Mug Aesthetics
When you are working in the realm of functional art, you have more to think about than just visual aesthetic. You have to consider the user instead of just the viewer.
My Crafts 3 class was starting a wheel-thrown mug unit. Before they started throwing, I thought it would be nice for them to interact with some handmade mugs. I brought in 14 handmade mugs, varying greatly, and let them explore them. After we talked about them as a class, I pulled out a sheet of eight categories that they would rank each mug in (Mug Aesthetics).
The categories were separated into visual aesthetics and ergonomics. We talked about how the different mugs looked, which ones were interesting and cool, which forms were nice to look at, how the handles looked, etc. We also looked at and discussed ergonomics. Was the handle comfortable to hold? Was the mug too heavy? Did the lip look user friendly?
We ranked the mugs and then took the averages of each mug in each category. We then looked at mugs that scored very high and had a discussion about why. Students used this information to make decisions about the mugs they were throwing.
Categories Spring 2018, Student Teacher Blog