A junior designer once showed me a poster. It was clever. Typography formed an image. Colors created depth. The concept was layered with meaning.
"It's very clever," I said.
She beamed.
"That's the problem," I said.
Clever is seductive. Clever makes you feel smart. Clever impresses other designers. But clever often fails the only test that matters: does it communicate?
I spent years chasing clever. Visual puns. Hidden meanings. Designs that revealed themselves slowly, like puzzles. Other designers loved them. Clients were confused by them. Audiences ignored them.
Nobody's trying to decode your design. They're trying to understand the thing your design is communicating.
Clever asks: "Do you see what I did there?" Clear asks: "Do you understand what this means?" One is about the designer. The other is about the audience.
I'm not arguing for simplistic design. I'm arguing for clear design. Complex ideas can be communicated clearly. In fact, complex ideas require clear communication more than simple ones.
Einstein's E=mc² is complex physics, clear communication. Clever would have been a visual metaphor about energy and mass that nobody outside of physics could parse.
If you're choosing between clever and clear, always choose clear.