Design Thinking: Understanding how designers think and work

201 Pages·2023·13.639 MB·English

by  Nigel Cross

Design Thinking
ii
Design Thinking
Understanding How Designers
Think and Work
SECOND EDITION
NIGEL CROSS
BLOOMSBURY VISUAL ARTS
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
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First published in Great Britain 2023
Copyright © Nigel Cross, 2023
Nigel Cross has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,
1988, to be identified as Author of this work.
For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p. xi constitute an extension of
this copyright page.
Cover design: Nigel Cross
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Contents
List of Illustrations viii
Preface x
Acknowledgements xi
Introduction 1
The design of this book 3
1 Design ability 7
Studying design ability 8
Asking designers about what they do 10
Deconstructing what designers do 16
Watching what designers do 19
Thinking about what designers do 25
Understanding what designers do 28
Summary 28
Sources 29
2 Designing to win 31
Background: Formula One designing 33
Radical innovation 34
Self-adjusting suspension 35
Pit stops 37
Designing from first principles 40
Steering column 41
Integrated design 44
City car 45
Learning from failure 50
Design process and working methods 53
vi C ONTENTS
3 Designing to please 55
Background: The art of technical design 55
Looking for improvement 57
Sewing machine 58
Going beyond the brief 63
Locomotive 64
Learning from failure 70
Design process and working methods 71
4 How designers think 75
Motivation and attitude 75
Other outstanding designers 78
Common features 81
Strategic thinking 83
Creative thinking 86
Problem framing 88
Co-evolution 92
Summary 95
Sources 95
5 Designing to use 97
The experiment 98
Design in action 99
Systems view 102
First principles 103
Designing for clients and users 104
Discussion: Design strategy 107
6 Designing together 111
Teamwork in design 111
Roles and relationships 113
Planning and changing activities 115
Gathering and sharing information 119
Generating and adopting concepts 123
Plastic tray 124
Persuasion 126
C ONTENTS vii
Avoiding and resolving conflicts 128
Discussion: Design cooperation 130
7 How designers work 133
Creative working 134
Team working 136
Team leadership 139
Design process 142
Structure versus spontaneity 145
Collaborative designing 147
Creative designing 149
The creative bridge 151
Summary 153
Sources 153
8 Design expertise 155
Experts and novices 155
From novice to expert 157
Development of expertise 159
Developing design thinking 161
Expertise in teamwork 165
Experience 166
Design intelligence 168
The designing brain 169
Summary 173
Sources 174
Glossary 177
References 179
Index 183
Illustrations
The author and publisher gratefully acknowledge the permissions
granted to reproduce the copyright material in this book.
Figures
1.1 Philippe Starck’s Juicy Salif lemon squeezer for Alessi 9
1.2 Ambiguity, emergence 12
1.3 Philippe Starck’s design sketches for the lemon squeezer on
the restaurant place mat 17
1.4 The Juicy Salif design process deconstructed 19
2.1 Gordon Murray’s sketch for the McLaren F1 32
2.2 Gordon Murray’s explanatory sketch of the F1 steering column
design 42
2.3 Some of Gordon Murray’s early sketches for the city car
concept 45
2.4 Later sketches by Gordon Murray for the T.25 city car 47
2.5 The early wire and card mock-up for the city car 48
2.6 The first prototype version of the T.25 city car 49
2.7 The Dyson DC05 vacuum cleaner 50
2.8 The Brabham BT46B Formula One ‘fan car’ and the Gordon
Murray Automotive T.50 supercar 52
3.1 The Frister & Rossman sewing machine 59
3.2 Kenneth Grange’s sketches 61
3.3 The OXO GoodGrips vegetable peeler 62
3.4 Development of the nose of the High Speed Train to improve
aerodynamics 67
3.5 The British Rail High Speed Train 68
3.6 Evolution of the fret saw frame 69
3.7 The Kenwood Chef kitchen machine 73
4.1 The Lotus Type 108 80
I LLUSTRATIONS ix
4.2 A model of the design strategy followed by creative
designers 86
4.3 The designer’s sketches for the litter bin 92
4.4 A diagrammatic representation of the co-evolution of problem
and solution 93
5.1 The design brief for the experiment 100
5.2 Victor Scheinman’s early sketch 104
5.3 Victor’s later sketch 105
5.4 Victor’s final design sketches 106
6.1 The team’s design process plan 117
6.2 The team’s early ‘concepts-positions’ list 118
6.3 The team’s ‘functional-specification’ and ‘features’ lists 121
6.4 The team’s final ‘concepts-joining’ list 124
6.5 The team’s final design sketches 127
7.1 Principal phases of the team’s and Victor Scheinman’s design
processes 143
7.2 Ivan’s sketch of the ‘convertible trailer’ design 152
8.1 Progressive stages in the development of expertise 158
8.2 Design process timeline plots 162
8.3 Design process timelines for the same student as a first-year
and as a senior 163
8.4 Example design process timelines for senior students ordered
by quality of the resulting design solutions 164
8.5 Design process timeline for a seven-member team 165
8.6 The sequence of sketches for re-designing a laboratory 170
8.7 The sequence of sketches made by the patient with
neurological damage 171
8.8 The pattern of design activities as recorded in the think-aloud
comments 172
Tables
4.1 Reflective practice analysis of one designer’s activities 90
7.1 Different design approaches of Kerry and John 137
7.2 Different roles adopted by the three designers 138