how to evaluate good design

If you're a great carpenter who's building a great cupboard, you won't put a cheap piece of plywood at the back because nobody's seeing it. You'll still put a great piece of wood there, because you know it is there. Most of the times people ship absolutely deplorable work and say, design is not how it looks but how it works. They have it all wrong.

If you don't have the perspective of art, you'll not create anything beautiful. If you don't create anything beautiful, it is a lost chance. Every day you have a chance to create something beautiful. If you don't capitalize on it, that day is lost. So look for somebody who has a passion for beautiful things, a passion for the beautiful, uncertain subjectivity of beauty. That is the baseline. You put function before it, fine, but the baseline has to be high.