Kanwee Harichanwong, the director of design at Wide and Narrow, gives us some insight into how they encourage and work together as a team.
Q: What inspired the name of the design studio?
A: The name “Wide and Narrow” basically came from the way the two founders generate ideas. One is good with creativity, seeing the bigger picture and lots of possibility to design. Another is good with focusing on details, narrowing down and bringing the ideas close to reality.
Q: Your approach to design and branding seems to go towards a more modern and sleek direction. Why do you think more and more brands prefer to go for this look?
A: It’s not our intention to have specific directions of design or branding. We believe that the concept of every work piece comes from half of our customers’ identity and half of our identity. Our design studio tries our best to balance every possible requirement such as the customers’ demand, marketing trend, and our identity. We tend to combine all these compositions for the most satisfactory output.
Q: What would you say the creative arts and design industry is like in Thailand?
A: Compared to when I started working in this industry, I believe we have come very far. There is significantly more of an understanding and awareness of creative arts and design from the public. We can also see an increase of art and design events, both directly and indirectly. New entrepreneurs also start to realise the value that design could bring to their businesses. Anyway, even though we have come very far, we still have a long way to go. We need to keep moving for the sustainability of new designers in this industry.
Q: What are the ways you, as a team, encourage each other to be more innovative?
A: Team innovation is the backbone of every successful company. It’s what sets a business apart from the competition, and helps it to grow and prosper. We empower our designers to make decisions and take action. For example, if I never think creatively with my own work, I can’t really expect our employees to do the same.
To see what works well before starting a design, I always encourage my team to experiment, do their own research, and test out an idea to identify the barriers and solutions before starting a design.
Q: Have you ever experienced a creative block while working on a project and how did you overcome that?
A: As a design student, creative block happens from lack of experience but when we become a designer, creative block happens from depending too much on sense and experience. We forget to adapt the theories we got from our classes. When that happens, we have to stop everything, take a step back, and use creative and design theories to re-evaluate our work before moving on.
Q: Which project would you consider your most significant accomplishment?
A: Virgin Daisies was one of our first identity design projects we accomplished. It’s the area that we believe to be an expert in. We began to adopt graphic design ideas into the retail business. From that point onward, it became the foundation of our business direction where we became experts in that integrated area, from graphic design to interior design.
Good things are meant to be shared. 😉 To see more of Wide & Narrow’s work, check out the links below!
Website: Wide & Narrow
Behance: Wide & Narrow
Facebook: Wide & Narrow
Instagram: wideandnarrow
Vimeo: WideAndNarrow