We found a bit of time this weekend to catch up on the BBC's Genius of Design series, which is available on the iPlayer for just a few more days.
The first show took a look at the birth of the design industry at around the time of the industrial revolution, and we were particularly taken with the No.10 Double Bow Drummer Boy sheep shears, which they picked out as an exemplary piece of design.
The steel shears are made by Sheffield firm Burgon and Ball, and have been hand-made in more or less the same way since 1730. They're designed to be used single handed, so that the shearer's other hand can hang onto the sheep. As they point out in the show, they have been stripped back to their absolute essence - two single pieces of steel, shaped and sharpened, part rigid cutting blade, part flexible handle. A truly beautiful instance of form following function, fitting well with Dieter Rams' Ten Principles for Good Design (which feature earlier in the programme):
1. Good Design is innovative
2. Good Design makes a product useful
3. Good Design is aesthetic
4. Good Design helps a product be understood
5. Good Design is unobtrusive
6. Good Design is honest
7. Good Design is durable
8. Good Design is thorough to the last detail
9. Good Design is concerned with environment
10. Good Design is as little design as possible
We've been musing on the idea that products can evolve into a perfect form, much as an animal might, given a stable environment.
We'd love a shop that sold only those distilled, pure products; the ones that exemplified the form. Somewhere where you could get the most perfectly evolved mug, glass, watch, chair...
Lovely stuff.
