General
A course looking at Design
Suitable for KS4 + pupils
Topic outline
Topic 1
Introduction
- This unit looks at the process of design – from assessing the complexity of design as an activity, to exposing the difficulty in making general conclusions about how designers work. You will be able to...
Topic 2
1 Design and designing
- Design is everywhere. Look around you, and consider the objects you see. For example, in my office I can see my computer, a telephone, a pen, a coffee mug, my sunglasses, a stapler, my wallet, my diary,...
- One way to look at design is to consider it as a problem-solving activity. For example, a person designing the interior of a house has to solve many problems such as how to make it functional in an appropriate...
- I stated in Section 1.2 that we are all capable of undertaking design activity. I am now refining this to the activity of designing. Some people have developed their skills and abilities to a high level...
- Any attempt to integrate skills, knowledge, abilities and sensitivities in formulating a design is going to be difficult, and the outcome from one designer's work is likely to differ from another person's...
- In the opening sections I raised the question of ‘need’ as a foundation for design activity. A dilemma came to light: although we might look for needs before generating design proposals, we recognise that...
- Generally, solving design problems is different from solving puzzles or mathematical equations. One major difference is that design problems are often not well-specified. This is discussed in more detail...
- Design is an interesting form of problem-solving, since part of the problem is to find an accurate way of expressing what the problem is. This may sound paradoxical, but it is quite simple really. For...
- Before proceeding further, it is worthwhile clarifying some of the terminology which surrounds the design process. The words given in the heading above are often used almost synonymously, and in this unit...
- Most design is routine: it's a job. It's people at drawing boards, working at computers, building models, arguing in meetings and learning by doing design work. The subject of design is broad and it takes...
Topic 3
2 Design and innovation 1: the plastic kettle
- Section 1 attempted to tease apart the various factors and processes that might be found in design activity. Designs can be the result of quite complex interactions which in turn are influenced...
- As sales were so buoyant, does this indicate that the new plastic kettles were an immediate runaway success? Well, actually no. The early plastic kettles quickly became shabby, primarily because the polymers...
- I started this section with a reference to needs and I want to return to this now. There was no explicitly stated ‘need’ for a kettle made of plastic or a kettle shaped like a jug. Even if a manufacturer...
Topic 4
3 Models of the design process
- As discussed in Section 1, models – physical or conceptual – are used extensively in design to give information about what the final product might look like or what its properties will be. This is a way...
- In this section I am going to make a model of the design process. I'm not going to be specific about what is being designed; I want the discussion to be very general in a way that will apply to many products....
- Having now begun to make simple models of the design process, let us consider whether this is useful. Are such models helpful in working on and developing a new design? I will postulate that there are...
- In this section I have:
Topic 5
4 Conceptual design
- We might also come across this process of defining the design space in other fields such as laying out a page on a word processor, designing our garden, or planning to redecorate a room. This is not really...
- Hull shapes for sailing boats typically fall into the three types shown in Figure 22. The ‘fin and skeg’ design is typical of modern mass-produced yachts and small dinghies. The long-keel design is typical...
- It is possible to become fixed in one particular design solution space and not realise the potential of alternative approaches. Figure 24 shows Puffin, a human-powered aircraft produced by a design team...
- In this section we have looked at how the generation of an initial concept can dominate the design decisions which are made thereafter. The amount of space available in a boat is dependent on the keel...
Topic 6
5 Concept to prototype
- In the last section I examined one part of the design process in detail: the generation of concept. Towards the end of this stage, ideas for a design are given some detail. However, they are still not...
- A little later I will describe an example of a product undergoing this process of defining the detail where you can follow the decisions that are made. First I will give some general examples to give a...
- One of the difficulties with designing is that it is almost always complex. There are contexts, which impose particular constraints on parts of the design and their connections. To describe a design case...
Topic 7
6 Design and innovation 3: the Brompton folding bicycle
- Go to buy any functional product, and you will almost certainly be presented with a range of different designs. Some of the differences will just be in the styling, but there may also be real differences...
- Andrew Ritchie started designing a folding bicycle in 1975, stimulated by the Bickerton folding bicycle design. The Bickerton (Figure 44) is made from aluminium, and is hinged at the chainwheel bracket....
- In Ritchie's first prototype design (P1) the rear wheel hinged forward in its own plane from the lowest point of its triangular support structure, as in the production model in Figure 46. However, unlike...
- The major design difference between P1 and subsequent prototypes was the removal of the complex skewed hinge required to move the front wheel in its own plane underneath the bicycle to sit alongside the...
- A bicycle consists essentially of a horizontal beam, to which is attached the wheels and a seat post. It is this beam which, structurally, is the most important part of the bicycle. There are forces acting...
- Let's return to the story of the development of the Brompton. Because Andrew Ritchie could not sell his idea, he decided to set up his own factory to manufacture the bicycles. He borrowed money from friends...
Topic 8
7 Conclusions
- In this final section I would like to lead you to consider several different ways of looking at design. This is meant to introduce some of the issues and debates which have engaged designers.
- Design is rather like problem solving. We try to define the problem, perhaps in terms of a client's requirements, then search possible solutions for a satisfactory outcome. However, design itself is much...
- We have noticed during the unit that designing takes place under various degrees of uncertainty. This is another way to classify design. From the early stages to a concept are full of uncertainty, whereas...
- The term ‘industrial design’ is often used to denote those design activities mainly concerned with the appearance and aesthetics of a product. In contrast the term ‘engineering design’ is often used narrowly...
- Designs are not just differentiated by what they do and how they do it, or what they look like, but also by the wider social and economic contexts in which they are created and used. To illustrate this,...
- To end on a lighter note I would like to touch on a famous design case study from the history of navigation. Clocks in the 1700s only worked accurately if their mechanisms were kept still on the mantelpiece....
