Design Success and Failure / Syntactical Guidelines

A SUCCESSFUL DESIGN

“Scratch my back” by Pinkeye

“Scratch my back” is an interesting grater, which was designed by Pinkeye – a team of Belgian designers, composed of Arnaud De Vicq, Bram De Baere, Luc Heylen, Ruud Belmans and Thomas Vanden Abeele.

Balance as Functionality

The four feet are providing a stable stance that allows for a practical use. The physical balance here is the result of a functional balance so that this grater can be operated safely and properly without making a mess. For instance, the firm and solid feet will avoid the grater from bending or shifting, thus, there will be no carrot / cheese grating all over the place, but just on the plate. 

Leveling

This “Scratch my back” grater achieves balance, stability and lack of tension and stress. Therefore it is a leveled product design that utilizes "Leveling" as one of the syntactical guidelines.

Positive and negative space

There are some negative space around and between this grater. This dome-shaped animal (porcupine) creates an arched negative shape under its belly, which adds an aesthetic perception to the entire design.

A FAILURE DESIGN

Elevator button design by OTIS

Balance as Functionality
Even though this elevator button is a symmetrically balanced design, the design doesn't meet the functional requirements. It is true that visual balance could be desirable; However, it is a huge failure when a product design is "visually" well-designed, but it is "physically" failing in its functionality. A design of elevator button should be simple and user-friendly, but this OTIS elevator bottom seems to create confusion and inconvenience to the users instead. Therefore, it is a failure design in terms of it functionality.