Creative OrbitFree-flow thinking of Wigy Ramadhan. It is a collection of my borderless thinking about phenomena in the areas where I operate.




04. Designer Isn’t Just a Designer


8 April 2025 
21:56 BST
London, UK


Prologue 
 A designer always changes their role every time.  At one time, we are a designer, a philosopher, a builder, an engineer, a scientist, a strategist, a facilitator, an anthropologist, and many more, depending on the situation and roles we need to act. This is by nature because we, as designers, don’t always work on the same case again and again. Though maybe for some designers, what they are doing is always similar, the fact that we are constantly changing depending on the context or situation we are working in is important to ensure our project is successful.

*) please note that everything I write here is very fluctuating, just to help me get the ideas out of my mind. Technically, it is my coping mechanism I am experimenting with, so don’t take it seriously as I like doing things like this) Designers who can’t adapt will fail.

One of the most important things is when we are working as a designer, adaption is the key. The openness and humbleness of embracing something new or unexpected, and how to empathise and not force our own will is very  The problem with many designers
My way to identify design language is basically started by searching for an answer to release my self from creative block. That’s when I realised, creativity does affected by how I define my identity, and clearly define what I care about and what I want in to do with my practice. 

It was clearly said above that I see myself as still operating in the spirit of the time, I was just following what is happening out there rather than focusing on myself I am interested in particular topics. But, self-reflecting is not enough to define our identity. Oftentimes, in creative practices, we work better with probes. Therefore, in search of my design language, I am looking to external, but now, I am not looking at just the visual preferences of the designers or works that I like or find inspiring. Rather, I am trying to understand their manifesto, their design language,  their ideas, and their approach to doing their practices.

This is where I came across 2 renowned designers I felt whose practices were relevant to what I am trying to achieve conceptually and philosophically; Johanna Selemann and Julia Lohmann. Though I might not yet explain what are my practices at the moment, this journey of design language basically is a journey to find out what kind of practice I want to claim of myself.

Things that attracted me to Johanna Selemann and Juliah Lohmann are the way they incorporate materiality, the sciences, and the systematic around those things in relationship with the human. Nevertheless





Figure 1: The draft of my design language (Wigy, 2025)