People love chocolate. Some even experience a kind of high from it and recently I witnessed the same phenomenon with good design.

We were in a client meeting. The first part of the meeting was technical requirements for a web site – important, but hardly exiting (except to me). We accomplished our goals and things went well. Everyone was serious and business-like.

The second half of the meeting was the presentation of several logos we created for a new identity for the company. The show started and by the time the third example was displayed everyone’s demeanor had totally changed. Gone were furled brows and looks of concern. A great dialog was happening. People shared personal anecdotes that related to the work they were seeing. By the time the last logotype was shown everyone was smiling and chatty. People were energized by design. Design communicated and resonated with everyone in the room, even those of us that had previously seen the work.

I witnessed the power of good design. The next time someone doubts the importance or value of design, this is a story I will tell. Design is important. It may not be quantifiable all the time, subjective things rarely are, but its importance is undisputable.