INTERIOR DESIGN:
THE DISCONNECT
BETWEEN DESIGN
TEACHING AND
DESIGN DOING
I
remember back in the day in 1985 when I went to study Architecture, there
was no such thing as an ’interior design’ school. You could by and large only
study Architecture or Industrial design. By extension there were of course
also no shopfitters or shopfitting companies, only cabinetmakers. The skill
set around retail and restaurant design was therefore extremely limited.
By Callie van der Merwe, CEO Design Partnership, www.designpartnership.co.za
Whilst certain interior or retail design companies have recently made
massive strides in this field, most if not all, interior design schools, have
sadly not. In truth they have and still are leading students completely
astray as their program does not address any of the realities around the
biggest opportunity that exists in this field today, namely commercial store design.
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It could be said that commercial store designers are, or should be, in the business
of solving business problems with design solutions, as opposed to merely design
problems with design solutions. For me herein lies the rub, as most schools seem to
teach the latter. This not only completely misdirects the expectation of the students,
africandesignmagazine.com