'Good design is largely a matter of common sense': Questioning the Meaning and Ownership of a Twentieth-Century Orthodoxy

Abstract

This article has two main objectives: the methodological enrichment of Design History, and the application of these perspectives to a central issue within the history of design-the 'good design' discourse. In response to the 'Post-Modern dilemma'-what to study? -Part One considers how in particular circumstances objects may be regarded as forms of cultural discourse. It is a perspective well established in material culture studies and museology where Foucault's idea that discursive artefacts operate as knowledge and involve the exercise of power has been highly influential. In contrast much recent work on the history and theory of consumption has emphasized the positive aspects of cultural discourse-its ability to empower the individual and tofacilitate self-representation. In reconciling these positions I introduce Bourdieu's concept of 'habitus' or taste culture, an idea that allows a consideration of subjectivity in terms of the appropriation and modification of knowledge in accordance with distinctive circumstances. Part Two focuses on the 'good design' discourse. I define this as a collection of axioms that were especially prominent in the 1930s and the post-war period. In thefield of public rhetoric it presented itself as 'common sense'. However, I argue that it was a partial and elitist form of knowledge in so far as it positioned itself in opposition to an idea of 'mass' culture. When introduced to the market-place, 'good design' became 'good taste', taking on associations that were generic to particular commodity types. I base my analysis on Heal's inter-war marketing strategy. In order to reconstruct a consumer perspective on this commodified knowledge I examine the Mass Observation Report on the 'Britain Can Make It' exhibition of 1946.