Remember when there were no cell phones? Remember when TVs were square and weighed 100 pounds?
Remember when you had to cut a piece of rubylith with an X-Acto knife to mask off areas of your design to prep it for print—or had to use a hot wax roller to paste down your text? Or when you had to go to the typesetter to even have text?
Maybe you don’t remember those days because you aren’t as old as, ahem, some of us, but you get the idea.
2020 seems like a long way away, but that’s only 5 years off. So, what will the future of design be then?
In an article in FastCoDesign (written by John Brownlee), the online magazine asked 5 elite design studios to give us their near-future predictions on what design will be in 2020.
Out of 25 ideas shaping the future of design (according to Fast Company) we’ve listed the first 5.
Here is what they said.
DESIGNERS WILL HAVE PERMISSION TO PLAY OUTSIDE THE SANDBOX
“Designers will officially be called on to move outside the traditional boundaries of what a design effort is, into the true definition of businesses, and be responsible for exposing and building new markets. This happens today—we do this [at Ammunition]—but what will be new is that we will have tacit permission to play.” — Robert Brunner, Founder, Ammunition Group
THE WALLS OF DESIGN WILL CRUMBLE
“As everything becomes a connected device over the next five years, you’ll see a crumbling of the wall between graphic designers, technologists, interfaces designers, and so on. To design the cross-platform experiences of the future, everyone’s brains will meld together.” — Mike Treff, Managing Partner, Product Design Group at Code and Theory
THE INTERNET OF THINGS WILL LEAD TO THE INTERNET OF SPACES
“There will also be vast ramifications for the way we design products and spaces. The converging requirements of aging baby boomers and technology-embracing millennials will lead designers to focus on where product design and architecture intersect and inform one another to create better outcomes.” — James R. Wisniewski, Senior Associate – Architecture, Michael Graves Architecture & Design
THE RISE OF THE SELF-EDUCATED DESIGNER
“Self-learning options for designers in tech will outpace offerings from universities and colleges. Because the knowledge required to design in the medium of technology continues to expand and evolve, real-time learning will be more important than what a college course can teach in a perfected, hermetically sealed form within the span of a semester or quarter. Options to keep with the pace of learning will expand through Starter League, Codecademy, and General Assembly.” — John Maeda, Design Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
HELLO, CEO
“More and more, individuals trained in design will hold leadership positions. But not all will be qualified. It will always take a broad understanding of a business and the vision and strength to take it somewhere. But strong business skills combined with design training and talent will become a potent combination. Not all will be successful, but a few will kick ass.” — Robert Brunner, Founder, Ammunition Group
What are your predictions for the future of design?
Read the full article to find out more: