Design is Messy
I learned this lesson the hard way in an architecture class. For the first assignment, most of the students showed up with intricate, beautiful, and fragile homework assignments. One hardy soul showed up with a pile of cardboard shards, duct taped together hastily into an uneven tree. All five feet of the fiery professor stormed over to this monstrosity, and she began to laugh as she grabbed it by its shredded trunk and waved it around menacingly at the other students.
“THIS is what I want to see!” she bellowed. A nearby student ducked as she swung it. He saved himself from getting decked, but his painstakingly crafted homework caught a branch and fell to the floor in pieces.
“THIS is a prototype! It gets the idea across quickly and sturdily. Do not even THINK about beauty yet!” She swung around again, as if to yell at anyone behind her who had missed her point. This time, the draft alone was enough to knock over another unlucky student’s paper-crafted structure that had obviously taken many nights’ sleep. Unfortunately, that unlucky student was me.
She slammed the tree back on the desk and stomped to the far corner to begin her critiques with a defiant “Explain yourself.”
Ever since, I have laid projects out and built prototypes in front of me early and dirty. I don’t need the perfect shade of ochre to see how everything will come together, and once it happens, it may be cerulean anyway. The early sketches and prototypes over the years have gotten many laughs, both due to their roughness and the little jokes I put in to entertain myself. They are built to get what I need from them. They make sure the design has a solid foundation with no surprises that will sneak up later. When I return to add the polish, I know it will stand up to whatever I throw at it, or whatever I throw it at.