# Make taste explainable

Source: https://segern.com/practice/make-taste-explainable

Know why it belongs.

Taste helps us choose between possibilities that may all be technically acceptable. It notices an awkward transition, an unnecessary feature, a sentence that sounds right but says little, or an opportunity to make something feel unmistakably itself.

That judgment needs more than the authority of the person expressing it. We explain what a choice contributes, what it costs, and why it suits this particular work. Examples help. So do counterexamples that show where a promising idea becomes excessive, confusing, or wrong for the situation.

References can sharpen our perception without becoming instructions to imitate. The useful question is what made a decision appropriate in its original context, and whether that reasoning holds here.

We take evidence seriously without pretending every worthwhile quality fits a metric. We also refuse to use taste as protection from feedback. When people consistently struggle with a decision we admire, the decision deserves another look.

A shared standard should make critique more precise and collaboration more generous. It should help people see the work more clearly, not learn to guess what will please the person reviewing it.

*Can we explain this choice without relying on “it feels more premium”?*