The sum of its parts

I saw some photos of a house where the owner had installed manufactured wood flooring ... on the ceiling.

The effect was unmistakable: it looked like there was manufactured wood flooring on the ceiling.

* * *

Sometimes the whole is exactly the sum of its parts and nothing more.

When design is at its best, elements work together to elevate the whole. The viewer is delighted and changed — at times even unknowingly.

When design is clumsy, the viewer’s attention is pulled backwards from experience and into the production phase ... questioning the designer’s choices.

What was intended as innovation ends up reading as blunder.