(007) Flawed beauty
How we think about imperfections based on where we encounter them
Hello, it’s been a while. I wanted to take a moment to say sorry for the radio silence to reintroduce myself.
My name is Matteo Grand and I’m a product designer based in London. I’ve helped some of the best brands in the world launch and improve products, and I’ve also started my own software business for interior designers, called Portaire.
This newsletter will hit your inbox every week, and is my way of making sense of the world. I’ll share a thought I’ve had in the week about creativity and design, and a bunch of links I find inspiring for whatever reason.
And now, back to the show…
Flawed beauty
Over the last couple of years, I’ve developed a love for sourcing furniture.
Our couch is a 70s sofa I discovered on Facebook marketplace in Rome. Our arm chairs are Gothic thrones from vintage markets outside of London. Our ceramics, pieces we’ve collected on holiday and carefully smuggled home.
Our Finnish dining chairs are a little stained, our coffee table a little faded, and our antique frames chipped. Each piece is unique, at times impractical and uncomfortable, but with each imperfection comes a patina that can’t be recreated. Each piece has character and a story to tell.
The Japanese call it wabi-sabi, meaning “flawed beauty” and this approach to collecting has trickled into our everyday (secondhand coffee table books, vintage jackets from Portobello market, antique glassware, etc).
It seems the more of these items I collect, the more I’m drawn to this idea of permanence.
This is somewhat ironic as for the past 15 years I have made my career in tech — a world in a constant state of flux. Here, design is inherently temporary. Software is constantly upgraded, websites optimised and no phone should last you more than 12 months.
And to be fair, this same mentality has crept its way into the physical world too, with fast fashion and interiors selling trends on seasonal cycles. Bouclé might still be acceptable had the likes of H&M Home not discovered it.
And though I love innovation, I find myself disconnected from the disposable nature of it all and becoming increasingly aware of the role designers play in propelling trend culture.
Perhaps it’s time we switch our focus back from timeliness to timelessness.
FINDS
Each week I collect a bunch of interesting links from across the internet and share them here so you can sound interesting at your next dinner party.
I stumbled across The Tyre Collective at Material Matters during during London Design Festival and was blown away by their concept of capturing and recycling tyre debris. Apparently tyre dust is the second most abundant micro-plastic in the ocean.
Venezia FC are a masterclass in branding and are selling the life I want.
The iPhone 15 is cool and all, but I’m going long on the Nokia 8000 4G.
This catalogue of fake people wearing fake turtlenecks is both reminiscent of an early 2000s year book AND way better than using stock imagery in your next project.
Webflow have FINALLY opened up an app marketplace, making it way easier to make websites with a little more horsepower. I built the MVP for Portaire (my business) using Webflow and spent countless hours hacking together a pastiche of tools, so this is happy news.
The best way to create timeless design is to see what has endured through time, and the Trend List has done a great job of cataloguing the “most current” in graphic design since 2011.
Portaire (my business) interviews Norm Architects about what it means to bring sensuality into a space.
Learn from some brilliant designers how they think about timeless design and what they do to fend off trendy.
Studio Haos have get it.
Don Norman on why good design makes you happy (video below).