Point of View

I spent some time this weekend screwing the glove box back into my car.  Odd.  I know.  The story of how a perfectly good glove box came to be outside of the car is interesting and left me contemplating the general degree of isolation and detachment we often have from the people who influence myriad aspects of our modern life. Of course that’s not universally the case.  We can see the actors who star in our favorite movies.  We know the authors who write our favorite books and the athletes that compete for our favorite teams.  I guess with the advent of the Internet and a more seamless flow of information I can often figure out who wrote my latest iPhone App. 

But with a few notable exceptions, we generally have little or no personal connection to—or awareness of—the people responsible for the products that shape, interact and influence our daily lives.  I have absolutely no idea who designed the building I work in, the bicycle I ride, the computer I’m typing on.  I put my eyeglasses on every morning and suspect John Varvatos (I had to look him up. He’s a famous designer ironically from Detroit – see below … shows what I know) lent little more than his name.  Mostly I never give much thought to who designed my possessions and, heck, I’m in the profession.  I suspect many of you give it even less.  Our forefathers might find this strange—but they lived in a world where a larger portion of their lives was contained within the sphere of their daily influence.  Such is no longer the case where today our detachment is so profound we often don’t know the person who grew our food or cooked our meal.  So maybe it’s not so odd that we don’t have a clue who designed our products. 

I guess one reason for this is that product design is much more a team sport than say, for example … team sports.  Really.  By the time any reasonably complex product or service winds its way to market it’s actually sort of rare that any one individual or small group of individuals can legitimately claim singularly meaningful credit. Likewise, if product design is the ultimate team sport, then who exactly lays claim to being the quarterback?  Unless you’re remarkably self-centered or egotistical, this probably isn’t the right profession if you’re into adulation and fame.   

I look at the brilliant product designers who work here at Design Concepts, and although it’s really cool to see a product you worked on in a store, in general they know they’re toiling away in some degree of anonymity.  I know they realize they’re a small but important part of the complicated tapestry of sweat and effort it takes to move a product from the spark of an idea to a place in our lives and – if they’re really good – our hearts.   

So back to my glove box.  Some time ago I bought a new Cadillac CTS 6-speed manual.For me the car is an absolute joy – one of those rare evocative products that can connect with me at a visceral level.   I can take a client out to dinner in it, but it has everything the 17-year-old boy in me relishes.  It’s all black, aggressively styled, brutally quick and the stereo goes really, really loud.  What in the world could be better?

And unlike the vast majority of products I alluded to above, I actually have a personal connection to the car.  Before joining Design Concepts I worked for General Motors and a friend of mine – Lee Visci – a brilliant engineer and superb manger – went on to become the assistant chief engineer on the CTS.  That was sort of beside the point – I’ve actually always liked the CTS and when I went looking for a new car the CTS was a great match.  But since I knew she worked on it I always joked with Lee that someday I’d have her autograph it.  When I ended up traveling to Detroit a couple of weeks ago on business, I lamented the fact that I was going to have to fly until it occurred to me that I could bring the mountain to Mohammad, so to speak.  So I (carefully) tore a perfectly functional glove box out of my beloved car and carefully packed it into my suitcase where I was able to wrangle it past a somewhat bemused TSA agent at the airport.  In Detroit, I delivered it to a probably likewise bemused Lee who, out of the kindness of her heart, arranged to have a few of the people responsible for the CTS autograph the inside of the glove box door. So I’ve now got a one-of-a-kind autographed CTS.  How freakin’ cool is that????  

The signatures inside include Lee; Dave Leone, Cadillac Global Vehicle Chief Engineer; Liz Pilibosian, the CTS Chief Engineer; and Eric Clough, Director of Interior Design, and responsible for the awesome CTS Interior.  Rock stars, the lot of you! 

So to Lee, Dave, Liz, Eric and all the rest of you out there who worked on my CTS – here’s a shout out.  I’ve been thinking of you.  Thanks.  You didn’t toil in anonymity.  Great job and it’s appreciated.

Daniel Lee, senior mechanical engineer, project manager and DJ, brings us this cymatic study with cornstarch, water and a speaker. Sure there’s science behind this non-Newtonian fluid experiment. But at it’s heart, it’s dancing cornstarch.

Some of you might remember that a group of us are working to design and build a smalll vertical axis wind turbine.  One of the great things about working for a product design and innovation firm is the level of resoures at our disposal – both physical and intellectual.  Is there anything these folks can’t do? 

The ultimate objective would be to disconnect my office computer, lights, etc from the electrical grid and see if we can be a president who is… well… err… disconnected, I guess.  Hmmm. Maybe I should think about that a bit.

Anyway, we reached a milestone of sorts after the weekend when our prototype made electricity for the first time.  The turbine was designed and built entirely here at Design Concepts including CNC foam cutting of the blades which you can see here:   http://www.design-concepts.com/blog/hot-wire-foam-cutter-for-our-wind-turbine-project 

My sincere thanks to Design Concepts’ electrical engineer extraordinaire Chris Sherwin for his slick prototype charging circuit.  Chris has a passion for power supplies and charging circuits and whipped together a design which handles cut-in, voltage step-up and even has electric braking!  Not bad for a first generation.   

We have a way to go, but it’s been a fun diversion.

Today for the first time in my life I want to travel to Las Vegas. For today I took a peek to see what one of my favorite creative companies has been up to.

Digital Kitchen created a “digital experience” for The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas that looks like it may be worth the trip alone. But then I poked around the website of this new luxury resort on the strip and was sucked into the Mad Men image of me having a martini in the Chandelier bar.

This new resort seems to have put a lot of thought into what their clients want and the image they want to embody, I wish them all the luck Vegas will bring them.

Like many offices, the post-holiday period here is a weird ying/yang combination of New Year’s resolutions doing battle royal with an endless stream of holiday treats and brought-from-home baking offal.  However I feel we reached a new nadir with the appearance in our kitchen of a dozen bacon covered donuts. 

Oh my.  Had I not seen this with my own eyes I would not have believed such a thing could exist. 

I try to remain open to new things but seriously now.  Yuck.