Watches Tell More Than Time: Product Design, Information, and the Quest for Elegance [Hardcover]

Del Coates (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 9, 2002

From Audis to iMacs, Beetles to palm-tops, the design secrets behind some of the biggest business success stories of all times

"Del Coates has written a definitive playbook for product managers on how to cultivate winning design leadership strategies."­­Betty Baugh, President of the Industrial Designers Society of America

In Watches Tell More Than Time, awardwinning designer and mentor Del Coates explains the importance of product design for businesspeople and other nondesigners. From an explanation of the physiology of our responses to product design, to secrets of achieving harmony and elegance, to the impact of computer-assisted modeling on modern design, Coates covers the topic from every angle, using real-life product design case studies to illustrate his points. A lively and accessible exploration of the fascinating world of product design, written by an internationally acknowledged master, Watches Tell More Than Time will appeal to managers and executives, marketing professionals, and design junkies interested in the subject.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"I hope people are starting to see design is making a difference." --Steve Jobs on the iMac "Fifteen years ago, companies competed on price. Today it's quality. Tomorrow it's design." --Robert Hayes, Harvard Business School"

From the Back Cover

The design of every product conveys certain information, and modern consumers are experts in reading the language of product design. Most of us can discern the different messages conveyed by say, a Rolex versus a Swatch, a Porsche versus a Hummer, a Kenneth Cole versus a Bally, or an iMac versus a Compaq. But whether we're talking watches, cars, shoes, personal computers or any other mass-produced item, how many of us can say with any real conviction what differentiates a good design from a bad one, or exactly how the good design manages to tell its story so clearly and so well to so many people?

Design experts, psychologists, marketing theorists, and even French philosophers have wrestled with these questions for nearly a century. But few have provided more comprehensive or persuasive answers to these questions international industrial design authority Del Coates has in this fascinating and accessible book. Watches Tell More Than Time is a much needed resource for shaping corporate design strategies, evaluating product designs at any stage of development or marketing­­and optimizing them.

Drawing upon findings in an array of disciplines, including aesthetics, psychology, information theory, physiology, anthropology, as well as his own vast experience as an award-winning industrial designer, Coates peels back the layers of some of the greatest product designs, past and present, to reveal the secrets behind their success. From the neurophysiology of human perception and how it shapes our responses to design elements, to the secrets of achieving harmony and elegance, he attacks the subject from every conceivable angle in order to flush out the basic laws of good design. And perhaps more fully and eloquently than any author before him, he explains exactly why, while zeitgeists come and zeitgeists go, and today's Space Age sensation is tomorrow's white elephant, the principles of good design are forever.

Watches Tell More than Time is essential reading for managers, entrepreneurs, marketing and advertising professionals and virtually anyone in business who understands that, in today's volatile global marketplace, more than ever before, superior design is the key to success. At the same time, this book offers design professionals and "design junkies" a unique opportunity to learn the secrets of successful product design from an acknowledged master.

From Audis to iMacs, Beetles to palm-tops, the design secrets behind some of the biggest business success stories of all times

In this fascinating and informative book, award-winning designer and international design mentor, Del Coates, explains why design is so important to the success of a product. And, with the help of examples of many of the best product designs of all times, he takes design professionals and non-designers alike on a lively excursion into the world of product design to reveal the subtle interplay of psychological, physiological, and aesthetic forces informing both the design of man-made products and our responses to them.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (August 9, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071362436
• ISBN-13: 978-0071362436
• Product Dimensions: 9.7 x 7.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #878,208 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent content that needs some condensing, December 9, 2002

By 

Lars Jensen (Sausalito, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Watches Tell More Than Time: Product Design, Information, and the Quest for Elegance (Hardcover)

"Watches Tell More than Time" is about how industrial designers influence the emotional responses that their products create. (Note: it's primarily concerned with physical objects, as opposed to computer software, which gets a lot of design press these days).

It explains these responses in terms of evolutionary psychology. And, in what I consider to be the reason to read the book, it tells you how to measure and optimize them. That is, it lays out the theoretical underpinnings for a small set of attributes (contrast, novelty, objective concinnity, and subjective concinnity) that are fundamentally responsible for our emotional responses to objects, then describes a systematic process by which you can strengthen the responses that you consider important for a given product, and then measure your success (using a semantic differential scale) and find out you whether you have simultaneously weakened other desirable responses.

There is some jargon, but it's well defined and to the point, and anyone interested in design should have no problem understanding it.

It's at its best when the author delves into specific examples. Many are from his experience in the car design field; others are everyday items that everyone can relate to. The detailed deconstruction of a "simple" Corelle cup is outstanding -- I wish the book had a dozen more like it.

The book's major weakness is the amount of time devoted to relatively elementary concepts, such as contrast and novelty. (How many times and in how many ways do we need to be told, for example, that new things command more of our attention than familiar ones?) I finished several chapters in a row thinking "OK, now that's he's got that out of his system, he's about to get to the good stuff." Eventually he does, but the repetition beforehand is why my rating is four stars, not five.

Note: The book is _not_ about what I might call the "mechanics of aesthetics". How is it that Curve A feels dull while Curve B -- a subtle, almost unnoticeable variation -- seems taut and alive? Why does this union of materials and forms seem exactly right, even inspiring, but that one fails to catch the eye?

For example, the author calls SUVs outwardly "robust", "rugged", and "militaristic". That feels right, but what makes it so? What is it, exactly, about the shapes and lines of an SUV that evoke such a different reaction than is typical for a minivan ("bland", "boring", "utilitarian")? Each is, after all, more like the other than like a sedan. Yet no one would have trouble identifying the type from a picture -- even without telltale backgrounds of the Rockies vs a youth soccer field. Each time I think I've got it nailed down, I see a counter-example on the road. I think it's mostly a matter of the angle between the hood and windshield, and the height of the grille. But that just begs the question: why are the more acute angle and higher grille more aggressive in the first place? A lower grille and gentler angle are considered more aggressive in a sports car.

"Watches Tell More than Time" tantalizingly dances around such questions, but fundamentally doesn't attempt to answer them. But it leaves you better equipped to wrestle with the answers yourself. (A sports car has different emotional goals than an SUV.)

So the book won't make you an industrial designer any more than a trip to the art supply store will make you an artist. Instead, it introduces you to a fundamental chunk of an industrial designer's toolkit. If you've already internalized "talk to your users" and "keep it simple", and you want a deeper understanding of how some products are able to become beloved icons, you'll probably find very interesting material here.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What it takes to have a Wow product!, January 1, 2003

By 

John C. Dunbar (Sugar Land, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Watches Tell More Than Time: Product Design, Information, and the Quest for Elegance (Hardcover)

You will learn how humans react to a product - particularly great ones. I appreciate that the author has given me a new way to look at products and the effect of their designs.

The author describes from a neurological and pyschological point of view how you react to a new product the instant you see it. I am talking micro-seconds here. Then, he discusses how you come to like it or reject it (a few microseconds later). This was truly interesting. He relates it back to Information Theory -- yet the book was not about bits and bytes. He describes how various shapes communicate differing amounts of information. Too much results in an over load.

The author presents a simple model to analyze products. To help with this he discusses how he uses semantic difference surveys. I found this material very interesting although I wish that he had included samples of the survey documents. I didn't understand how the prospects visualized and then specified the ideal product to compare your product to.

This is truly a great book but it does requires you to slow down when you read. The author carefully defines his terms - which unfortunately have to deal with cultural abstractions (like 'zeitgeists', 'daimons'). To keep up with the author, you need to understand these terms, as the author defines them.

I will now go back a second time and try to make his framework more permanent in my brain.

The author sleeps and dreams about great design. He has been a great designer (cars) for some time and now teaches out in San Jose.

If you develop new products, or are a CEO of a company, or if you just like design... this is a required book.

I looked at the book at the book store several times and put it back because the abstract terminology turned me off. Later I went and sat down in the book store and read it more slowly. It was then that I realized what a jewell this book is. I'd love to sit in on one of his classes.

John Dunbar
Sugar Land, TX

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Design Theory, October 19, 2002

By 

Robert J. Vahsholtz (California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Watches Tell More Than Time: Product Design, Information, and the Quest for Elegance (Hardcover)

I entered the field of industrial design about 40 years ago with a shiny new degree from Art Center, considered then as now, a top school in the field. I was taught nothing worth mentioning about design theory, and indeed there seemed little in print at that time that was worth knowing . It's difficult to write down a set of rules that can be used to understand and create good design. Del Coates has taken a good bash at it. I wish I'd had a book like this when I started my career. Better yet, I wish my bosses had read such a book. I hope others will build on what Del has started.