Or, Systematizing the Kitchen Jeff Wilkinson
The mid-20th century saw a shift in design toward systems-thinking. Typographers and others began operating on grid, as they do today. Approaches to design tend to read more like engineering manuals than aesthetic treatises: Lindinger writes that at Ulm they excluded art, taste, and fashion from their design processes, and in doing so “freed themselves from the emotive and irrational charactistics of those fields of activity.” In text, we see with integral typography that language is used with modern typesetting practices in mind. Typesetting therefore does not respond to the text and medium, but is conceptually linked to them from inception. It is a wholistic and efficient approach. Similarly, Gugelot declared that he would only develop furnishing systems, not pieces of furniture. Here are some bowls and mugs, designed to stack efficiently as a set — a system designed to store quickly and easily.
I can’t help but think of my own mug collection
oddly-shaped handmade mugs Budapest
This one’s made of tin. It burns my hands sometimes
This one’s a butt This one’s got an ear
This one has a chip so you’ve gotta be careful
The coffee maker presents an issue. Maybe this is the modular system around which my morning routine is centered. The Aeropress has a 2.75 in. wide filter, which pours directly into the mug.
4 3 2 1
#1 Dad
If I’m making coffee for both Eve and I, I’ll sometimes make both servings in a mug that fits, pouring half into another mug. Others can’t go through the dish washer, or be held with one hand. Despite the inconvenience, the extra rules for each item, I’ve resisted systemizing my kitchen.
Hand wash only
Doesn’t fit the Aeropress
Budapest
Minor danger
I find myself combing through the dish wares at thrift stores, selecting for the right amount of nonsense and utility. Maybe handmade and used are just values I have. Irrational and emotive, not something that can be designed for.
On the other hand, not all of my mugs are heirlooms. The butt mug was manufactured en mass. I think if I had more than one I wouldn’t like it. It would shatter the illusion of craft.
This isn’t an argument against systemization. I don’t resent the grid. I understand that stackable cups are essential for a cafeteria or small restaurant. While earning my B.A. I had a few mugs I’d stolen from the dining halls, and I loved them. Not because they stacked, but because I’d re-contextualized them with memory. What I think is worth examining is how efficiency and systemization account for natural human systems. Not irrational ones, but ones rationalized by feeling and memory, even virtue. A perfectly efficient chair reads as a piece of manufacturing, not as a valued or prized object.
Budapest
Copyright Jeff Wilkinson 2021 no stealing