New York Magazine has a nice little article on Deborah Adler's beautiful pill bottle redesign for Target. 29-year-old Adler has done a great job redesigning something that, in retrospect, was in dire need of a redesign. What made Adler take notice? Her grandmother was hospitalized after mistakenly taking her husband's pills. Who knows how many others have been hospitalized or have even died from making a mistake that better design could have prevented?Some really thoughtful design moves were the color-coded bottle caps (a different color for each member of the family) and the flat face of the bottle instead of the typical cylinder, so information printed on the label is actually readable without having to rotate the bottle.
Target, of course, snatched up the rights to the design. Yet again, they're using good design to set themselves apart from the competition — bravo, Targé. No doubt, other drugstores will be following suit before long.
Surely there are more everyday objects like the pill bottle that could use a good redesign, and could save a life. Can you think of any?
(As an aside, I was amused to see graphic design god Milton Glaser referenced at the bottom of the article. The author mentions that Adler now works for "graphic designer Milton Glaser" but doesn't even make a nod to the fact that Glaser was also the founder and president of the magazine for which she is writing, New York Magazine.) (Thanks to MR for this link.)
