02. Design Language
21:56 BST
London, UK
As designers, we often think that we’re creating objects, systems, or branding. But in reality, what we’re truly designing is a language—our own language, or one that we represent. Whether it’s the curved forms of a product, a visual identity, or a key touchpoint in a service, these elements are all expressions of our design language.
Yet what we can see and touch is only a small part of it.
We call it a design language because, at its core, design is about communication. We spend our lives crafting and refining this language—designing, iterating, testing, redesigning, and repeating—until it becomes distinct enough to serve as an identity: for ourselves, for what we create, or for the brand we design for. It’s never fixed. But as designers—and as humans—we naturally gravitate toward a design language that others can easily understand and connect with.
While working on my final project for my master’s degree, I was unexpectedly forced—by nature, perhaps—to search for my identity in the midst of stress and creative fatigue. It became a reflective journey. I felt stuck, and lost in the process, and nothing around me was stimulating or intriguing enough to spark my creativity. That’s when I realised was losing my sense of identity.
Creativity is deeply connected to our identity. But we can’t claim creativity as part of who we are if we don’t genuinely understand ourselves—what we care about, what drives us, and what we want from life. So when we feel stuck in our creative journey, it’s often not because we lack creativity, but because we’ve lost touch with ourselves. Creativity is self-reflective and self-driven. Even though we may be inspired by the external world, true creativity doesn't arise from outside—it comes from within.
In The Red Book, Carl Jung explores the unconscious in a visionary and artistic way, describing encounters with five spirit figures. Two of these are particularly relevant to identity and creativity: the Spirit of the Times and the Spirit of the Depths.
Kae Tempest references these Jungian concepts in his book On Connection, where he reflects on authenticity, meaning, and the soulful experience that drives creativity. Drawing directly from Jung, he examines the tension between the Spirit of the Times—a mindset shaped by cultural, religious, and intellectual norms—and the Spirit of the Depths, which is rooted in the unconscious, myth, archetype, and soul. Tempest suggests that many of us operate under the influence of the Spirit of the Times, reacting to external pressures, rather than grounding ourselves in the deeper truths that emerge from within—where true creativity and connection reside.
The point I’m trying to make is this: many of us are caught up in what’s happening out there in the world, in this particular moment in time, rather than tuning in to what truly moves us. What calls to us. What gives our life meaning. And maybe that’s why we get stuck.
Is identity really what drives creativity? Maybe not. Or maybe yes. But when you find yourself blocked, it might be worth asking: What does creativity mean to me? What part of my identity fuels my energy to create?
On Connection by Kae Tempest (2022)
My process of identifying a design language began as an attempt to overcome a creative block. In searching for a way forward, I realized that creativity is deeply influenced by how I define my identity — by understanding what matters to me and what I want to pursue in my practice.
As mentioned earlier, I recognized that I had been operating more in response to external trends — following what’s happening "out there" — rather than focusing inward on what truly interests me. While self-reflection is important, it alone isn’t enough to define one's identity. In creative practices, we often work better with probes — external prompts that challenge or guide our thinking.
So in searching for my design language, I’ve begun to look outward — but not just at visual aesthetics or designers whose work I find inspiring. Instead, I’m trying to understand the deeper aspects of their practices: their manifestos, their philosophies, and how they approach design.
This journey led me to two designers whose work resonates with what I’m trying to explore conceptually and philosophically: Johanna Seelemann and Julia Lohmann. Although I may not yet be able to fully articulate my own practice, this search for a design language is essentially a journey to define what kind of practice I want to claim for myself.
What draws me to Seelemann and Lohmann is how they integrate materiality, science, and systems thinking — all in relation to the human experience. Their approaches open up new ways of thinking about design that I find both inspiring and aligned with the direction I want to take.
Figure 1: The draft of my design language (Wigy, 2025)