07 — The Art of Translation

Designers spend much of their lives translating.
A business goal into an experience. A complex idea into a simple image. Technology into something human. One person's intention into something another person can understand.
Design lives between different languages and different worlds.
The best translation is rarely literal.
It changes form while protecting meaning.
Perhaps that is one of the designer's most important abilities:
to make something understandable without making it less meaningful.

BEHIND THE SPREAD

Working across branding, advertising, education, and business made me realize that much of my job was translation. The people around the table often used different languages, even when everyone was speaking Japanese.