We’ve recently got our hands on Design Incubator: A Prototype for New Design Practice – a handbook written by Patrick Chia – director at the Design Incubation Centre (DIC). The book outlines design strategies and workflows applied by the Centre and was published by Laurence King Publishing last year. It’s a quite interesting reading, here are are some impressions.
The Design Incubation Centre is a design research laboratory based at the Division of Industrial Design at the National University of Singapore. It is a test bed for the teaching programme that engadges students in a series of internships, workshops and studio projects.
Redefining Boundaries
Redefining human interactions and discovery of unmet human needs are some of the major topics discussed at the Centre. Further investigations are driven by basic human needs that evolve in the ever-changing landscape of social trends and technologies.
This leads to numerous interesting design concepts such as Dandella – an intuitive navigational device that uses light to guide the user towards his designated target. (see bellow)
Design Frameworks
The workflow used by the Centre is influenced by Tom Kelley – founder of IDEO and author of the book The Art of Innovation: Lessons in Creativity from IDEO, America’s Leading Design Firm
This leads to the creation of new design frameworks, based on gained knowledge and project experiences.
New Design Practice
One of the most interesting topics discussed in the book is the need to rethink how can design practices explore the new and exciting possibilities presented to them.
The role of design is evolving very quickly as designers are constantly finding themselves engaging in new domains which demand a different set of tools, skill sets and, more importantly, fresh mindsets. […]
With new challenges come new opportunities.
More about DIC
Check out the Design Incubator: A Prototype for New Design Practice
