Ted Brown

Ted Brown starts off his presentation by saying that maybe what passes as design isn’t as important, that it doesn’t matter if it is pretty or desirable.  He states that the importance is less on the object itself, but more on the design thinking which would perhaps have a bigger impact. We as designers should solve problems to reach greater results. There is a balance within design of desirability, visibility, and feasibility. Brown believes that the world of design used to be a bigger canvas and has seemed to reach a much smaller one. However, design is getting big again by the use of design thinking. Overall, design starts with humans and what they need. Designers need to understand these people’s needs as well as their culture and context. Ted also discussed the effect prototypes have in the design process. He said that they speed up the overall process by allowing designers to get their ideas out, tested, and then seeing the strengths and weaknesses of them, which result with a final product. This relates to the wayfinding process in the way that we are using prototypes to test something that will hopefully make people have a better experience within a certain location.