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Myth and Maturity: Toward a New Order in the Decade of Design Author(s): Richard Buchanan Source: Design Issues, Vol. 6, No. 2 (Spring, 1990), pp. 70-80 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1511439 Accessed: 22/12/2009 13:41
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REFLECTIONS

RichardBuchanan Myth and Maturity: Toward a New Order in the Decade of Designvs 1) GeorgeNelson, "'Captive' Designer (?) 'Independent' Designer,"in his (!) Problems Design of (NewYork:Whitney Publications, Inc., 1965),30.

"The industrial a designprofessionhasestablished place for itself in a phenomenallyshort time. It is widely accepted as a useful service.But it is also still in the process of realizingits full potential as a serviceto a society going through aseries of tremendoustransformations." - GeorgeNelson' "To be humana man must understand what has been and accomplished whatcanbe accomplished the artsof by
man."

"TheLiberating Arts McKeon, 2) Richard andtheHumanizing in Education," Arts in Humanistic Educationand Western Civilization: Essays for Robert M. Hutchins,ArthurA. Cohen, ed. (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964),159.

-RichardMcKeon2 Colin Forbes and a distinguished executivecommitteerecently the first StanfordDesign Forum:an invitedgathering organized of CEOs, designmanagers, and leaders with an designers, cultural activeinterestin promotingdesignawareness effectiveness and in the contemporary world. Intendedto be international scope, in the forumwill be held in Londonin 1990andperhapsTokyo in camefrom Europe,Asia, andthe 1991;in 1988 the participants United States. The goal of the forum, as Forbesexplains,is to maintainan informalinternational networkof people who meet fromtimeto timeto discussmajorissuesandto formulate general in responseto them.3 policies The issuesidentifiedfor the firstmeetingof the forum,heldin September1988,werethe role of designas a corporatestrategy, the relationshipdesignandinternational of trade,andmethodsfor the importanceof designto the generalpublic. communicating Therewereno formalpapersbut the discussions reportedin a are narrative JeffreyMeikle,a designhistoriancommissioned by by the forumto providea background sketchanda general surveyof the issues and views represented at the meeting. Though conversation seldomfollowsa simple,logicalline of spontaneous Meiklesucceeds in representingthe event in a development,
straightforward, literal account that manages to incorporate

3) JeffreyMeikle,Designin the Contemfrom World, porary publication prepared the proceedings the Stanford of Design 1988 Forum,Stanford,CA, September (n.p.: Pentagram Design, AG, 1989). Copiesmaybe obtainedfromthe StanfordAlumniAssociation.ColinForbes is chairman the Executive of...