God is no longer in the details

One of my personal favourite sayings was coined by Mies van der Rohe, who first uttered the famous phrase: God is in the details.

An iconic phrase, deeply mysterious yet also true in its most profound essence. And indeed, as a principle it is unimpeachable: Mies was right. The problem is that we have stopped paying for these details. And God is no longer to be found there…

It happens in homes, in products and in brand experience. In recent years, if you look closely, nobody invests in the small things any more. One more finishing touch. A picture with the right frame. That subtle detail that takes a letterhead from fine to perfect. No, nobody cares about this sort of thing any more. Everyone asks: how much will it cost me? And then, once they hear the price: but who cares?

It is a legitimate question. Entirely understandable. When resources are limited, managing expenses is the reflex of a responsible person. The problem is that this kind of criterion is applied indiscriminately both by those who cannot and by those who could: developers, CEOs and industrialists included.

We can see it on the façades of buildings – far removed from the splendour of constructions a hundred or so years ago –, in the villas we admire on certain streets – boxy, brutalist and all alike –, and then in a culture that, let’s face it… has dried up.

And so the rug is not bought. The finishing touch is skipped. The thing that would have completed the space (a minimal detail, yes, but a fundamental one) stays in the shop, because four hundred euros in your pocket feel more concrete than an effect nobody knows how to put into a spreadsheet cell.

Indeed, God is no longer in the details. And without him – without them – this world now seems so damnably empty.

The maths doesn’t add up

Fortunately or unfortunately, I have been able to observe this mechanism in dozens of different settings. To be clear, we are talking about minimalist homes that are minimalist only because furnishing the space would not have been functional. We are talking about offices that work but say nothing and leave no memory behind. And restaurants, too (good ones, at that), with spectacular food and everything else bland.

We could extend this reasoning to merchandise, company websites, social media and so on. By now, though, the point is clear.

Every sacrifice, taken on its own, has its logical justification. The engraving on the handles does not help the door open any better. Thicker paper does not change the content. The sculpture at the entrance is nice, but it can wait. Small, insignificant details, each assessed on its own for the return it would bring (that is, none).

And here lies the problem! Those details should never have been considered individually, but as a whole: add up a hundred similar decisions and you get something nobody could ever have predicted. On one side, an anonymous, interchangeable environment. On the other, personality. Uniqueness. Character.

But who thinks about these things any more, right?

The detail suffers because its contribution is almost always marginal. Exceptionality, however, is a sum of marginal elements. So it has been, so it will always be.

What a detail really does

Obviously no detail will convert more on its own. But consider the concept of inference: when someone walks into an environment cared for down to the finishing touches, even without forming a judgement on the individual elements (rugs and so on), they will still receive a more general impression. And that impression is: someone here cares. Here, things have been chosen. Here, there is judgement.

Servicescape, the halo effect: for decades neuroscience has been trying to tell us that the physical environment and design can influence the perception of overall quality, as well as the meaning attributed to an experience. Mind you: people are not naive. They are not persuaded by superficiality (not always). Precisely because they are not naive, though, they are likely to think it is easier to receive attention from those who pay attention to things than from those who neglect them. It makes sense, if you think about it.

What happens to brands

This principle applies to individuals as much as to brands.
Today’s compulsive optimisation has drained every perspective of culture: yet it is the brands with a clearly defined culture, able to create a strong experience with their users, that are currently unaffected by intense global competition.

True, the product still works without the heavy packaging or the extra finishing. Margins even improve. But in the short term: only in the short term. The years go by, and management then wonders why the brand generates less loyalty, why price has become the dominant criterion or why more communication is needed to win the same preference. Blame it on a Brand Strategy that was missing from the outset and failed to give value to the details.

Details build culture

Then there is an even less measurable dimension. Details teach.

The craftsman who finishes the part of the furniture nobody will ever see is communicating a standard to those who work with him. The company that responds with care to a minor request is telling its employees what behaviour is considered normal. The manager who accepts “good enough” work because the client won’t notice the difference anyway is teaching something just as effectively.

Culture is shaped by these micro-decisions far more often than by the values written on the wall. An organisation learns what matters by watching what its leaders are willing to correct, defend and pay for.

This is why care is also a pedagogical act. Once a team has learnt that the final five per cent is expendable, the rule tends to spread. First to the internal presentation. Then to the client delivery. Then to the product. In the end, nobody will be able to point to the exact moment the standard dropped, because there was never a single moment.

What is worth paying for

Spending more, in itself, solves nothing. There are expensive details that add no meaning and almost free details that transform an experience on their own. The interesting question concerns the criterion: does this choice make what we want to be truer, more recognisable and more coherent?

If the answer is yes, the return can exist even when we cannot attach a single number to it. If the answer is no, saving in that case is the right call: adding elements would produce no additional trust, quality or reputation.

Mies van der Rohe was right. God is in the details. Except that God does not guarantee ROAS within the quarter, does not appear on the dashboard and refuses to be assessed one element at a time. Those who want that quality, those who want culture and those who want God in their details will have to keep relying on something yet to come.