What is design?

[Deathdart]

Hey,
I'm trying to find out everyone's views on design for my own knowledge. This includes designers and non-designers. I intend to study the feedback I get from people, draw conclusions from it and publish it on my website.

So, in a few lines, please write down what design means to you! Feel free to write whatever you think!


Thanks,
Abhay

[Coy]

great question. I think you'll get a variety of answers, in which I'm eager to read.

For me design is something that I've always loved to do. Either from drawing whatever is in my head, designing custom parts (cad), fabricating something out of metal and just about everything in between. I've always been a creative person and love to make something out of nothing or transforming something into something else. I try to think of things in a different way and if I can make it possible it's one of the most gradify things for me to achieve. Doesn't matter if I get paid or not... even though getting paid to do something you truely enjoy is "icing on the cake". just like when I built houses I can go back 30 years from now and say I made that or seeing a company using something I've designed.

[Rockhart]

hmmm... design to me is communication. Great design is when a person actually understands what you're trying to communicate

[Deathdart]

Thanks for the great replies, more would be appreciated!

@Rockhart: I believe you're talking about just Communication Design

[Chung Dha]

Design is everything and nothing. Design is everything that is created by some one or something. Art is design, but design is not always art. I design cause people find my designs pretty and artistic. Graphic design and webdesign is interesting cause you can make something out of nothing and give it a value, while product design and packaging design is making something out of materials and actually increasing the value of something.

[Maja]

Hi!

I think design is a way of translating. You translate your inner thoughts (are there any other kind? ) about things or words or... Or just translating your current mood or feeling. Or translating other people's (clients) thoughts or ideas into reality.
I love to see a finnished work on paper! It's soooo good to create something from my head, see it "grow", and at the end to hold it in my hands and remembering the first concepts that came to my head, and now here it is in "real world"... It's like creating! Or bringing things to this world, this reality from another dimension! The dimension of thoughts, ideas... Or why knows!

Maja

[Spot2]

My Art-History teacher always said "LISTEN! Design is nothing more than the wart at the ass of art!"

[twistedpiston]

One of the definitions that Webster lists is "adaptation of means to a preconceived end" I think that's pretty much it. I don't think of design as a noun as much as a verb. I think it's more of a process. Like getting an idea from your head to a sketch to the final product. ...just my 2¢

To me, design is taking a feeling, emotion or experience and making it visual and tangible. But, just like any profession, you have to be able to use the tools to preform this. Imagine how frustrating is must be for people to have these feelings with no way to express them...