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Products of Our Time
by David Redhead
Guy Babineau

The last decade witnessed an unprecedented escalation in 
the public's appreciation of industrial design and the 
hyperactive production, in rich countries, of design-centric 
stuff. It started out with the mass marketing of minimalist, 
modernist chic which emanated from the tight pursestrings 
of the early 1990s and defined lifestyle choices for several 
years. Then the post-recession pinata burst, showering us 
with the new toys of what design commentator David 
Redfern, the author of Products of Our Times,  calls 
techno-capitalism.
	Western economies, particularly the U.S., went into 
overdrive. Giddy with affluence and overwork, we started 
to buy more products. Too busy to have lives, we could at 
least purchase lifestyles. Suddenly, thanks to technology 
and the media, everyone became a style expert. On one 
hand, the demand for and resulting preponderance of new 
items spelt good news for designers. But on a fundamental 
level, isn't it all just a little bit creepy?
	Products of Our Times is an astute, well-informed, 
clearly written overview of how, throughout the 1990s, 
design reflected the wishes and worries of a rapidly 
changing society. At sixty-one bucks a pop, the price of the 
first in a trade paperback series of design books being 
published by Birkhauser is a bit steep. Nonetheless, it's a 
worthwhile addition to any design library. 
	It's really a lengthy essay, divided into five chapters 
entitled Basics, More, Control, Identity and Crisis, that take 
us on a chronological design arc spanning the decade from 
austerity to disposability. The book's snappy design is a 
hybrid of the sassy photojournalism in Colors magazine 
and the point-and-click selectivity of a website, with lots of 
sidebars and inserts  providing additional information to 
back up Redfern's hypotheses.
	Redfern, formerly the editor of Design magazine 
and managing editor of Blueprint, is not coy about the fact 
that design is the plaything of the privileged minority who 
live in well-off countries. Then there are those even more 
rarefied creatures, the approximately two hundred million 
e-shoppers mall-crawling through cyberspace, half who 
live in Canada and the United States. 
	Today, it would seem, form follows fancy not 
function, more is more and nomadic workstyles mean that 
people want to surround themselves with impermanent 
objects. Products of Our Times implies that a newfound 
respect for design has taken centrestage. While the 
spotlight continues to shine, maybe designers can use the 
visibility to address issues of sustainability and ecology in 
products coming down the pike.

Originally published in AZURE

© Guy Babineau 2003-2004

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