Periodic Table of Form.

Great article on Core77: The Perodic Table of Form: The secret language of surface and meaning in product design. Gray Holland describes how we think about and perceive form based on the form language we grew up with as a species: nature's form language.

I love how his thesis relates natural evolutionary form language back to CAD: the modern, man-made way of defining surfaces and form:

If there is an empirical meaning behind form then, how does it manifest across the natural and into the man-made world? Going further with this notion, let's deconstruct the meaning of form naturally, and then distill that meaning into some simplified geometric categories technically. In order to define these categories, I will ironically employ a three-level definition of surface continuity from the engineering CAD lexicon: Positional, Tangential, and Curvature continuities.

Natural G0 or positional tangent forms in nature (rocks, crystals, porcupine spikes) communicate precision or even danger, just as they do in the man-made environment. The opposite is true for G2 or curvature tangent forms (flowers, dolphins, even humans are G2!), which communicate elegance and gives G2 objects an alluring quality. In the middle is G1, which is a completely man-made form of tangency, a product of machining and production processes; it does not exist in nature and therefore communicates human functionality/practicality. Holland gives fantastic examples here.

If you have no idea what the difference between G0,1, or 2 is then read the article! It's full of great info-graphics and explanations. I think designers take a lot of this for granted, so it was nice to read something so well written about how we think about and work with surfaces to create forms that communicate to users. Over the last couple days it has made me think a lot more about those decisions I make in CAD.

You can download a PDF of The Periodic Table of Form and print it large, I did! It has stimulated a ton of conversation in my studio.