I recall when a Friend of mine told me he'd like to Study Industrial Design, the first thing that came to my mind was 'what the hell is that?' Funny enough, he didn't even know what it meant, but because the term 'Design' was there, that was why he wanted to study it.
I had to do a lil Research from Wikopedia to find out the meaning and I discovered that they are very Creative but 'Inconsiderate' People. Erm, don't get me wrong, industrial design is one Very Great Course for the Very Creative Person: infact, Industrial Design sometimes, require a higher level of Creativity than Architecture.
A very obvious Relationship exist between Industrial Design and Architecture: this is the Application of Creativity in design.
For the Records, DESIGN is the creation of objects and places having practical functions which are intended to be looked at or used.
CREATIVITY can be defined as the development of ORIGINal Ideas to solve practical problems.
INDUSTRIAL DESIGN can be defined as the use of both applied art and applied science to improve the aesthetics, ergonomics, functionality, and/or usability of a product, and it may also be used to improve the product's marketability and even production. Wikipedia.org
Back to the issue, the Industrial Designer is one who takes into consideration issues we Architects also consider, but the differnence between we and them is the ORDER at which those considerations are taken.
Let me explain, the Basic Issues that MUST be put into consideration before any work is designed are:
-Economics
-Functionalty and
-Aesthetics
Both Careers do put into use these Factors but where they differ is in the Order to which they are applied.
For instance, we Architects consider in this order:
-Economics: this comes first because we Architects design for people-most of which are not extra Rich,therefore we need to put into consideration the Budget we are given an Make the best of it.
-Function: lemme put it this way, guys,who will you prefer for a Wife:a beautiful girl with that's not Smart or a 'Not so beautiful' but smart Girl?
The answer is obvious!
So in the same vein, a beautiful building or design that is not Functional is "(@@#%>"<<whatever that means!
-Aesthetics: If Aesthetics wasn't a requirement for Architecture, then Engineers would have more rights to believe that they are better than we Architects.
Aesthetics is Beauty,Full stop! This however dwells on some Boring things tho' known as Principles of Architecture.
So, every Design MuSt be Beautiful, or it's just some other Engineers' work!
For Industrial Design on the other hand, the Order they make use of is:
-Aesthetics
-Function
-Economics
They make use of this order because most of the time, Industrial Designers (obviously) design for Industries, so there is not much of a Money issue.
They design products to be sold, so first, it has to be beautiful so as to attract Customers/Consumers, it then has to be Functional before the issue of Price comes in.
More so, Industrial Designers just design! The effects of their design is the Headache of the Developers. For example, an Industrial Designer can design a Car, but the Mechanical Engineers will them have to Brain storm do as to see how the Engines and the rest fits into that design.
So if you have industrial Design in mind as your Career Choice, I'd say you should go ahead-if you're sure it's you're calling.
...and yeah,you're Welcome.
