デザインにおける美の重要性
This is Reinamoto's podcast, The Creative Mindset.
Hi everyone, welcome to The Creative Mindset, a podcast about what the future holds at the
intersection of creativity and technology. I'm Reinamoto, the founding partner of I&CO,
a global innovation firm based in New York and Tokyo. Today's guest, Stefan Sagmeister,
is a world-renowned graphic designer and is someone I've always looked up to since my early
20s when I moved to New York City. If you haven't listened to part one of my conversation with
Stefan, please have a listen. It's really worth it. In this episode, Stefan shares his lessons
and tips on maintaining his motivation as a designer and as a professional. Now at 60,
he's as excited about what he does as ever and is still a practicing designer and an artist
working in his studio every day in Manhattan. So, let's get started.
Is there a moment or a piece of work where you deliberately started to put quote-unquote
more beauty in your work? Where was the moment in your professional career where you feel like
you started to realize, you know what, I need to push more beauty into my work?
I think it started properly during when Jessica became partner.
Okay, Jessica Walsh.
Jessica Walsh, yeah. And Jessica had her own sort of aesthetic ideas, particularly
I think she brought much more color into the book. And I think there was a realization.
Interesting.
I'm not sure if it was a particular piece, but there was a realization when we got more feedback
of functionality, when we got more feedback, oh, this really worked well. And it always seemed to
be the pieces that were where I felt aesthetics were at the forefront.
Jessica Walsh is another leading designer of our times. And she works in New York. And
you partner, you used to be an independent designer. And in the past, you partnered with
Jessica Walsh to create San Marzano Walsh in the same studio for several years.
And now you're working separately and independently, I assume.
Right. So, what you're saying is that before you started to work with her,
your work was, I guess, less colorful. But then you started to work with her and her style,
she uses a lot of photography in her work and very heavily art-directed, conceptually
driven photography work in her work. And what you thought the work that was more aesthetically
pleasing, the clients were giving the feedback, oh, this worked better. Is that sort of the
realization that you had?
Yes.
Yeah. Interesting.
That's exactly true. Yes, absolutely. And I couldn't pinpoint if it was Jessica's influence.
My guess is that it was more where we were going together as a studio.
Oh, I see. Yeah.
You know, Jessica used to be an employee of the studio. And then because she was very good,
she became partner after, I think, three years of just working for us as a designer.
And it was around that time that we really started to talk about the importance of aesthetics,
which before, like in the beginning of the studio, like, you know, we had a sign in the very
beginning in 1990s, we did set style equals father. And I thought that, you know, stylistic
questions were really beside the point, they were just hot air and non-important. And I had to
Appleにおける美の重要性
completely 180 degree change my mind on it. That style, just as form, just as gestalt, and color,
and materiality, and composition were actually extremely important for the functionality of a
piece. And I find that to be true for graphic design. But I also find that to be unbelievably
true for design. I'm meaning, look at the unbelievable success of pieces that Apple
created. And probably Mr. Jobs was the only CEO ever who openly talked about the incredible
importance of beauty, who put that, who also, if you ever read the biography, who basically
the only real person in the Apple that he truly trusted was Jonathan Ives.
Right, right.
And when the question came down, even though of course, he knew marketing, he knew engineering,
and he knew design. But when the question came down, he was always opting for design.
And meaning, you know, look at the unbelievable success that made not only for Apple,
but look at the influence it had for other companies in that, but only in that segments
range. You know, like, basically, now, every single smartphone around the world is a copy
of the iPhone, because it was undeniable how superior it was over every other system.
Right.
But it's interesting that the incredible emphasis that Apple places on aesthetics,
not just on the iPhone design, but of course, on the interfaces and the
unbelievable trouble that they go through doing so.
Right.
You know, like the decisions that that are made, that strangely, still seem to be opaque
to many other companies. Meaning, I had a client who wanted to open stores. And he said, Oh,
he wants to do, he doesn't want to spend a lot of money on it. He wants to do something simple,
like the like the Apple Store. Completely, completely unaware that the Apple Store is
the most expensive.
Expensive. Right.
Most thought about most time consuming that that that no other store in the world
has been as well thought out and has put as much resources into as the Apple Store where,
you know, the cost of one of those wooden tables is astronomical.
Right, right.
Because it is so simple.
Yeah.
But strangely, many other clients are unaware of the fact that this comes at a cost of
unbelievable amounts of time, effort.
Right.
And ultimately money to create something like this. Like, you know, I had one time actually
had a chance to talk to Jonathan about some of the decisions that they made at Apple,
you know, where I remember he was at the time creating the stand for the iMac.
And the company that they were dealing with in China could only make it as two pieces,
which would have created a seam at the end, at one part of the stand, which you wouldn't
have seen from the front. You only would have seen it from the back.
The back, yeah.
And they went through the unbelievable task to find a new supplier who could make that stand
out of one piece because Jonathan didn't want to have the seam.
No other company in the world would be willing to change the manufacturing process.
Right.
All that means, you know, new problems, maybe a larger price, maybe delay in the product.
Right.
Just because the designer doesn't want the seam in the stand.
美と長期的な思考の重要性
Everybody else would say, you're out of your mind. We will have the seam shut up.
Right, right, right. The seam that nobody probably would pay attention to.
Yeah. But strangely, that ultimately, that sort of conviction, of course,
is very, very much part of the unbelievable reason that people buy an iMac and they don't buy
whatever, the computer that has the seam.
Right.
So ultimately, we do very, very much appreciate that sort of concentration on beauty and
aesthetics because the visual seam had zero functionality.
Right.
It had, or the non-seam, it was a pure aesthetic decision that they went
to unbelievable amounts of trouble to achieve.
Right. You explore these big topics such as beauty, happiness, long-term thinking,
the fact that society is, over time, getting better. What are you working on now?
I'm still working very, very much on the long-term thinking project.
I find the whole entire process, let's say the process of creating the paintings,
ultimately very enjoyable, simply because the final piece can be initiated by the form,
by the idea, by the data, by the original piece of historic art, by a color combination.
And it's different than working on our previous design projects.
This is much more, it's almost like composing a song.
The song can come also from a piece of lyric, it can come from a guitar riff or a rhythm.
Right.
You have these six or seven or eight strands, and you take one up and you basically beef it
with another, and it creates, it's a pleasant, like I love the process.
So I definitely want to create more.
But then also, let's say, if it's something else, if it's a mural, it allows me to concentrate on
that same overall direction, which already puts down a lot of limitation, which I like.
If I have to do, let's say, if a client comes and says, oh, we have this wall,
it's this and this size, do whatever, it's very difficult to work within that space,
do whatever.
So the now is better direction gives me more limitations.
Okay, it has to be about something.
It has to be about data.
It has to be about something that developed well.
Well, where is the moral?
Can we do something about something local that developed well?
What would be a subject that's interesting to the people that walk by that moral?
So it gives me some very good limitations on how to think about it.
It increases the chances that that moral is actually going to be interesting to the people
who walk by there.
And it still allows me to do all sorts of different techniques so that it's not boring
for myself.
So let's say we just did a mural that was made out of hundreds of thousands of little
stainless steel metal disks.
I had to completely explore that new material.
It was a new manufacturing method with new people.
We had to figure out how to put that stuff up on a wall that is permanent and is supposed
to stay fresh for many, many years.
It's not a temporal moral for a couple of months.
It's supposed to be up there for decades.
So researching that and figuring out and finding the proper collaborators who would know much
サバティカルの重要性
more about it than I do is an interesting process.
Right, right.
When I was 20, I wanted to do something brand new.
Now that I'm 60, you know, really not just scratching the surface by doing one thing
and then jumping to the next.
Directed into sticking this one thing for a longer time and going deeper in that subject.
I see, I see.
And I think that's sort of a natural development.
Now, I'm very happy that certain artists or designers stuck with the same thing all their
life.
I'm super happy that James Turrell is still working with light and in some ways is basically
improving the skyscape, the same exact idea.
He's been doing that for 40 years.
But it's slightly improved to the point where a new skyscape is just so much better than
an old skyscape.
And so I even now like Roy Richtenstein, who I couldn't stand when I was 20.
I thought, what a lame guy doing the same comic bullshit idea over and over and over
again.
Right.
And now I see that he really went deep with that one single aesthetic direction and could
explore all these different fine points.
And I really enjoy it.
I think my best, my by far most successful way to keep design for me as a calling rather
than just as a job were my sabbaticals.
For designers who've been working for some significant amount of time, I do believe
that that is a fantastic way to refresh, to rethink, to figure out what you really want
to do.
It's all of those things that I find very difficult to contemplate when things are super
busy and you're basically, you're occupied, your mind is occupied with hitting deadlines.
You know, I basically every seven years, I go for a year on sabbatical where I pursue
things that are different from the stuff that I'm pursuing professionally.
And that really was the main reason why I'm still so excited about design.
When was the last sabbatical that you took?
Was already six years ago and my next one is coming up next year.
Next year?
Absolutely.
Yes.
So in October next year, I'm going to go be, I'm going to go on sabbatical again, of
course.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Where, can we ask where you're going?
What your sabbatical plan might be?
Looking at different possibilities now, but Buenos Aires might be a good possibility.
Madrid might be one.
A place in Mexico might be one.
But in the last sabbatical, I did three different places.
So I did Tokyo, Mexico City, and a tiny little village in Austria in the Alps, in the mountains.
Oh, wow.
And that worked out well.
So probably do three places again.
Yeah.
And then will you continue to do your work or are you going to stop making things?
I will definitely explore things.
Right.
For me, the one rule for the sabbaticals is that it should be different from other sabbaticals.
I see.
So I don't really have an idea yet for the sabbatical coming up.
So it could even be that I continue working on the things that I'm working on because
I've never tried that in a different place.
I see.
So I'm not quite sure yet.
It's also different because in the last five years, I've basically not done any commercial
work.
Not basically.
I have not done any commercial work.
Yeah, yeah.
I've done 100% the things that I wanted to do.
So it's basically so this will be the first sabbatical that I'm taking while being on
sabbatical because I'm already doing whatever I want to do.
So it's a very it's new only by that already.
So it's a great position to be in because you've done these sabbaticals that you've
gotten to a point in your life that your work is working and taking a sabbatical almost
at the same time.
Yes, yeah.
So it's yeah, I would say it's a good problem to have.
Yes, it's an excellent problem to have.
Excellent.
デザイナーへのアドバイス
What advice would you give to a 25-year-old somebody who wants to be a designer or wants
to pursue a career in the vicinity of an industry?
What advice do you have today?
Yeah, I would say take form very seriously.
Like really train yourself to be able to make things that look better.
That's about as simple as I can express it.
And one way to train yourself is to copy.
Like I think copying is an underappreciated way of learning.
Of course, not to publish it, but to learn.
Like, you know, every band I've ever seen and met basically starts out by copying their
heroes.
You know, in my generation, that was you started playing Rolling Stones and Beatles songs.
And I'm sure now a band starts to play different songs, but you play, but you start playing
the songs of the bands of the people that you like.
And I think this is underappreciated in design because so many of design school faculty from
my generation, and they still believe that it's all about the idea and it's all about
concepts.
And there is not really an emphasis on form, on materiality, on gestalt, on color selection.
It's still sort of like about the ideas.
So if you, I don't know, let's say if you're a traditional graphic designer and you're
making websites and posters and Instagram posts, select a couple of pieces that you
think look really good and copy them.
And by copying them, see how they are constructed.
How are they composed?
How is that form really made?
What typefaces are used?
What kind of photography?
How is that achieved?
Like, you know, basically learn through copying.
I can 100% guarantee you that your work will work better for your audiences,
but also for you.
If your portfolio is good looking, you will be much more desirable.
Also, because there are so few designers out there who really know how to make good looking
work.
And I do find though in general, I do find that while there are many, many, many great
possibilities of posting your work online, because, you know, when I was in Tokyo, I
found a whole group of foreign designers who was working in Tokyo because they wanted to
live in Tokyo.
But all of their clients were really all around the world.
And the only way that they could possibly get those clients at such a young age was
because of Instagram.
Like, you know, let's say when I was getting out of art school, it would have been 100%
impossible for me to move to Tokyo and work for clients in the Middle East and in Austria
オンラインコミュニケーションの影響
and in South America, because there was no way that those clients could have possibly
ever gotten in contact with me or could have known about my book.
Right.
So there are these real advantages that are advantages.
And at the same time, it can be incredibly discouraging because our connection online
while there is a connection is so loose, that it encourages people to be incredibly mean,
which they wouldn't be in a person to person connection.
Right.
And I know this from my own experience, because sometimes I've met people who said mean things
about me online.
And when I talked to them in person, they were completely friendly.
They were a totally different personality than what I had suspected them to be online.
Because there is, I give you another example, like, I think that when you look at the people
who are engaging in road rage, you know, shouting at people, they wouldn't do this, that same
person wouldn't do this, if they wouldn't be protected by their car, shouting at another
car.
If they would be next to each other, let's say at a dinner, it wouldn't behave the same
way.
And of course, what we're doing online or what some of us are doing online is sort of
the extreme of road rage, because they tend, they are much more protected in their own
bubble, as being far away on their own computer in their own little dark room.
Right.
And they think that they can rage against other people, or leave terrible comments.
Because, well, that other person is far away, and they don't really have empathy for that
other person.
So it's a very peculiar way of communicating.
And there is a specifically for very young people and young designers, a big danger in
it.
I have an Instagram account where I talk about the young designers sent me their book and
I critique it.
And I try to be as helpful for the betterment to the book as I can.
So I try to be not cynical and not snarky.
And if a book is bad, I say so.
But I also try to give tips on how to start again.
And I feel because that's the overall tone of my account, the people who comment on the
book, and they always comment, tend to be with exceptions, but tend to be positive too.
I feel that it's very rare that somebody really dumps on something.
Right, right.
But I guess one way, you know, the way you're demonstrating is just the tone of your account,
as you said, because you're critiquing, but you're not criticizing in a harsh way.
You know, you have empathy towards this young designer's work.
I follow your account and I see your comments all the time.
And the people who make comments after you make the comment, I think take subtle cues
from the tone that you said.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah.
That's definitely, but I definitely found that to be happening.
Excellent.
That was part two of my conversation with Stefan Stagmeister, a world-renowned graphic
designer originally from Austria and based in New York City.
If you are in the field of graphic design, I'm sure you've heard of Stefan and you may
follow his Instagram account, which has over 500,000 followers.
In it, he provides feedback to the work sent in by his followers and he gives quick and
succinct feedback to each piece of the work that gets submitted.
Stefan Stagmeisterとの対話
Today's episode, it was a much, much deeper conversation with Stefan Stagmeister.
And I hope you took away much more than few and short comments that he makes on his Instagram
and hopefully that this episode and the previous episode can become a useful collection of
wisdom tips and lessons on not just work, but also on life.
So my three key takeaways from Stefan today are also tips on work and life.
Key takeaway number one, it's okay to change your mind.
Key takeaway number two, beauty matters.
Take form seriously.
And key takeaway number three, design your life with intent.
Key takeaway number one, it's okay to change your mind.
This was an unexpected point that Stefan made.
I remember when I was in my 20s and when I was looking at his work and what he did from
afar, he had a statement that he made in one of the interviews.
The statement was, style is fart.
I went to visit his studio several years later, and I noticed that there was a sign on the
wall, high up on the wall that said, style equals fart.
He says that when he was a younger designer and particularly his generation of designers
and creatives, they emphasize so much on the ideas and not so much on the beauty, the form,
the aesthetics.
He says now that was wrong.
And in the work that he does, he cares and pays much, much more attention to the form,
the beauty factor of the work that he does.
And it was surprising and refreshing to hear such an established and renowned individual
to admit that his stance in the past used to be wrong.
We don't hear that a lot from famous people.
And it was a good reminder for me personally that it's okay and it's natural for people
to evolve thinking.
And perhaps it's equally important to admit that your view in the past may have been wrong
or may have been different.
It's okay to evolve your thinking.
So key takeaway number one, it's okay to change your mind.
Now that leads into my second point, beauty matters, take form seriously.
When asked about what advice he might give to young designers today, he said with conviction,
take form seriously.
And again, if I had asked the same question to Stefan, say 20 years ago, he may not have
said the same statement.
Over time, through his 20s, 30s, 40s, and even 50s, his practice design as a profession,
the work that he did in the past, which is pure graphic design.
So things like posters, album covers, books, those types of graphic design pieces, the
ideas were there.
And I always felt that Stefan had a certain kind of aesthetics that were very unique and
that were different.
So when he said that he didn't care much about the aesthetics, the beauty, the form of the
work that he used to do, I was surprised, but it was an important reminder that I took
away from him that, you know what, what we as creative individuals, what we create should
have at least an element or at least a quality of beauty embedded into every aspect of it.
美の重要性
He didn't share this episode in my conversation, but I had read somewhere that many years ago,
he was somewhere in Germany giving a speech.
And during a break, he stepped out to smoke a cigarette and he noticed that surrounding
him was a very bare and boring scene surrounded by these buildings that were very utilitarian
and didn't have a lot of beauty in it.
And the reason why he noticed that was a week before that, he was in Lisbon, Portugal, and
similarly, he was taking a break and he was outside of the event, the conference, which
was happening in a medieval cathedral.
And he had noticed the tiny elements of design that were embedded and infused, even something
as little and something as simple as, say, a doorknob.
A doorknob on the door of this cathedral had engraves on it, and he noticed that beauty.
But a week later, when he was in Germany, in this modern utilitarian set of buildings,
that there was no attention paid to those details.
And that's when he realized that as humans, beauty is something that captures us emotionally.
And that beauty is something that can sustain over not just years, but decades and possibly
centuries.
サバティカルの周期
So take key takeaway number two, beauty matters, take form seriously.
That was a piece of advice that he gave to young designers in my conversation.
But in my 40s, I think that was a good reminder to receive.
And finally, key takeaway number three, design your life with intent.
Stefan is famous for taking a sabbatical, a year-long sabbatical every seven years.
It was a TED speech that he gave many years ago where he revealed that he started taking
this year-long sabbatical every few years.
I asked him when he started taking his sabbatical, and he said it was when he was 38.
His studio was doing great, and he had no shortage of clients.
So it was scary and risky at the same time to stop taking on clients, which means stop
taking on income.
But he had managed his life so that he didn't have to work for a year, and he deliberately
designed his career and his profession and his life around this seven-year cycle.
So ever since then, every seven years, he would decide to take a year off, not have
to take on client work and just pursue purely what he was interested in at the time.
That's how he started pursuing more artistic and less commercial work in his field of graphic
design.
It turns out that 2024 is when he's taking the next sabbatical.
And I asked him, well, so have you been taking on client work, to which he said that he
has been taking on client work, but for the past six years, he's been doing the kind of
work that he wants to do, and he's not having to take on client work just because he has
to.
So even though in the last six years, he has done commissioned work, it's the line between
what he has done as a designer and what he does as an artist today is completely blurred.
And yes, he sees himself as a designer, but the work that he does is more art than, say,
commercial design.
And for him, there's no difference between the two.
And he's reached that state of professional bliss.
意図的な人生設計
And that's because he started to think about his career and life in this seven-year increment,
and he designed his life with intent to be able to focus purely on what he's interested
in and what he wants to do.
And that was another reminder for me that, yes, I do think about my life with intent,
but I can be more deliberate about planning and designing, not just the next couple of
years, but potentially the next couple of decades.
And hopefully one day, I may reach the state of professional and creative bliss that Stefan
seems to have achieved.
My three key takeaways from my conversation with Stefan today were key takeaway number
one, it's okay to change your mind.
Number two, beauty matters.
Take form seriously.
And number three, design your life with intent.
リスナーとの交流
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I'm Reina Moto, and this is The Creative Mindset.
See you next time.