Design – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Design is the creation of a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system (as in architectural blueprints, engineering drawings, business processes, circuit diagrams and sewing patterns).[1] Design has different connotations in different fields (see design disciplines below). In some cases the direct construction of an object (as in pottery, engineering, management, cowboy coding and graphic design) is also considered to be design.

More formally design has been defined as follows.

Another definition for design is a roadmap or a strategic approach for someone to achieve a unique expectation. It defines the specifications, plans, parameters, costs, activities, processes and how and what to do within legal, political, social, environmental, safety and economic constraints in achieving that objective.[3]

Here, a "specification" can be manifested as either a plan or a finished product, and "primitives" are the elements from which the design object is composed.

With such a broad denotation, there is no universal language or unifying institution for designers of all disciplines. This allows for many differing philosophies and approaches toward the subject (see Philosophies and studies of design, below).

The person designing is called a designer, which is also a term used for people who work professionally in one of the various design areas, usually also specifying which area is being dealt with (such as a fashion designer, concept designer or web designer). A designer's sequence of activities is called a design process. The scientific study of design is called design science.[4][5][6][7]

Designing often necessitates considering the aesthetic, functional, economic and sociopolitical dimensions of both the design object and design process. It may involve considerable research, thought, modeling, interactive adjustment, and re-design. Meanwhile, diverse kinds of objects may be designed, including clothing, graphical user interfaces, skyscrapers, corporate identities, business processes and even methods of designing.[8]

Substantial disagreement exists concerning how designers in many fields, whether amateur or professional, alone or in teams, produce designs. Dorst and Dijkhuis argued that "there are many ways of describing design processes" and discussed "two basic and fundamentally different ways",[9] both of which have several names. The prevailing view has been called "The Rational Model",[10] "Technical Problem Solving"[11] and "The Reason-Centric Perspective".[12] The alternative view has been called "Reflection-in-Action",[11] "Evolutionary Design",[7] "co-evolution"[13] and "The Action-Centric Perspective".[12]

The Rational Model was independently developed by Simon[14] and Pahl and Beitz.[15] It posits that:

The Rational Model is based on a rationalist philosophy[10] and underlies the waterfall model,[16]systems development life cycle[17] and much of the engineering design literature.[18] According to the rationalist philosophy, design is informed by research and knowledge in a predictable and controlled manner. Technical rationality is at the center of the process.[citation needed]

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Design - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia