Many of us are working in design-related businesses. We find a great deal of satisfaction through being in contact with the creative process: inquiry, insight, innovation, and invention are wonderfully stimulating! We are surrounded by explorations and investigations. They deliver new perceptions and new experiences, and encourage us to reshape our personal interpretations of the world around us.

We are all, by nature, limited to an understanding of “what is” colored by our individual body of exposure. What is seen by one pair of eyes may be quite different from the impression garnered by another’s glimpse of the same scene or even a single object. The degree of objectivity depends completely on an unspoken agreement upon the assumptions brought to bear in the moment (which, after all, results in subjectivity!). Each individual act of interpretation delivers additional code to unscramble the next message; more answers are provided to further field questions of immediacy.

Breakthroughs may appear when new questions are asked, and suddenly, new answers become manifest. This might be the secret behind “great design”: there is an untried angle of investigation resulting (hopefully) in a fresh reduction of foundational reality. The process moves off in a different direction and a completely unforeseen solution appears. It all depends upon the questions asked: good design answers worthy questions. One might even notice that the question is implicit in the answer. Think of this when you look at the “latest design” that comes across your field of vision. Is this a question that has been asked before? Is it a question worth asking? Does it answer it better?