子邮件等。Kinko's是一个能让人们产生共鸣的地方。实际上，也是设计成功的一个很好的案例。

问：产品设计遇到过哪些很大的挫折？
Kelly: 例如Edsel. Edsel的设计不合乎时尚。如果Edsel的外观能博得消费者的喜欢，销量肯定会非常不错。所以，在设计方面进行巨额投资之前，一定在消费者中进行调查。雷诺汽车的新产品Twingo样子很滑稽，但消费者很满意。 再有大众公司的 Beetle款轿车，我不知道他们是否想激起人们对Beetle的回忆，总之，这种概念的轿车很受消费者青睐。如果在Edsel推出市场前人们也做了充分的市场调查，他们就会发现消费者并不喜欢他们的设计，这样他们就会节约很多成本。

问：一个公司聘请很多设计师好还是只聘请几个设计师好？
Kelly:这要根据具体情况来定。如果我要设计一架航空飞机，我需要不止三个或四个设计师跟我合作。如果设计一种饮料纸杯，那一个设计师足矣。最重要的是设计团队是否具有创造性。如果在你的设计团队中有一个才能类似于达芬奇或爱迪生的人物，那这个团队就很具备实力了。否则，设计团队就必须有能产生创新思维的一套方法。问题的关键不在于人的数量，在于人的想法是否总是重复的。在学校里，我向孩子教授视觉思维，锻炼孩子思维的流畅性和灵活性。流畅性的意思是脑海中浮现出很多种想法；灵活性是指每一种想法都是不同的。

问：好的设计作品的基本特点是什么？
Kelly: 就像我刚才所说的，好的产品设计一定要迎合人们的心理。包括IDEO在内的很多公司所聘用的社会科学家比其它人才的数量要多。这些社会科学家可以观察消费者的行为，听取消费者的意见，了解他们的想法和感受。如果能找到一个迎合消费者的想法，公司就能维持比较长的时间。在设计领域有各种各样的谚语，例如low-mass design, getting a lot from a little. 如果你想给每一件事物镀金，使用最先进的微处理器，并使用很多原料和能量，那就更容易的做出人们想要的东西，因为这样已经给了他们所有的东西。困难的是如何用少的原料或材料,例如飞盘，人们会因为一块价值不到1美元的塑料板而玩耍整个小时，这真是不可思议。它并不含什么东西啊?

问：您又没有任何私人朋友为您设计？
Kelly: 我将毕生的精力都放在了设计领域，我不会聘用任何人为我设计一个电话或一把椅子。但是我聘请了一位83岁高龄的设计师花了好几年的时间为我设计一套住房。他能仔细地为我量出适合窗户的比例，相对于房间宽度的天花板的高度。我总是聘请世界上最优秀的设计师，例如意大利设计师Ettore Sottsass.他是我的心目中的英雄。他既是一个人道主义者，也是以消费者为中心的设计师。他在设计房间时总是会考虑到房子主人的生活方式和建议，这样设计出来的房子的外观自然会令人满意。

问：哪一些地方可被看作是产品设计的热点地区？
Kelly: 美国式的设计风格很受青睐，因为总的来说我们是在追求最有趣的素材。因为我们是产品设计师，产品设计的优势就在于信息工具和技术。但是，在世界其它地方也有产品设计的热潮，例如英国的伦敦拥有世界上最好的设计学校。在我看来，英国皇家艺术学院在世界上处于领先地位。德国的慕尼黑也是设计的热点地区。与欧洲的设计风格相比，我们的缺点在于不如他们更注重美学。欧洲人从小学时就已开始学习绘画，而在美国成为一个设计师就像成为一个医生或律师，起步比较晚。

问：您希望从这次讨论会得到一些什么？
Kelly: 我正在寻找不同学科之间的共同之处。我所希望做的是召集一些百搭和不同学科的人士，并找出结合点。我对宽度比对长度感兴趣。在办公室开完会总是碰到同样的事情，真正重要的讨论往往是在讨论会的会议室门外展开的。所以，这次有创造性的讨论会属于所有那些小型对话的一部分。