No Comments Written by Robert on May 26, 2008 – 1:15 am

Engineering design departs from the arena of style in that its content focuses on scientific methods while taking into account aspects of sustainability, as well as environmental, material, and production technologies that play an important role in innovative product development processes.

The activity of designing began long before the phrase “engineering design” was coined and for as long as people have existed form has been a decisive factor when selecting objects. This applies to objects found in nature, objets trouves, as well as artifacts.

Defining design as art with a function means that there would be another interface between the applied and fine arts at the point when the primary functional use that prompted the particular choice of form becomes secondary, transforming the once purpose-specific object into an object that is now observed, appraised, admired, or even worshipped for its aesthetics.

As none of the variations of the aphorism “form follows x” (where x = function, emotion, and so on) are adequate definitions of design, it is important to remember that even Louis Henry Sullivan, the man behind the three-word declaration, adorned his own modern high-rise architecture with ornaments and decorations, and that even today ornament is still not a crime. One example of a piece of contemporary high tech ornamentation is the rubber knobs on the handle of Braun electric shavers, which have no real haptic or ergonomic function.

In fact, there are many examples of design elements that are independent of functional rationalization, even in areas that at first glance would appear to be outside the scope of styling. An example of this phenomenon from the nineteenth century is the vertical form of steam engines that was a deliberate reference to ancient Greek and Roman architecture and not a technical or functional necessity. In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, the appearance of machines and equipment is reinforced by stylistic elements that are there to convey technological supremacy visually.

Car styling (Automobile Design) has had an enormous influence on the sector that constructs machinery, where a curved and graceful line is evident in a vast range of equipment, including static objects like Heidelberg printing presses. Consumer goods manufacturers, dedicated as a rule to minimalism and reduction, also employ design details that are not entirely based on function.

Coating technologies simulate luxury finishes in car interiors or on cell phones, where special laminations can simulate carbon fiber or galvanized plastic can imitate metal. This is called mimicry design. The technologically-inspired decoration serves subconsciously to convey ideas of beauty and technological innovation. Of course, stylistic elements also have a cultural context and are implemented accordingly by global companies to support product-marketing strategies. Something akin to engineering design probably already existed in the Stone Age or at the moment a suitable, natural object became scarce and needed to be replaced by an artificially made, easily reproducible version.

Even in the Stone Age it was necessary for form, materials, and production methods to focus on optimizing function. If more than one material is required, then construction and assembly methods play additional roles in constructing the artifact with regard to its intended functions. This function could be a secondary one based on adornment or display, as commonly seen on hatchets and axes. The intended primary purpose of an object greatly influences its shape via design, material, and production method if the aim is to make it function better.

Engineering design cannot freely invent a purpose-related form, because this is determined by functionwhich, again, largely determines the choice of the most appropriate material and production method. Optimizing purpose-related form requires clear, causal relationships. Perhaps this is why general designers do not design airplanes, wing sections, rockets, satellites, internal combustion engines, or cardiac pacemakers.

Engineering design’s progress is attributable to the development of mathematical models that determine the manufacturing process and the associated virtual simulations (Virtual Reality) that allow one to analyze many more variations than would be possible without a computer (CAD/CAM/CIM/CNC). Materials research and further development in amalgamation and production technologies are making it possible to create completely new and innovative forms (Rapid Prototyping).

All this feeds into the purpose-related form. The memoirs of French-born American industrial designer Raymond Loewy were called “Never Leave Well Enough Alone.” Striving for optimal outcomes is a never-ending taskand yet, the world economy is growing despite the fact that most of the goods, capital or consumer, available today are not professionally designed. From this it can be deduced that design is obviously not the most important factor in this burgeoning consumerism.

Design has always been a niche concern of the intellectual bourgeoisie in mainly Western, industrial countries. Design can also mean that something might look better, but function less well, cost more, and be less durable than other similar products. Engineering design counters this with scientific methods for finding the optimal form coupled with intuition and aesthetics. This might be why engineering design seldom concerns itself with furniture, household accessories, or things that are not actually essentialmaking it fundamentally different from the field of design in general.

In the second half of the twentieth century, bionics began to influence artifacts. Bionics is based on examples taken from nature, but does not merely duplicate these in the technical, manmade world. Bionic architecture (a building for cognitive science modeled on the workings of the brain) and objects (a car whose shape is derived from a trunkfish so that it can accommodate equipment) are based on direct, phenomenological counterparts of natural models mostly borrowed ad hoc from biology. The study of bionics, also called “biomimicry,” could become the somewhat fantastical technological metaphor for the next phase of modernity.

Charles Darwin was and continues to be misunderstood as if the survival of the fittest meant the fastest, strongest, or best survive. In reality, the fittest means the solution that best fits the situation at hand. From this it follows that the minimal use of resources and energy for maximum results, coupled with a perfect economic loop, becomes an essential part of the equation for success. Regarding material, combination, and production technologies, this implies a shift from isotropic (uniform) to anisotropic (composite) materials, from linear to non-linear, and from mono- to multi-functional integrated properties. In the future, environmental technology will play an ever-increasing role in the sustainable development of the human race (Environmental Design, Sustainability), especially where the production of its artifacts are concerned. Engineering design is geared to this development.

The fact that the terminology of design has become so compartmentalized reveals how highly fragmented our understanding of the discipline is, a discipline that requires a series of specialists rather than a unified approach.

The unity of art, science, and technology was standard when Leonardo da Vinci was working during the Renaissance without a need for the term “engineering design”despite the fact that so many inventions, even those that derived from direct observation of nature, were made at that time. This compartmentalization is reflected in our educational strategyeven in the two-phase bachelor/master’s progression at universityand in the specificity of the academic degree, Graduate Engineer in Industrial Design.

Maybe in the future, the latter could be replaced by the invented word “scionics,” a composite of science and bionics.