KARIM RASHID
DESIGN VISIONS
HIS DESIGN STYLE AND DESIGN PHILOSOPHY
“Designers must humanize our physical and virtual world. Through the use of soft flowing curves and organic shapes a sense of comfort and security is immediately established. I believe something is well designed when it is not overly adorned or embellished. If you take the embellishment away from an object and the object still functions then it is more style than design. If an object is well designed then no part is inseparable from the form. And with new technologies, I can create new sensual and organic shapes that never existed before in history.”
ON GOOD DESIGN
“But also Good design can shift and change human behavior and create new social conditions. I preach about how design shapes the future and culture. I believe that design is extremely consequential to our daily lives and can positively change the behaviors of humans. Good design can touch you and embrace you. I define beauty as something for which the inner and outer are in sync.”
HIS VIEW ON SUSTAINABILITY
“I love collaborating with clients that want to source eco-friendly materials or recycling practices into their manufacturing. And now there are organic plastics! I am obsessed with working with responsible plastics that are biodegradable, recycled, or even derived from other sources like corn, sugar, bark, and acai instead of oil. There are many biodegradable materials I am using now that are amazing. So I can create a synthetic like a world, a sculptural more comfortable world, but with smarter ecological materials.”
HOW DESIGNERS CAN CONTRIBUTE TO MAKE A BETTER TOMORROW
“The big challenge of design is to create something that, although accessible to all consumers, touches people’s lives and gives them some sense of elevated experience and pleasure and is original. Designers have the power to shape a better, smarter world, to simplify yet inspire every individual, to make well-made and beautiful products accessible to all.”
NEW MATERIALS AND MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGIES
“People like to assume that design moves with more superficial trends but it is the technology that drives us. Industrial design is driven by designers embracing new technologies, whether it is material, production method, or mechanical invention. So industrial design is driven by designers embracing new technologies, whether it is material, production method, or mechanical invention. So future innovation will depend on how we as designers embrace newness.”
THE FUTURE OF DESIGN
“Casualism is the future. In the non-stop connectivity of our digital age, there is a blurring of all social and human behaviors. Hence this is the new casual age in which we live. We work, dream, love, learn and play anywhere and everywhere with no boundaries. We have evolved into the age of Casualism which is a spiritual, physical, and mental condition and one could say represents real freedom. Freedom to work and play anywhere and everywhere simultaneously. Ideally, Our lives should be focused on comfort, ease, seamless experiences, and fluid technology. This Casualism has shaped our lives, our minds, our spaces, so the virtual and physical blur, where luxury is ease, where new comforts prevail.”