Understanding Design

Design is the deliberate act of shaping something — an object, image, space, or experience — to solve a problem for someone, within real constraints.

Humans design because our bodies are unspecialized but our minds can plan — so we shape tools, clothing, shelter and systems to close the gap between ourselves and the world.

Design and art share methods and materials, but design is accountable to a problem and an audience, while art answers primarily to the artist's own intent.

Decoration embellishes a surface; design determines whether the thing works at all. The two can coexist happily, but mistaking one for the other produces objects that impress and fail.

Function is what a thing does; form is what it looks and feels like. The long argument between them is really an argument about which one should be decided first.

Before designing any solution a designer must understand the problem — who has it, why it exists, what has been tried. Solving the wrong problem well is still a failure.

Constraints — material, budget, time, technology, regulation — are not obstacles standing in the way of design. They are the conditions that make design necessary and often make it better.

A design is only good or bad relative to a particular person in a particular situation — the same object can succeed completely for one user and fail completely for another.

Visual design is the deliberate arrangement of shape, color, type and space to communicate meaning and direct attention before a single word has been read.

Design history traces how objects, images and systems evolved in response to technology, materials and society — showing that today's choices sit inside a long chain of cause and effect.