From doors to phones, Don Norman’s lesson on why modern design needs exit points

That irritation with things which are pretty but thoughtless has morphed into a lifelong discipline for Norman.

Don Norman is an irritable, 89-year-old man. After listening to two minutes of platitudes on what an inspiring man he is, he says with a weary wave of the hand, “Why don’t we just begin?”

Donald Arthur Norman at BITS Design School in Thane on Thursday. (SATISH BATE/HT)

The issue here is, where to begin. Because Norman is the kind of man who didn’t just design objects; he redesigned how we think about them. Long before “user experience” became Silicon Valley jargon, he gave it meaning. His fingerprints are on everything; how we