No Comments Written by Robert on May 21, 2008 – 10:09 pm

There is an interesting history behind the design and architecture that is predominately related to the design of interiors, lighting, and housewares.

Given that architecture has been historically understood as a closely associated but distinct practice to design, this entry deals with architects working in design and not the field of architecture itself.

The reason for architects’ interests in design is clear.

They usually tried to design more than the enclosed space and be responsible for at least a part of the interior as well and so extended their practice to design furnishings and to commission tradesmen to realize these ambitions. As architecture had existed long before the other design fields, craftwork and trade skills had for a long period been architecture’s only true competitors.

This fact in turn established a tradition and influenced the beginnings of the development of design. It also inspired or seduced architects to dabble in design. Mies van der Rohe and Frank Lloyd Wright experimented with design, as well as Walter Gropius (who even designed a car), and later Robert Venturi and Michael Graves, Peter Eisenman, Zaha Hadid, and Norman Foster.

Yet in Italy, a special situation characterized the relationship between design and architecture up until the end of the 1980s. It was almost impossible in Italy to study design as a separate discipline; moreover, all Italian designers were obliged to study architecture. Which is why it is still very normal in Italy that those who became famous in the design context, such as Sottsass, Mendini, Marco Piva and Branzi, all developed architecture practices alongside large-scale product design. Several questions arise from the historical and empirical connections between design and architecture.

First, can design competence be found in architecture at all? Does an inherent relationship between architecture and design truly exist? And even: if an architect had been dabbling in design, is this immediately recognizable?

This has led to discussions about scale, and questions about whether objects are not really in effect miniature examples of architecture and whether buildings, in their turn, are enlarged objects which would in fact point to an inherent connection between the two. This has been debated in many publications, including Alessandro Mendini’s “Alessi,” which for example has initiated projects in which architects were invited to design coffee sets and these designs clearly betray an architectural influence. The question became even more interesting when prominent designers (such as those mentioned above as well as Philippe Starck, among others) began designing large buildings.

Yet all of these discussions about architectural design quickly become redundant when contemplating design’s true complexity (with components like service, communication, corporate, engineering, or interface design, as well as design research). It still remains an issue because the borders between the two disciplines do occasionally blur, or practitioners of one stray into the other’s territory, and the outlook from that standpoint often presumes affinity. In this respect, an end to the discussion is not yet in sight.