LuxeBook December 2020

“W hat is it about the human mind that makes it impossible for us to sit still? We are perpetually in a state of flux, frantically shuffling from one task to the other. Even after doing an incredible lot more than we did as a peasant economy, fulfilment still evades us. Our experiences and interactions have been reduced to verbose fabrications. We say we wish to eat the best food in the world, we lose taste by the second bite. We want to experience heaven without having to die. There is a sensation that time seems to slow down when we are present in the very moment. There are no distractions and there is no desire to be elsewhere. It is when each bite flavourful, every note hits the right chord, and every word of the story touches us. This, to me, is what being alive is all about: for each moment to reach its full potential. From where I stand as a designer, design is an extremely powerful tool for making human lives better. So, how can we use design to help people gravitate towards a lifestyle grounded in the present? To begin with, we must place people before design. When we comprehend universal human aspects, we must develop an astute awareness of individual differences and celebrate those differences. It can no longer be a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Each element in our immediate space needs to be an extension of us. We live in a world where people are often treated like furniture. I’m talking about a shift where furniture is treated like people. It’s not animism per se, but a state in which the human aspect of the maker seeps into the grains of the object, in turn, making it a little alive. This is, perhaps, why we are more drawn to hand-made things rather than machine-made. A skilfully crafted chair is like soulful music if compared with the noise of utilitarian objects that surround us. At the end of a long day, that Coming soon... DECO D ED 58| L U X E B O O K | D E C E MB E R 2 0 2 0 Temporal Design Siddharth Sirohi , Designer and Co-Founder of Baro Design, writes about putting humans above design and creating simple, playful products that make one fully aware and alive BY RIDDHI DOSHI