Content is the Soul

I have never been in love with graphic design. For years—during school and my professional career following—I have struggled to focus on what I’ve been designing because I have been so focused on the design itself. 

My education and training in graphic design was invaluable. I learned principles of graphic design that have improved my work far beyond what I was creating before studying it at university. However, the focus on the look of what I was designing has blinded me from seeing what I was designing. 

Steve Jobs was the co-founder of Apple, the company that brought to the world incredible electronic devices including the Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Under his direction, Apple embraced the belief that products should be great—they should work great and look great. In his last keynote address at an Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in 2011, Steve Jobs talked about the relationship between the hardware of their devices, and the software inside them. He said, “If the hardware is the brain and sinew of our products, the software in them is their soul.”

Basically he was saying that the hardware—the physical product and the mechanical parts that made it work—is like a body. The software—the content and tools within that hardware—is like the soul. 

When it comes to design—whether that be graphic design, product design, marketing design, book design, editorial design, etc.—I believe it is like the hardware, or the body. We care about what things look like. But ultimately it is their content that can either enhance attraction or push us away. 

Design is the body. Content is the soul. I realized that this is why I feel so dissatisfied with some jobs as a graphic designer. If the content is not compelling to me, it does not matter how good I make it look. I will still struggle to be drawn to it, and to be interested in what I’m doing. 

On the other hand, if I love the content, producing excellent design to enhance that content is invigorating and exciting. 

I believe anyone is lovable, despite what they look like. And that is because they have a soul. My advice to designers is to find the content you love, and then enhance it with what you can bring to the table.

Design is the body. Content is the soul.