Stone Soup

Last class we had a great activity planned called Stone Soup.  The basis for this was directed towards the lessons shown in the book, Stone Soup, by Maria Brown.  Everyone brought a few items, whatever they wanted, and we all threw our stuff together to make an object.  Everyone brought quite a few things such as duct tape, string, paint, paper, and even more odd objects like tubes and CDs.  As we thought about what to make with all our items laid out on the table, we thought, maybe it would be interesting to try to make something natural out of man made objects instead of usually making all these things out of what were once natural materials at some point.  We didn't even talk about what we were going to make.  We just made it.  

That is what was so great about the Stone Soup project.  Everyone brought a few little pieces of themselves to the activity and our group turned it into an object inspired by their own individual lives.  This is just the same as design and how designers work.   Each designer brings their own experiences as objects and cooks their own stone soup to better the world and feed it to their peers.  I feel that often times designers attempt to redesign other works they have seen and these can be good works, but truly great design comes from originality, inspiration, and motivation within.  Sometimes the best work of designers doesn't only redesign something, but creates some unique way to prevent the problem other designs are merely fixing.