Jason Solarek on his blog Tableware and Homegoods Marketing Strategy recently quoted an article in the New York times about  how fashion designers are using the web to design new collections. He wondered if the same could be said about tableware and home goods designers. As a tableware designer I find myself relying on the Internet more and more as a giant sourcebook for design ideas. I used to spend hours making my way through design magazines for trend predictions and creative inspiration but like everything these days, the practical side of technology has overtaken the need to buy as many magazines and books. Here are a few reasons why.

1. The cost. Websites are free and subscriptions to magazines can add up to quite a hefty bill if you look at it over time.
2. Convenience. Big bulky magazines and sourcebooks can be heavy to lug around especially if you do a lot of travelling or work in different locations. Anything that catches my eye these days on the web I right click on and save  in my ‘inspiration folder’.
3. Variety. To get a greater insight into different niche markets requires a lot of digging around and a lot of different books to get the information needed. An hour or so on Google is all you need to learn about the style of Rio De Janiero’s emerging street art or the decorative scrolls of the French Renaissance. Google images have been particularly helpful on one or two of the more vague commissions we’ve been asked to do.
4. Bias. Being the cynic that I am when you are reading a magazine you never know how or why exactly something is being featured. In the back of my mind I am always thinking that a big PR firm has paid lots of money to persuade me that so and so is the next greatest thing. Blogs, on the whole at least are written because a person is passionate about something. Rarely do they get paid and that leaves the writer with the freedom to write whatever they want. There numerous blogs for example la la lovely things , absolutely beautiful things and the always excellent especially if you’re a pattern junkie print pattern blogspot, that are just personal voyages into the whims and lusts of passionate creative people that have gone out and traveled far and wide and have taken the time to share all the wonderful things they have found along the way. You can’t get better inspiration than that.

One thing that the Internet cannot provide however is the simple joy that the latest copies of Vogue and Art Et Decoration, a large cup of tea and some post it notes can provide. This indulgent activity never felt like work and the blissful hours spent scrolling through the pages of www.etsy.com as wonderful as it is will never make me forget that.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 15th, 2008 at 12:41 pm and is filed under Inspiration, Trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.