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introduction

I’m here for Product Design as an elective because of a couple of reasons. I missed Freshers Week and course selection, so the first 5 or 6 electives I tried to pick were all full. The day before I picked my classes, I went to IKEA and read one of the magazines there. It had an article on product design that made me think. I actually took a picture, so here’s that. Not sure if you can read it. It said designers could focus on one of two things: the noun glass or the verb to drink. It compares designers to behavioral scientists who focus on what people do and how the objects interact with those actions.

I liked that because it made me realize that design was a lot more similar to the stuff I’m studying than I thought. Anyway, that got me thinking, so when I was looking at the list of courses for the 7th time, it caught my eye, and then it wasn’t full.

So I got put into the class one hour into that first week project thing. So I decided to just go and see what the end of the first class would be. I walked into the room of this girl playing the cello, and I was really confused. But then I got put in a group, found myself in a pub, and realized that I had made a great choice for my elective.

I’m studying social policy, but I think that the two classes are actually similar. They both focus on optimizing people’s well being, whether through objects or public policies. So that’s my justification for why I’m taking this class.

Also I think that plastering sounds really fun. I’ve never done it before. I’ve never drawn before either. The scavenger hunt has changed the way that I see the city though. I can’t stop seeing shapes now.

My goals for this semester are to teach myself more about design (watch that documentary and read a few articles) , start sketching things that are interesting to me (scavenger hunt rn and then possibly do the 100 days challenge with sketching), and to experiment/have fun with plaster.