DesignBytes

In July 1907, Leo Baekeland was experimenting with formaldehyde and phenol. What he invented was the first fully synthetic plastic. He called it Bakelite.

For people who want to take their kitchens into a more stylized realm, the International Design Excellence Awards, put on by IDSA, are a good place to start.

Ford is using Microsoft’s HoloLens, an IDEA 2017 Gold winner, to let designers quickly model out changes to cars, trucks and SUVs. This allows designers to see the changes on top of an existing physical vehicle, instead of the traditional clay model approach to car design.

“Striking the right balance between intelligent, high-tech robot and family-friendly, lifestyle product was at the forefront of our minds when developing the design for Aire." said Bill Webb, IDSA.

10 students from Finland's Lahti University of Applied Sciences have designed a collection of essential furniture items for those affected by natural disasters and the refugee crisis.

Some design flaws are obvious, but what about the subtler forms of bad design, the flaws of which make our lives ever so slightly harder every day.

Hyundai Motor Co. has opened a hulking new design studio for its Hyundai and Genesis brands that will allow the automaker to work on 24 separate vehicles at the same time. The main goal of the new studio will be to accelerate the product development process.

Talking Hands is a migrant-run design workshop in Italy where asylum seekers make and sell furniture, embroidery and textiles.

Many designers hold onto the notion that creativity can only be done by a human, that machines can’t make the leap into the creative process, and that the creativity of humans is beyond being mechanized.

Designers have the crucial task of thinking about what our future will look like and how we will interact with it.

When creating new products and technologies, designers tend towards the average user which can exclude the elderly and people with physical disabilities.

Adidas’s Futurecraft 4D is the first 3D-printed running shoe to deliver on the promise of mass customization. But it hasn’t been easy getting here.

Just another design problem? Not quite. But here’s how one designer turns his anxiety into creativity.

Reporter Roger Renstrom of Plastics News takes a closer look at the role of plastics in #IDSAIDEA 2017 winning product designs.

Jaguar has revealed what it calls the steering wheel’s future: an artificially intelligent, voice-activated steering wheel that's removable from the car.

A Cornell professor has partnered with Google, IDEA 2017 Gold winner, to develop robots that help children with autism learn to react emotionally in social situations.

A new exhibition at London’s Wellcome Collection will show how design plays a fundamental part in the healthcare sector, whether we are conscious of it or not.

Officials announced three significant programs developments that will be rolled out during the fall semester.

IBM CEO Thomas Watson Jr. famously declared “good design is good business.” Jeneanne Rae, IDSA has the numbers to prove it. In 2013, Rae, founder of Virginia-based consultancy Motiv Strategies, devised the Design Value Index (DVI), an investment tool she says shows that companies that integrate design thinking into corporate strategy can outpace industry peers by as much as 228%.

Despite its solid economic growth and sizable population (the largest in the world), China is noticeably absent from many conversations and events surrounding design.

German carmaker BMW has unveiled the basic design for the full-production electric version of the next Mini car.

A partially 3-D printed wheelchair that is custom-fit to its owner. It not only looks cool, it uses some smart design tricks to make pushing yourself a little easier.

Aptly called the Fast Food Furniture series, the colorful seating aims to have unpretentious fun with product design by fusing it with icons of American pop culture.

For her graduate work at the Royal College of Art, Dani Clode created a wearable third thumb that can help its user carry more objects, squeeze lemons or play complex chords on the guitar.