TY - GEN
T1 - A practical approach to product design for future worlds using scenario-development
AU - Eggink, Wouter
AU - Reinders, Angelina H.M.E.
AU - van der Meulen, Barend
N1 - Conference code: 11
PY - 2009/9/10
Y1 - 2009/9/10
N2 - The focus of consumer product design is shifting from primarily offering functionality, towards
experience and emotion driven product characteristics [1]. At the same time the functioning of
products is more and more defined in its social context. Product designers can play a major role in
developing our future social context, as long as they are aware of the responsibility towards users,
society and environment. In the master ‘Design & Styling’ of the Industrial Design Engineering
program of the University of Twente, we created a course “Create the Future”, addressing both these
future- and society oriented aspects of design. In this paper we describe the course structure and the
associated teaching methods, give examples of student results and discuss the points of interest and
application possibilities. In the 2008 edition the students explored the future of food. First the students
created a future context by investigating, building and visualizing multiple scenarios. Subsequently
they designed a future product concept within these scenario contexts. It showed that the structure of
this course was particularly suitable for designing products for the not so near future, i.e. 15-20 years
ahead. Especially scenario development proved to be a good instrument for the students to be able to
create a tangible context for designing future products and services.
AB - The focus of consumer product design is shifting from primarily offering functionality, towards
experience and emotion driven product characteristics [1]. At the same time the functioning of
products is more and more defined in its social context. Product designers can play a major role in
developing our future social context, as long as they are aware of the responsibility towards users,
society and environment. In the master ‘Design & Styling’ of the Industrial Design Engineering
program of the University of Twente, we created a course “Create the Future”, addressing both these
future- and society oriented aspects of design. In this paper we describe the course structure and the
associated teaching methods, give examples of student results and discuss the points of interest and
application possibilities. In the 2008 edition the students explored the future of food. First the students
created a future context by investigating, building and visualizing multiple scenarios. Subsequently
they designed a future product concept within these scenario contexts. It showed that the structure of
this course was particularly suitable for designing products for the not so near future, i.e. 15-20 years
ahead. Especially scenario development proved to be a good instrument for the students to be able to
create a tangible context for designing future products and services.
KW - IR-78391
KW - society
KW - Product design
KW - future
KW - scenario development
KW - METIS-259432
M3 - Conference contribution
SN - 9781904670186
BT - The 11th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education
A2 - Clarke, A.
PB - Institution of Engineering Designers
CY - Westbury, Wiltshire, UK
Y2 - 10 September 2009 through 11 September 2009
ER -