WEEK 3 TUTORIAL

The question for the third week tutorial is probably had been widely asked among the students who are dwelling in subjects which involve the process and activity of designing. The question:

“Is design brief provide by your client is same as design problem?”

In addition, we were also given a sample case:

The design brief is to create an interior design of navigation signage for dementia patients’ care/residence. The residence has 24 patients, 4 care takers and 12 administration staff.

“Is this brief a task or a problem? If it is a problem, what is it? How do you jump into this problem/brief? Where do you start and why?”

As for my answer, I would say that the design brief is actually a task rather than the problem. While the brief, which also the task, is to design a signage for 24 dementia patients, the designer must also be considerate of the problems that the readers of those design may encounter. This, therefore become the problem. How are we going to design a signage that is not going to cause confusion among the dementia patients? Since signs are just communication tool, the problem is how are we going to communicate the message that the sign contain effectively, yet efficiently?

To get a grasp of the problem, I would firstly set a goal for the design, then executing a series of analysis to determine the obstacles that might get in the way of achieving the goals which I had set before.  After determining both the goal and the problems that comes with it, I would work on a research to get a way around those constraints. Finally, I would evaluate everything that I had done, and fix every part of the design which I think is flawed, or can be done better.

In the previous journal, my comprehension of design activity had developed from the traditional understanding of design activity into a slightly more complex version of modern day design concept, as I was introduced to the modern day definition of design activity, which, as it is defined by Archer (1984), involves planning, crafting, and outcomes that is novel. The second week lecture, upon deeper studies, had also led me into a more complex ideas about the design activity, as in the lecture, I was also introduced to the aspects that surrounded the design activity such as analysis, synthesis and evaluation.

Reference:

Archer, L. B. (1984). Systematic method for designers. London: The Design Council.