Clare Cooper
When we come up with new ideas, it is important not only to ground those ideas in research about the end users and/or customers but also to consider relevant precedents. There is much we can learn from the history of design. Previous design solutions have been influenced by opportunities, pressures, resource availability, needs, desires and other designs that have come before them. Design timescapes provide an approach for visualising these influences in an organised way. This allows us to better understand how design concepts, products and projects came into being and what the consequences of their realisation are for broader society.
Continued on pages 62–63 of Design. Think. Make. Break. Repeat.