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How a designer influenced a writer. How that writer became a brand strategist. And why the 10 Principles eat away at him.

There’s too much noise in the world. Too many people saying too many things. It’s getting hard to tell what’s true, what’s good and - to be honest - what we can just ignore. Noise, noise, noise. 

There’s too much waste in the world. Too many people making too much stuff that we don’t need. Waste, waste, waste. 

We’re in the 1970s and Dieter Rams is worried. 

He sees the world around him as “an impenetrable confusion of forms, colours and noises”. 

As a famous designer, designing popular things, he knows he’s “a significant contributor to that world”*.

To calm his conscience and make sure his contribution is positive, he sets out his Ten Principles for Good Design. So he can answer the question, “is my design good design?”

Flash forward to the 2000s. A nosy busybody of a copywriter starts getting pretensions of becoming a brand consultant. Those pretensions lead to several career moves that end up in him *actually becoming* a brand consultant. He even sets up a business with some talented partners, a big bit of which helps build brands big and small, all around the world, through strategy, naming, brand architecture, verbal identity and brand narratives. 

But he’s worried. There’s too much noise in the world. Too much waste. 

He worries in case the brands he’s helping to build might be contributing to it all. 

He needs reassurance. So he turns to his hero**, Dieter Rams. 

He finds 10 Principles that, frankly, aren’t just guidance for good design, but for everything in life - especially brand building. 

All underpinned by a BIG IDEA that he gets obsessed by: “Less, but better”. 

This BIG IDEA becomes the mantra for the business he co-founded and all the brand work he does. 

I am the “he”. Still worried and plagued by concerns about the world. Still asking, “are my brands good brands?” “Are any of us leaving the world better than we found it?”

I set up this Substack to unpack and obsess over those worries and concerns - and use Dieter Rams’ principles and ideas to navigate those worries. And, hopefully, in the process start a conversation where we share simple but useful ideas to help us all build better brands for a better world. 

Anybody with me…?

*In years to come, a British designer called Jony Ive will design many electronic rectangles for a company called Apple, based almost entirely on Dieter Rams’ aesthetic and principles. So, yes, “significant contributor” seems fair. 

**Yes, really. Nerd klaxon!