(photo credit: Alessandra Sanguinetti for the New York Times)
In grad school we were taught to broaden our definition of "designed things" beyond traditional media to include the less tangible—a single moment, an experience, behavior. Certainly physical objects could be evocative and memorable, but using our skill set as designers to orchestrate a moment of interaction—and ideally documenting it for later discussion—was routinely encouraged.
I thought of this while reading an article in yesterday's New York Times Magazine about the design collective Project M's initiative called PieLab in Greensboro, Alabama. While PieLab has garnered a lot of press, this story is an interesting case study of the full picture—not just the aspirational roots and initial execution of the designed experience, but also its ramifications within a given community, and, ultimately, how such a concept needs to be able to evolve (both in its goals and in its management) in order to last. It is a testament to the strength of this designed experience that PieLab (now simply called "Pie") continues to exist, now anchored a bit closer to the ground but with its heart fully intact.
Read the full article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/magazine/10pielab-t.html