Das Gesamtkunstwerk

by Tobias van Schneider
Published Jun 21, 2024

First and foremost I am a designer. By trade and at heart.

I love to design things, love to create things, for myself and for others. It's a way of life for me.

Over the past decade I've had the privilege to experience the full professional spectrum of being a designer in the commercial world.

I worked for direct clients through my own service design studio.

I worked as a freelancer/consultant for other design agencies and their clients.

I worked as a full-time designer at large advertising agencies.

And I've worked as a full-time designer at a regular product company.

Even though I had some sort of design role at each of these jobs, they all differ from each other. The work, the responsibilities, the structure etc.

But with all of these there was something missing for me. Something big, something that kept me moving and eventually landed me to where I am today.

Creating my "total work of art"

In German we have this perfect word "Gesamtkunstwerk"often associated with Richard Wagner's operas, which translates to "total work of art" or "universal artwork."

It describes a creation that harmoniously integrates multiple art forms — music, drama, visuals — into a cohesive, immersive experience. As a designer, I've come to see my business from this perspective. A symphony where every element plays a crucial role in crafting a unified masterpiece.

And this is precisely what I was missing before I had my own product company. Working for clients (as in, providing a service) means that I get to do beautiful designs, but I have very little responsibility or ownership when it comes to the implementation and follow-through of those design solutions. It's both a blessing and a curse: you get the satisfaction of a clean "end" to a project – but sometimes you want to go further, and you can't. As a designer you're hired for your specific skillset, with limited exposure to the entire business operation. And for some, that's the ideal scenario.

But I always had this urge to "control" the entire picture, the "total work of art" across all disciplines. It's a weirdly selfish act to be honest. But I find pleasure in "designing" things more traditional designers might not care about, and perhaps that's the WHY behind what I do today.

Let's look at some of the instruments that make up the orchestra of business:

Customer Support

Customer support, often seen as a mere necessity, is one of the things I'm most passionate about. The entire customer experience can be "designed" from front to back. In fact, I'd even argue that customer support is the backbone of your brand-building effort.

It's where you create a dialogue, build community and even more importantly: It's where you build trust. And the beauty is, it's all in the details. The time you need to respond to support tickets, the tone of voice (part of branding) you use when talking to customers — All these things can be designed. And it's something I greatly missed before having my own product company.

Branding

One of the most fun things about running your own product company as a designer? I get to do the branding for it. The visual and the invisible language that connects everything.

Branding is more than just a logo or color scheme — It's a promise, a personality, a story told through every typeface choice, image or tagline. It's the manifestation of "the vision" made visible through the power of design and copywriting. And that's why for me, branding and customer support for example are inseparable. They belong together in the "Gesamtkunstwerk."

Product Design

Product design is at the core of everything. The company wouldn't exist without it. But product design is more than just the functionality and what it does. It's more than just "solving a problem" in a technical way. Product design can be branding and marketing at the same time. A product in itself can have character, it can be designed with intention and imbued with meaning. Some people think that that's the job of branding or marketing, but it couldn't be further away from the truth.

In fact, I believe this to be one of the great misconceptions of this industry. There are many companies out there who try to fix or change their product with a new logo or marketing idea. But you can't. The product is at the core of it all, and you'll have to do a lot of hardcore "marketing storytelling" to change the story of a product that has a strong narrative on its own. The biggest problem many companies face is that they've separated the product from the brand or marketing. They're all different teams with different roadmaps. It's an orchestra of instruments where everyone's trying to play a different song.

Marketing

I love marketing. In fact I was probably more excited about marketing when I started designing than I was about becoming a designer. It came naturally to me because I was deeply fascinated by human psychology.

Marketing is about sharing your company's story. It's the loud speakers you set up – and where you set them up, how often you do so and how loud you make them. The way you do marketing highly depends on your brand and product. You can't apply the same marketing strategies to every company and just rinse and repeat.

Once again, this is where companies often fail because their marketing department is different to their brand department and their brand department doesn't even talk to the customer support team and so on. When there's a disconnect between all these instruments, the orchestra just doesn't work. The "total work of art" doesn't exist because each of them are fighting for their own attention.

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What I love most is being the conductor, overseeing this entire process. Being the conductor means I can ensure all these elements work together seamlessly. When customer insights inform product design, when branding aligns with marketing messages, the result is a cohesive, meaningful experience. It's truly a designer's dream; for the first time I am able to design every single touchpoint the way I always wanted to.

This holistic approach results in more than just commercial success (I hope). It provides a sense of creative fulfillment, something I was missing before. Moreover, this method fosters more genuine connections. In today's often impersonal world, offering a thoughtfully integrated experience makes people feel understood and appreciated. They're not just buying a product; they're engaging with a brand that speaks to them and speaks with them.

Of course, running your own business isn't always smooth. There are challenges—financial pressures, operational annoyances, market shifts and so on. But the beauty is, each problem becomes a chance to improve some aspect of my operation through the lens of design.

In the end, I get to be a designer the way I imagine a designer to be.

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