Re: Custom Products

Layla, I get where your rant comes from. I think it is a real gripe a lot of designers have and I know I have been there too. While I was google-hunting for interesting things to add to this conversation, I came across this article/video (posted below) talking about the mass customization of apparel that this company, Knyttan (a  fashion start-up based in London), offers. Essentially, you can manipulate clothing design online, order it, and a 3-D printer creates your piece almost immediately.


 
Background:
Founded in April 2013 by Ben Alun-Jones, Kirsty Emery and Hal Watts, who met at London’s Royal College of Art, Knyttan aims to disrupt the $200 billion knitwear market with technology that turns the industrial knitting machines, which make 20 percent of the world’s garments, into the equivalent of 3D printers for clothes, enabling users to design and ‘print’ their own customised sweaters, scarves and other knitted items, made of Merino wool, for 200 pounds (about $315) for sweaters and 80 pounds (about $125 ) for scarves. (read more on this here and how it affects the knitting industry).

The conversation around the designers focuses on how their role is morphing into how you manage your brand, that they have to set style guides rather than finished pieces. The video states that it ask designers, "what are the key things of your brand and what are you willing to let go of?" It makes designers think about all the possibilities their design can offer, but still allows enough control so it doesn't turn into a literal walking disaster with their name attached. As talked about in the other posts, it seems like customization is everywhere and is a key selling point for a lot of products. We can't really escape it, and I've definitely bought some customized pieces (maybe not oreos, but some etsy jewelry and things of the like).

 It is kind of scary how it could affect the career path of designers... it could mean less jobs (not cool) and less control (sigh) but it also challenges us to think differently and will just catapult our field into a new direction.  It's the evolution of design,  like when type-setters had to come to grips with what they painstakingly studied and learned how to do to craft printed pieces could now be down with a few clicks of a button on a computer. I'm sure that was as infuriating as it was exciting, ha ha.  I do think there will always be value for original, artfully created pieces - much like I love a beautifully letter pressed print that I had nothing to do with.