Why do so many designs fail to pass the everyday test? Why is Normal disappearing, and when it’s gone how do we replace it? Is beauty just a question of looks, or could there be more to it than meets the eye? What makes a good object, and how come some objects get better with time?

Super Normal is more than a curatorial strategy. It a project denoting a positive feeling of esteem for objects who, according to Morrison and Fukasawa, radiate something good. It is rooted in the designers' shared belief that the objects we most enjoy using and looking at often seem, at first sight, quietly unremarkable because there is nothing conventionally spectacular about them. Super Normal is about sensations of the ordinary, whose characteristics can be put into words but are best revealed through the objects themselves. The aesthetics of these 210 objects (some anonymous some not) is in many ways a tribute to the legacy of design history. But it is also meant as an encouragement to current and future designers to observe the everyday more acutely before riding the waves of glossy lifestyle magazines and marketing departments.

"When I'm true to my feelings, I really "get" Super Normal” says Fukasawa. Morrison declares that, "there are better ways to design than putting a big effort into making something look special. Special things demand attention for the wrong reasons, interrupting potentially good atmosphere with their awkward presence. Super Normal is the artificial replacement for normal, which with time and understanding may become grafted to everyday life." June 2010, Jasper Morrison

From 3 July until 24 octobre 2010
SUPER NORMAL GENT: celebrating the normality of everyday objects
Design museum Gent