Design is everywhere - and that's why looking for a definition maynot help you grasp what it is.
Design is everywhere. It's what drew you to the last piece offurniture you bought and it's what made online banking possible.It's made London taxi cabs easier to get in and out of and it madeStella McCartney's name. It's driving whole business cultures andmaking sure environments from hospitals to airports are easier tonavigate.The single word 'design' encompasses an awful lot, and that's whythe understandable search for a single definition leads to lengthydebate to say the least.
There are broad definitions and specific ones - both havedrawbacks. Either they're too general to be meaningful or theyexclude too much.One definition, aired by designer Richard Seymour during theDesignCouncil's Design in Business Week 2002, is 'making thingsbetter for people'. It emphasises that design activity is focused firstand foremost on human behaviour and quality of life, not factors
like distributor preferences. But nurses or road sweepers could saythey, too, 'make things better for people'.Meanwhile, a definition focused on products or 3D realisations ofideas excludes the work of graphic designers, service designersand many other disciplines. There may be no absolute definitions
of design that will please everyone, but attempting to find one canat least help us pin down the unique set of skills that designersbring to bear.