Hey Y'all

Greetings from the fine city of Cincinnati! My name is Rachael Stefanussen, and I am an Industrial Design student at the University of Cincinnati. The subject of this blog will be design- good design, bad design, design I like to bitch about, design I like to praise, design I wish I could own, design I wish I could call my own, and design that has no right to existence whatsoever. Lots and lots of design.

I've long enjoyed writing and I've long loved design, but very rarely have the two interests collided. I was excited when my design communication professor (this is my first official shout out to the estimable Mike Roller ) announced the requirement to blog and document our musings on design. Few designers suffer a shortage of opinions when it comes to design, but even fewer can really explain why they think something is correct, appropriate or beautiful.

Though technical skill and theory is the foundation behind any design education, much of what a designer prefers personally is born from intuition and subconscious sensibility, formed over a lifetime of scattered, disparate, and oftentimes untraceable influences and events. Most of us don't know why we like the things we do. Even when I think I'm working in as objective a manner as possible, looking to function and brand to dictate style and form, everything turns out similar: the form is understated, often times linear and- strangely enough- phallic, almost always referencing some charming antique from centuries ago, and always, without fail, shown in damned, ever present pale, desaturated powder blue.

I would like to know why things always look best to me in pantone 7457 EC, and I would like to be able to explain why eloquently and concisely. And then, when I am tempted to render something in that wretched 7457 EC though I know I should employ the use of, say, downey blue or tide orange, I can resist and do what is appropriate, and will in turn be most successful.

This is one of my goals for this upcoming quarter. I would like to use this blog as a tool to practice disecting, understanding, and vocalizing my design preferences and opinions. My other goals are as follows: resume sketching religiously and learn to sketch faster, learn Maxwell so as to lessen my dependency on hypershot, and find a restaurant job so as to support my drinking habit.

Just kidding. Kind of.