WHEN OVER-ENGINEERING BECOMES THE PRODUCT

“Over-engineering is usually framed as a mistake, a failure to restrain complexity or to understand real needs. In functional terms, this is often true. Objects become harder to use, more fragile, more expensive to maintain, and less efficient than necessary. And yet, many of the most celebrated products of the last decade are precisely this: complicated where they do not need to be, elaborate where simplicity would suffice. The issue is not excess itself, but intent.

Most everyday objects are judged by how quietly they perform. The best ones disappear into use, doing what they are meant to do and stepping out of the way as quickly as possible. Over-engineering breaks this contract. It insists on being noticed. Interactions become longer, heavier, sometimes awkward, and the object no longer serves the task efficiently but reframes it. In these cases, the friction is not accidental. It is introduced deliberately, as a way to shift attention from outcome to process.

In certain contexts, complexity stops being a flaw and becomes the point. A mechanical corkscrew that turns opening a bottle into a performance, a device that introduces steps where none are strictly required, a product that asks the user to learn its logic rather than adapt instantly to it. The function remains intact, but it recedes into the background. What comes forward instead is the effort required to engage. Use becomes a sequence rather than a gesture, and time accumulates around the object.

When this happens, value is displaced. It no longer sits in how effectively a problem is solved, but in how convincingly the object justifies its own existence. Complexity becomes communicative. It signals intention, seriousness, sometimes even authority. Brands understand this dynamic well. When a product comes from a sufficiently trusted source, users are willing to accept inconvenience, carry additional components, learn new gestures, and change habits. The rationale does not always need to be explicit or even fully convincing. Reputation fills the gaps, and what would be criticised elsewhere is reframed as vision.

There is, however, a narrow margin between deliberate complexity and design failure. When additional steps feel arbitrary, frustration follows quickly. When they feel purposeful, they generate attention and involvement. The distinction is rarely technical. It lies in whether the object makes its logic legible and whether the user can understand why the friction exists. Successful over-engineering does not try to optimise use. It amplifies interaction and treats use itself as something to be experienced rather than minimised.

This does not make over-engineering inherently good. In most cases, it remains wasteful and unnecessary. But in specific contexts such as luxury, ritual, and performance, it becomes something else. It turns into a form of storytelling, where the product is no longer simply a solution but an argument. And like any argument, it only works if someone is willing to engage with it.”

– Mike Simonelli

February 2022