Design of Design

The design has been the central topic of our research. The biggest problem in the design field (e.g. product design, graphic design, landscape design, etc.) is, what is ironical, lack of design. History of design can be backdated only a hundred years and so far designers have not had their own language to describe their designs. Thus the first goal of our research was set to make a dictionary of design languages.

Before showing my recent works, let us share among us a brief view of what design is. New Oxford American Dictionary describes “design” is: 1. a plan or drawing produced to show the look and function or workings of a building, garment, or other object before it is built or made; the art or action of conceiving of and producing such a plan or drawing; an arrangement of lines or shapes created to form a pattern or decoration. 2. purpose, planning, or intention that exists or is thought to exist behind an action, fact, or material object. As we see, there are a couple of concepts in the word “design”: a plan, and drawing. After I illustrate our research projects we would probably have impressions that we have been doing some support for drawing pictures or creating models, however, the core of our research has these both sides: plan and drawing.

Our research projects are classified into two categories. Discovering design language and developing design tools are topics of our current interests. In “discovering design language” category I and my colleagues are challenging to find rules, or syntax, of visual designs. A world-class graphic designer is supporting one of our projects. In “developing design tools” category I and my colleagues are developing novel tools for aiding product designs. Another world-class product designer is supporting one of the projects in this category.