Tibor Kalman Quotes

Good design is making something intelligible and memorable. Great design is making something memorable and meaningful.

I believe consistency and orthogonality are tools of design, not the primary goal in design.

The design of the Mac wasn't what it looked like, although that was part of it. Primarily, it was how it worked. To design something really well, you have to get it. You have to really grok what it's all about. It takes a passionate commitment to really thoroughly understand something, chew it up, not just quickly swallow it.

Good design to me is both appearance and functionality together. It's the experience that makes it good design.

We always correct people who say, 'You're trying to make this look better.' Well yes, we want it to look better, but that's easy. The look and the function are one and the same. They are not separate. It looks good because it functions beautifully. That message is very hard.

Great design is so many things all at the same time. It is emotional, functional, and responsive. It creates an unwritten dialogue, a connection, between itself and those who experience it. It is open to interpretation yet created for a specific purpose. It creates meaning and value.

Good design emphasises the usefulness of a product whilst disregarding anything that could possibly detract from it.

I would like to make a building as intellectually driven as it is sculptural and as positive as it would be acceptable to hope.

Products have to be designed in a way that they are comprehensible.

Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics.

The designer must understand that form does not follow function nor does form follow a production process. For every use and for every production process there are innumerable equally attractive solutions.

Good design begins with honesty, asks tough questions, comes from collaboration and from trusting your intuition.

Good design should be honest.

I think entrepreneurs have a great opportunity to think of how to make things more understandable, simple and beautiful.

A building is no good if someone's got to explain to you why it's good. You can't say you don't know enough about architecture - that's ridiculous. It's got to work on many levels.

Good design keeps the user happy, the manufacturer in the black and the aesthete unoffended.

The architect should strive continually to simplify; the ensemble of the rooms should then be carefully considered that comfort and utility may go hand in hand with beauty.

Design must reflect the practical and aesthetic in business but above all... good design must primarily serve people.

When I'm designing, I'm thinking about what it would be like to wear that piece.

It's not so much about form versus functionality. Rather, it's about doing both and doing them a lot and doing them well-and that's how we should be talking about architecture.

You have to have great design to be competitive in today’s markets.

If you care about being thought credible and intelligent, do not use complex language where simpler language will do.

To know what to leave out and what to put in; just where and just how, ah, that is to have been educated in knowledge of simplicity.

Beauty is more important in computing than anywhere else in technology because software is so complicated. Beauty is the ultimate defense against complexity.

Beauty is the ultimate defense against complexity.