On Revolver Aesthetics, Part 1 - Introduction

Monday, July 30, 2007 Filed in: Revolvers, Personal opinions, General gun stuff
What makes one revolver look better than another? Have you ever stopped to think about the design cues that make the difference between a classic and an eminently forgettable gun?

In this series, I'm going to relate my opinions and prejudices regarding revolver design, primarily (though not exclusively) from the standpoint of factory guns. All of the concepts, however, are equally applicable (perhaps "especially applicable") to custom guns.

One thing to keep in mind as you read that these are my opinions, nothing more. I don't claim to be a design guru like, say, Jonathan Ive. What I can claim is to be a casual student of industrial design, and of art in the larger sense. (Growing up with a mother who was an accomplished artist and designer assured that I would understand such things, even if I wasn't terribly creative myself! I guess that's the best description of a critic.)

There exist well accepted design concepts, but that isn't to say that good design is carved in stone; if it were, we could just program robots to spit out our stuff and get some extra sleep! It is in the combination of design elements, with the occasional surprise or personal interpretation, that keeps the process of designing from becoming formulaic.

Some of what is people consider "good design" is really quality of execution. A great design, badly executed, is crap; a less grand design, but well executed, can be superb. Sometimes learning to recognize quality is a necessary prerequisite to appreciating good design.

(Engraving is a good example; I've been to gun shows where there was a good cross section of engraving quality. Invariably those guns with the most coverage get the most attention, but to the trained eye their lack of quality detracts from what might have been a great work of art. In my view, bad engraving is worse than no engraving.)

Finally, remember that 'popular' isn't necessarily the same as 'good'. I dare say that there are far more Velvet Elvii floating around this world than works of Rembrandt, but that hardly makes them equivalent!

Stay tuned for more...

-=[ Grant ]=-
© 2011 Grant Cunningham Click to email me!