Materials are like words.
Exploring Materials contains everything designers need not only to jump-start their design process, but also to follow a project through from idea to prototype to finished object..
The book concludes with a section on making it real, moving beyond the prototype to create a product that can be manufactured and marketed.
It highlights the materials\' behaviors and propertieswhich suggest different types of structure, surface, and connectionand it shows experimental uses of these materials, demonstrating how designers from around the world have exploited their characteristics in inventive ways.
The core of the book is a visual glossary of thirty-two materialsfrom corrugated cardboard to molded felt to plastic film.
By considering what is needed instead of what specific product can be made, designers examine the methodology of designing.
The book opens with two extensive studies: one for a place for sitting and one for a method for carrying.
Student exercises and inspiring examples from the world of contemporary product design show readers how to use Materials as tools for thinking and making.
Best-selling author Ellen Lupton (Thinking with Type) and her colleague Inna Alesina examine Materials from several points of view, including traditional uses, experimental uses, techniques and directions for prototyping with everyday objects, and environmental implications.
In place of the abstraction of pure forms or the whimsy of virtual objects, it encourages designers to make and test real objects in a studio environment.
Exploring Materials is an action-oriented, accessible guide to design thinking that addresses both the "how" and "why" of product design.
Sketching ideas with a pencil or rendering them with computer software are useful experiences, but there is no substitute for confronting physical forms and Materials directly.
The richer your design vocabulary, the more distinctive the design solutions you can express.
Materials are like words
