Design is a distillation of Craft.
The best design is not a set of instructions.
Good design inspires us to relate both to the materials at hand and our place in the world: physically, socially, and spiritually.
Design provides a framework for Craft where we develop our skills.
Design is not a prison of intention.
Design is a trellis
I’ve worked as a boatbuilder, made furniture, and designed and built houses. From these foundations in Craft most of my work has gone in to design. Most of my work has been designing Craft. With one excursion into technological design.
I had the opportunity to teach a short introduction to design at MIT. A week-long course offered during their winter inter-semester session. Open to the entire MIT community.
Reuben Smith and I used creating a half-model, and drawing it to scale, as a vehicle to present an organic approach to design. Helping people discover and identify their underlying needs. Then develop a design, working from first principles. Working to avoid the traps of unexamined assumptions that short-circuit so many design efforts.
The class was recorded as part of MIT’s OpenCourseWare program.
