• INMYX
• iF Website
• INMYX wins iF communication design Award
• Preview of the iF communication design Awards 2007
• INMYX wins the iF communication design Gold Award for Screen Design

Design also always has a function

An interview with Oliver Habboub, designer for digital media from Freiburg, Germany.

By Dirk Agelek

Oliver, what has been the focus of your work in more recent times?

For a long time now, my work has centered around the further development of man-machine interfaces. A great deal is happening in this field at the moment. User interfaces are becoming increasingly better to use. The complexity of the user controls is diminishing – entirely irrespective of the complexity of the particular applications or the tasks to be accomplished. To improve on this…

… it’s not exactly a genuine design topic.

That’s true. In contrast to art, design also always has a function. In digital media, it is not just a question of depicting content, but also about supporting processes or – in what is known as Web 2.0 – defining a framework in which the user can act independently. A key aspect of the design process is and remains aesthetics.

That’s a good catchword. You often work alongside globally active corporations, where it is more about guidelines and governance rather than creative solutions. You have now designed INMYX for Ciba. What’s it like designing a design magazine for designers?

It’s easier when you are part of the target group you are aiming at. However, you do get a bit schizophrenic and don’t sleep as well at night.

However, it was in fact highly interesting. The analog world provides colors, which you then work with as a designer. There is no equivalent in the digital world. To accentuate this contradiction between the analog, additive and the virtual world of colors, we have taken the framework design to the max with the aid of subtractive color mixing. In doing so, I was aiming to emphasize the aspect that at XYMARA it is primarily about the question of how colors can be used in a specific context, and not so much – as in the traditional specialty chemical business – about their qualities or technical range of applications.

Added to this was the fact that the creative scope was vast. In this respect, Ciba is very brave for its segment.

Incidentally, I was quite surprised how much knowledge and creativity exists at Ciba with regard to color schemes and color trends. Unfortunately, this is not so apparent in day-to-day business. I hope that this will change now.

Typical magazines place the emphasis on the content and support its effect by means of what tends to be a more reserved design. With INMYX, it is the colors that are the dominant component at first sight. Why?

With XYMARA, everything revolves around colors – why should we neglect this particular element? Our initial idea was to create a strong design framework in which different types of content can be published that center around colors and effects. The framework creates, as it were, the common scope for this content. The topic of color is meant to be staged here from both a formal and content aspect.

So why isn’t this formula also used at xymara.com?

Xymara.com also deals with corporate experiences and solutions. This calls for a different balance between content and design, as if, like with INMYX, only external perspectives come into play, which most certainly also have an entertaining component. Presumably, at xymara.com, such a use of color would have shifted the balance too far in favor of the framework, which I regard as not altogether safe, since with the typical Xymara article, the focus is more on the actual detail. In this case, the design has to take a step back. By contrast, INMYX is in fact a tension creating element, a counterpoint within the overall concept of the platform.

Your works have frequently scooped prestigious awards. INMYX has now won the iF communication design award 2007 in the category of Screen Design. As a designer, is this something you can feel proud of at all?

Naturally, I do not take all the credit for this. In fact, every designer tends to play such things down. In truth, however, designers are always delighted when the work of the team is rewarded by distinguished experts.