Design for Story-making: Conceptual Exploration on Emotionally Sustainable Design

Exploring on two major questions: 'Why do we feel more love for certain objects?' and 'How can design use this knowledge to realize design sustainability?', this article presents an alternative way of approaching the problem of design sustainability from the perspective that our relationships with design objects are of an extended mode of social relations. Recent discussions on design sustainability have transformed the notion of the problem by seeing it as a problem of our basic perception of design objects and our relationships with them. In this light, I propose that design sustainability could not be achieved solely by approaching from a mechanistic perspective, but by re-framing the way we see and relate things around us and by supporting our changes and actions to move forward a more sustainable notion of our relationships with the objects. As a way to realize design sustainability, I propose that design should involve story-making quality that supports our initiatives to build more affectional relations with objects by seeing the objects as entities of communication that tell stories of us, thus reflect our identities and meanings of our lives. Proceeding on the exploration of the subject, I present some of conceptual outlines in forms of an image diary, an interplay-able furniture unit, and a performance instruction that suggest a way for a special story-making process and thus a stronger emotional tie with the objects.