Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things by Donald A. NormanMy rating: 2 of 5 stars
Hooter: Good design makes us feel first.
I picked up Emotional Design because the idea sounded fascinating. Norman looks at why we like certain objects even when they aren't necessarily the most practical ones. The example that stayed with me was the Juicy Salif lemon squeezer by Philippe Starck. It looks fantastic, almost like a piece of sculpture, but apparently isn't particularly good at actually squeezing lemons. And that's exactly Norman's point. We don't judge things only by whether they work. We also react to how they look and how they make us feel. His breakdown of design into visceral, behavioural and reflective levels was probably the most useful part of the book. You can see it everywhere once you start thinking about it. A beautifully designed car, an old watch you are emotionally attached to, even the packaging of something you buy. There is always more going on than just function.
Having said that, I found the book pretty average. There are some genuinely good ideas here, but Norman takes a while to get through them and I felt he was making the same point in slightly different ways. I also expected the book to leave me thinking much more deeply about design than it actually did. Instead, I came away with a fairly simple takeaway: good design isn't just about making something work, it is about making people want to use it and feel something about it. Worth reading if you're interested in design or products, but I wouldn't call it a must read.
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