Gary Hustwit Interview: Better Living Through Streamlined Design

Boing Boing Gadgets got together with Objectified director Gary Hustwit, and explored questions about his new industrial design movie, and about design in general. Hustwit shares some great insights on quality design, consumption and streamlining our lives.

He talks about the sped-up process of product evolution:

30 or 40 years ago consumers put more thought into every purchase, took better care of their manufactured objects, and repaired them when they were broken. Who repairs their DVD player now? Come to think of it, who even buys a new DVD player now? We’ve had a totally new technology like DVD go from introduction, to being in almost every home in the country, to being practically obsolete, in just ten years. And obviously the concept of owning media in the form of tangible objects (CDs, DVDs) has completely changed. But lately people are consuming less, whether for economic reasons or environmental ones. Personally, I just feel like I don’t really need so much stuff, and the objects that I do have should be really meaningful.

Boing Boing Gadgets: “Gary Hustwit, director of Objectified, talks design, baby strollers, and streamlining our lifestyles”

[via Core 77]