What is Craft in the Age of 'Good Enough'?
Updated: Sep 24
Written by Michael Fullman, Chief Creative Officer
Michael Fullman is a creative executive and design-first leader. As Chief Creative Officer of ACRONYM, he shapes immersive brand experiences across physical and digital worlds, from live show to large-scale events, envirorments
This is one of the most generative moments creative work has had in a long time. The tools available to a single team today would have required a studio of thirty a decade ago. People are exploring things now that weren't possible two years ago. There is a real craft renaissance happening for anyone paying close attention. There is also more output than at any point in history. The gap between what's made and what's worth making has gotten wider, faster.
Quality and quantity used to track each other. They don't anymore and in that gap, craft has become the differentiator again because of the tools now at our disposal.
Craft is not polish
Craft is sometimes confused with polish. The extra hour, the final 10 percent, the layer of finish that lifts a thing from good to ‘great’. Polish matters, but that isn’t the craft. Craft, to me, is something built over time. It comes from experience and from genuine passion for what you're doing. Experience alone produces routine. Passion alone produces enthusiasm. But craft needs both.
What you develop, year over year, is judgment. It’s an ability to look at something and know whether it's right, not just whether it works. That kind of discernment isn’t and oftentimes can’t be taught in any meaningful way. It accumulates over time, from every project, every collaboration, every late night call about whether to ship a thing as it is or hold it another day. That kind of judgment can’t be automated because it requires a point of view, real experience, and an honest answer to the question of why you're making the work in the first place.
What clients are actually buying
What we can’t forget about our clients in the creative space is that they do have deep creative literacy. They can read decisions in the work. Which also means they aren't buying quality in the conventional sense. They want to see the thinking. Why this, not that. Why now. What did you choose not to do. That's a more interesting bar than it used to be because it pushes us to be sharper, more articulate, more deliberate, and it's a sign that craft still matters at the highest levels of how brands want to show up. The work has to be made with judgment, and the judgment has to be visible.
Creative judgment is still a human skill
While some people might consider the most interesting questions on any project being about the tools you're going to use, professionally, I think it’s what questions you're going to ask before you even open them. What is this for? Who is it for? What does it need to make them feel? What is the simplest version of this idea, and is the simplest version actually the best one? While these might not be the most profound questions, they're the easiest ones that get skipped when speed becomes the priority. They're the ones that determine whether the work matters.
We are constantly evolving the tools and processes we use at Acronym. New software, new pipelines, new ways to get from idea to execution. That's part of what experience design is. Building in territory that's still being mapped. But the tools should never replace the discipline of asking those questions first because they make it more possible to act on the answers, faster.
The work that ends up landing has the fingerprints of craft on it. You can tell that the process behind it was cared for, focused on, considered at every stage. That someone gave a damn.
Craft scales meaning
The tools will keep evolving. The output will keep accelerating. In that environment, craft becomes the most important thing a creative person can develop. Not as a defense against the tools but as the thing that decides whether the work made with those tools is worth anything at all.
That is craft. It’s the relentless interrogation of whether you're making the right thing in the right way for the right reasons, not just the careful application of a ‘skill' toward a predetermined outcome. While speed scales output, craft scales and segments the meaning.
Read more from Michael Fullman
Michael Fullman, Chief Creative Officer
Michael Fullman is a creative executive and design-first leader working at the inersection of experience, culture, and emerging technology. As Chief Creative Officer of ACRONYM, he shapes immersive brand experiences across physical and digital worlds, from live show to large-scale events, envirorments. Michael believes technology should serve craft and deepen human connection through work that feels tangible, emotional, and unforgettable.
