I think design - good, enduring, meaningful design - at its core is problem solving. Whatever your product, furniture, robots, websites, if it solves a problem for your end user (without creating new ones!) it will be beloved.

60 years later, our problems haven't changed much. We still need comfy, classy places to sit!

P.S. See Objectified if you haven't!

Where do things go when it is time to disperse something?
a) city dump (especially when there are more then one devisees - "If I can't get it you should not get it either")
b) museum (when the person was famous enough - "This is the used hanky of ...")
Most of the time things are only inspiring for the person who collected them, as the context is missing for others. Inspiring collections are just a reflection of the collectors' life experience. If someone else adopts it, a collection of things gets a new meaning - and maybe new inspiration to them.

Totally awesome art/design power couple! My wife and I went as them for Halloween last year. There's some talk that Charles took credit for some of Ray's work, but you can see their love for each other shine through it all. Their collaborations are well-planned and delightfully executed.

I highly recommend their collection of short films.

Bre,

Your observations are most interesting. It's always nice to relate the qualities of successful people to "maker types". I saw a lot of similarities watching a documentary on the Wright Brothers, as well.

BTW, Netflix has the Eames dvds. I just added them all and put them next on my queue. Thanks for the tip! http://www.netflix.com/Movie/The_Films_of_Charles_Ray_Eames/60030839?lnkce=seRtLn&trkid=222336&strkid=1920496248_2_0&strackid=239f3e59d526ae32_2_srl

I've been an Eames fan for quite sometime, for me it boiled down to the fact that I needed to have things around me so those things might as well be well designed. Once I actually lived with the pieces I realized how much of a difference that really makes on your day to day life - being surrounded by good design makes you look at everything differently, I'd argue better.

It's the subtleties that are lost on many people, not that there is anything wrong with that, but surrounding yourself with things vs surrounding yourself with things that all have similar lines and feeling changes an entire atmosphere. In the past I've known people who had houses full of ugly mixed matched furniture ask me how I could consider spending hours trying to find a specific chair and then spend hundreds of dollars on it when I could just go to the store on the corner and get something that would serve the same purpose for $15. My only answer is that my life is considerably better, and I'm noticeably happier with the carefully selected pieces - plus they go up in value!

As for the Eames' themselves, and why they stand out among all the others who made stuff at the same time there is that feel of utilitarianism because of the materials they made, which is why so many of their designs ended up in airports, schools and waiting rooms. The simplicity is unquestionable and unlike many of their contemporaries comfort is actually very important to them. Function was just as important as fashion so to speak.

Also, a personal opinion on this is because Ray was short and wide and Charles was tall and thin, they had to make things which were comfortable to both body types which lends it self to being perfect for a much larger group of people.

Bre,
I'll just repost my tweet, because I figured out why I like the Eames with haiku-like clarity.

motmotshop@bre #Charles & Ray Eames: pretty fantastic. Designers, engineers, & film makers! They were able to perfectly unify form and function.

The Eames duo has always been my "favorite designer" -- I think I loved them most for their mixedness; Graphic and Industrial, Engineering and Artistry, Making objects and telling stories about those objects.

One of my favorite projects they ever did was to make a promotional video for the SX-70 instant camera by Polaroid (itself designed by Henry Dreyfuss). The video is a perfect illustration of the human-object symbiosis inherent in good design -- Objects don't do anything useful by themselves. Instead, the best objects become part of a cultural and social interaction that results in something far more complicated than a simple picture.

Check it out, it's on Youtube:

SX-70 Promotional Video

The Eamses' work embodies some radical attitudes in the design world. They could easily be credited with the concept of mass customization; their only built house (Case Study #8 in Pacific Palisades, CA) was redesigned in a totally different configuration from the original plans using the exact same kit and only one additional I-beam.

Charles, once interviewed was asked if he thought his work would lead to useful objects as opposed to merely pleasurable ones. He replied "Who would say pleasure isn't useful?" The toys they designed can also be seen as serious prototypes to test their ideas in the hands of the user. They believed that the job of the designer was to guide the user into cultivating their own latent creative impulses- I find that attitude much more fitting than the intellectual isolation that most famous designers develop over the course of a career.

The Eameses are an excellent precedent for the new wave of DIY we're experiencing. Watch Eames Demetreos' (their grandson's) TED talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/the_design_genius_of_charles_and_ray_eames.html

Just as one additional bit (and kind of sad piece), I got to go to a party at the 901 studios for the opening of Continuum's LA Design Studio last fall. The building is much the same on the outside -- and it was really amazing to see the little courtyard where the picnic for powers of 10 was set up, as well as the library (which is the only part of the inside that seemed intact). However, the rest of the studio, and the playful, raw, cluttered, beautiful expression of the creativity inside of it was gone, replaced with a slick coating of "DESIGN" with a capital D. I've got some pictures on Flickr of the party:

Ex-Eames Studio 901 in Santa Monica

If I had any critique of design as a profession (Full disclosure, I am a card carrying IDSA member, and teach design at the University of Washignton), it would be that we are constantly pushing down the playful, wild, messy, dirty soul of what design was to the Eamess in favor of a slick, polished, professional look. Fear of not being taken seriously plays a big part in this. Frustration at not getting to sit at the "Big kid's table" along with politicians, architects, urban planners, and other people who design the world around us, is another factor.

But I think that the Eames example goes a long way to show that respect doesn't come from looking slick. These were a pair of people who influenced the way we think about materials in the most basic sense -- In fact, I think that IKEA would likely not exist without the pioneering research the Eameses did in plywood furniture, and in making people understand that furniture like that could still be valuable, and desirable (this was a much more difficult thing to do.)

Down with slicksters. Up with messy-makers. Long live creative clutter.

I've been an Eames fangirl since high school. I even met their grandson Eames Demetrios when I was 16 and afterwards sent him fangirl art that I had programmed on the computer. My mom still has the note that he sent back thanking me for the art.

I loved how Charles and Ray made being designers into a lifestyle. I spend everyday hoping to do the same.