What the Cooper-Hewitt Needs: More Design, Less Talk

This month’s issue of Fast Company, “The United States of Design,” includes a profile of Bill Moggridge, director of the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, co-founder of IDEO, and all around design world untouchable. The profile, by Jessica Lustig (a friend and former colleague), focuses on Moggridge’s big plans for the museum, which variously and vaguely include business partnerships, hands on programs, becoming a clearinghouse for other design organizations, and a better digital presence. What the article can’t, and Moggridge apparently won’t address, is what he’s actually going to do with the museum as a museum. When he lists the museum’s constituencies, designers come last.