Articles
Search previous Design Council news and articles.
Policy v5.127: Could government make services like Dyson makes vacuums?
20 August 2015
This article is part of The Design Economy series. Manufacturer Dyson tested 5,127 versions of their ‘Cyclone’ vacuum cleaner before it reached production. How many times has government tried to refine our policies? These are...
Design in the Public Sector: An insider's view - Part II
18 August 2015
Devon County Council is part of the latest cohort in the Design in the Public Sector programme hoping to learn how to better engage staff and find innovative new ways of working. Having prepared for the initial two-day intensive...
The top 5 most disruptive hardware trends
13 August 2015
As the finalists on our Spark product innovation fund enter the programme’s final weeks, we ask Andy Hutt, Ursula Davies and Tom Tobia of Makerversity - a pioneering community of emerging maker businesses - to tell us what they...
The importance of evidence-based design
12 August 2015
Dr Dan Jenkins leads the human factors and research team at DCA Design International, working on a range of projects in domains including medical, transport, consumer goods and industrial products. Lisa Baker is a Chartered...
Ergonomics in Design Seminar
12 August 2015
Overview This seminar will include the announcement of this year's Ergonomics Design Award winner, as well as two workshops looking at designing for particular user needs. Each workshop will run twice, once in the morning and...
Knee High Design Challenge: 8 cards open up design debate
11 August 2015
There are many people working within organisations with the potential to create great change - but often without belief in themselves, the support of those around them, or the opportunities to make sense of their power and...
Video: In conversation with the 2014–15 Future Pioneers
7 August 2015
We asked the 2014–15 winners of Future Pioneers – our award to celebrate and nurture emerging designers who are principled, passionate and purposeful – to tell us more about their winning projects and what inspired them. The...
Design in the Public Sector: An insider’s view
6 August 2015
In January 2014, Design Council launched a programme called Design in the Public Sector to increase the knowledge and use of strategic design skills across local authority public services, exposing teams to new ways of working and...
“All engineers should be taught elements of design”
6 August 2015
Professor Dame Julia King, vice-chancellor of Aston University, has a career spanning multiple senior roles in academia at Cambridge and Nottingham Universities and Imperial College in London, in engineering for Rolls-Royce and as...
The importance of measuring the economic value of design
5 August 2015
Why are we measuring the economic impact of design? Design Council is currently celebrating its 70th anniversary and is at the forefront of championing the role and importance of design. Research is a key aspect of assessing the...
It’s education, stupid. Or, how the UK risks losing its global creative advantage
3 August 2015
This article is part of The Design Economy series. Far and wide, Britain is recognised as a leading centre of design education and the creative industries – but could international employment opportunities, fees for higher...