Glossary

Design Education

The teaching of theory and application in the design of products, services and environments and focusses on the development of both particular and general skills for designing. It is primarily orientated to preparing students for professional design practice and based around project work and studio or atelier teaching methods.

Design Research

Process specifically undertaken to inform the strategic design and development of products, services and programs through understanding users’ needs (attitudes and behaviours) and cultivating insights from their feedback. Goal is often to reveal hidden layers of information in order to find unmet needs. It assists teams to better understand the underlying and sometimes hidden desires, needs and challenges of end users. In essence, the art of observing what people say & do and then deducing what they think and feel.

Lighting Design (Stage)

For stage/TV/Film etc. The creation of lighting, atmosphere and setting for the production in response to the performance. Lighting Designers work with people such as the director, choreographer, set designer, costume designer and sound designer to create this, while keeping in mind issues of visibility, safety, and cost.

Production Design

Overseeing the overall look, feel, mood of a production (TV, Film, Theatre, Concert). Production Designer connects holistically across many teams to ensure a cohesive result to the overall visual goal. They work with teams that create props, graphics, lighting, sets and locations and may also direct digital special effects.

Set Design

Also known as : Scenic Design, Scenography, Stage Design

The creation of scenery for theatre, film, television.

Account Management

An Account Manager is responsible for the management of sales and relationships with particular clients.

Client Services

Also known as : Client Experience

The process of nurturing and maintaining client relationships. Ensuring an excellent client experience across the board while being a safe pair of hands to drive any project to completion. Project/Account managers may report into the Head of Client services.

Creative Direction

A Creative Director (or creative supervisor) is a person that makes high-level creative decisions and oversees the design and creation of an item, product or suite of products, as well as creative assets such as advertisements, events, branding. They are often responsible for the people on the team as well as for bringing a company’s vision through all of its design.

Design Management

How businesses incorporate design aspects to help achieve business objectives, create products & services, attract customers and support marketing efforts. Design Managers typically create design briefs based on client/company needs, ensure that designs meet necessary standards, requirements & specifications, assist in setting & managing design budgets, train & support the design management team, work across teams to meet business goals and build a culture of creativity to enable design teams to hum along efficiently and create innovative products that bring impact to the business.

Design Project Manager

Works within a studio team and is responsible for managing incoming design requests, co-ordinating project essentials, allocating tasks to specific team members and following through the project lifecycle to completion.

Studio Manager

Responsible for organising the projects within an agency, assigning the work. They make sure the agency delivers work to a deadline, within the budget and that standards of work are maintained.

Design Thinking

Non-linear, iterative process that teams use to understand users, challenge assumptions, redefine problems and create innovative solutions to prototype and test. Involving five phases – Empathise, Define, Ideate, Prototype and Test, it is most useful to tackle problems that are ill-defined or unknown.

Universal Design

Also known as : Design for all, Inclusive Design

The design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood and used to the greatest extent possible by all people regardless of their age, size, ability or disability.

Content Design

Also known as : UX Writing

Design of the language that appears in a user interface. Sometimes called UX writing. Essentially designing with words and refers to written content that informs or persuades an audience. Can also include the images and multimedia used. Content designers and UX writers work within the product design team to craft clear, concise and compelling language within the user interface. They consider the user, the company’s brand voice and the needs of the product.

Digital Design

Broad term for design which utilises creativity and problem solving to design visuals for an electronic/technology-based environment. Digital Designers create images and elements that will end up on a screen – computer screens, phone screens, dashboards, or any other digital formats. Digital design often involves responsiveness and movement, such as animation, interactive pages and 2D or 3D modeling and audio.

Digital Merchandising

Also known as : Online Merchandising, E-commerce Merchandising

Refers to a variety of strategies designed to market and sell products online. Includes branding, personalisation, content strategy, product positioning & placement, image creation and more.

Front End Design

The coding and development of digital product design. Front End Designers work within the design team and ensure an accurate translation of the product design visuals into code. They act as a bridge between the design and digital engineering teams and also concern themselves with code governance, accessibility and digital design systems.

Game Design

Sits under the broader field of video game development. Refers to the use of creativity & design to develop a game for entertainment or educational purposes. Involves creating compelling stories, characters, goals, rules and challenges that drive interactions with other characters, users, or objects.

Immersive Design

Design for or involving Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), Mixed Reality (MR), Game Development, Realtime or Virtual Production, UX and UI.

Interaction Design

Also known as : IxD

Design of interactive products and services/digital interfaces, supporting a user’s flow through a system. The Interaction Designer’s focus goes beyond the item in development to include the way users will interact with it. Close scrutiny of users’ needs, limitations and contexts empowers designers to customise output to suit precise demands.

Motion Design

Also known as : Motion Graphics

Subset of graphic design that uses the same principles in time-based media through the use of animation or filmic techniques. E.g. kinetic typography, TV & film title sequences and sports show graphics.

Multimedia Design

Multimedia designers synthesise different media sources such as images, video, animation, sound, text and data to create a complete and integrated product.

Product Design (Digital)

Also known as : User Experience Design, UX Design

Formerly used in relation to creating industrial items (i.e. industrial design). Today this term is most commonly used in relation to the design of digital product e.g. apps and online services. A product design team can often be responsible for the entire experience for a user. At its crux is UX and UI design and it also concerns itself with accessibility, compliance and some front-end development. A product designer is typically a designer who does both UX and UI.

User Experience Design

Also known as : UX Design

Focusses on how it feels to use a product, app or website. The process of creating and designing user experiences, with the goal of ensuring that the product and everything surrounding it is user-friendly, easy to navigate and valuable for the end user. It starts with identifying a user problem and designing products or services that offer a solution.

User Interface Design

Also known as : UI Design

The process of designing the look, feel and interactivity of a digital product. A user interface is the point of interaction between humans and computers and UI design is the process of designing how these interfaces react and behave to the user.

Virtual Reality Design

Also known as : VR Design

Design for immersive computer-generated environments that simulate reality through the use of interactive devices, which send and receive information and are worn as goggles, headsets, gloves, or body suits. VR Designers partner with stakeholders to conduct research, design storyboards, UI, environments and create VR assets using 3D modelling software.

Web Design

Broad term that refers to the design of websites that are displayed on the internet. Usually refers to the user experience (UX) and interface(UI) aspects of website development rather than the software.

Craft Design

The creation of three-dimensional items such as jewellery, pottery, ceramics, ornaments, tableware, furniture and glassware. Craft Designers may design an item to be made in a factory, or as a one-off, made in a small workshop. They normally specialise in one craft.

Fashion Design

The creation of the specific look of individual garments – including a garment’s shape, colour, fabric, trimmings and other aspects of the whole. Fashion Designers work with other disciplines (from patternmakers to finishers) to turn the design into clothing and to plan its production for the market.

Textile Design

The process of planning and producing a fabric’s appearance & structure. Textile designers create designs that may be woven or knitted into cloth or printed on fabric. They are involved in the production of the material and the methods of its construction to achieve a desired result or effect.

Design for Manufacturing

The process of designing parts, components or products for ease of manufacturing with an end goal of making the best product possible within constraints of time, budget, quality. This is done by simplifying, optimising and refining the design of the product.

Furniture Design

The creation of various items for domestic, commercial and industrial use. Furniture Designers have an understanding of raw materials, structures and manufacturing as well as an understanding of the intended audience, from anatomy and ergonomics to the social and environmental purposes of their creations.

Industrial Design

Also known as : Product Design

Design of serially manufactured products, tools and artifacts that facilitate and enrich daily life. Considers originality, identity, accessibility, ease of use, aesthetics and product & manufacturing simplicity. Overlaps with user interface(UI) design. Extends to products in all areas of human activity including consumer durable products, medical devices, industrial equipment and transportation.

Medical Device Design

The process of designing a device intended to be used for medical purposes.

Wearable Devices (Design of…)

The creation of any kind of electronic device designed to be worn on the user’s body. Such devices can take many different forms, more commonly smartwatches and smart glasses and can also include medical devices, clothing or elements of clothing, jewellery and other accessories.

Business Design

A way of operating that combines the tools of business thinkers, analysts and strategists with the methods and mindsets of design. Business designers think about how every element of the business model affects the consumer and client experience.

Customer Experience Design

Also known as : CX Design

The process of optimising customer experiences at all touchpoints, leveraging customer-centred strategies. Broader than UX design, CX Design usually wants to optimise the experience users have in interacting with an organisation holistically as a brand, so that the customer/user perceives the brand as customer-centred.

Design Innovation

Generating ideas that are humanly desirable, technologically feasible and financially viable.

Design Strategy

Connecting the dots between human behaviours, business conditions and tech potential, Design Strategy helps define the overall vision & purpose (why), uncovers opportunity areas (how) and drives hypotheses-based experiments (what) to launch new products/experiences.

Experiential Design

Broad term that encompasses several disciplines – but is essentially the art & science of shaping the customer experience. Whenever someone interacts with the touchpoints of your product or service, they form an impression. Good Experiential Design influences this impression.

Research Design

Refers to the overall strategy utilised to carry out research that defines a succinct and logical plan to tackle established research question(s) through the collection, interpretation, analysis and discussion of data.

Service Design

The design of an intangible service or system instead of a product. Spans elements such the people, infrastructure, communications and materials, to improve the interaction between the service provider and users. Service Designers use a knowledge of psychology, logistics and communication to design systems and processes that enable the service to operate successfully. Service Design can also be described as the practice of making sense of complex, interconnected systems, which enables customers, employees and the business to achieve their desired outcomes.

Strategic Design

The application of future-oriented design principles in order to increase an organisation’s innovative and competitive qualities.

System Design

Interdisciplinary design and engineering activity that enables the realisation of successful systems. A “system” = an integrated set of components that accomplish a defined objective. A System Designer will define modules and components to satisfy the needs of this system and ensure they all work together.

Architecture

The Design of buildings and spaces. An Architect is responsible for how they are built, as well as the methods and materials they are made from.

Built Environment (Design For the…)

Examples of built environments include cities, buildings, urban spaces, walkways, roads, parks. A built environment is often formed by a series of places. Design for the Built Environment is a process that draws together many strands of place making, environmental concerns, social equity, economic viability and cultural awareness to create places which work and are sustainable in the long term. This area is multidisciplinary in nature, including fields such as architecture and visual design.

Exhibition Design

The creation of fixtures and display stands for events such as large public exhibitions, conferences, trade shows and temporary displays for businesses, museums, libraries and art galleries.

Interior Design

The design of interiors for residential homes or commercial premises such as restaurants, offices, homes, retail spaces, hotels etc. The aim of this practice is to enhance our space, improve quality of life and safeguard health in private, public, commercial and work environments. Interior Designers understand materials, building components, decorative surfaces, space planning, sourcing, light, colour, sound and ergonomics.

Lighting Design (Architectural)

Concerned with the design of lighting systems within the built environment, both interior and exterior. It can include manipulation and design of both daylight and electric light or both, to serve human needs.

Art Director

Title for a variety of similar yet often distinct job functions in theatre, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film & television, digital creation and video games.

Brand Identity Design

Also known as : Identity Design

Concerns itself with the visible and overarching elements of a brand, such as colour, design and logo, that identify and distinguish the brand to consumers.

Brand Strategy

The codification and mapping out of a brand in order to make it appropriate yet highly distinctive, different, memorable, credible, trustworthy and extremely likeable to your target customer.

Communication Design

A mixed discipline between design and information-development which is concerned with how media intervention such as printed, crafted, electronic media or presentations, communicate with people. The approach is concerned with developing the message (aside from the aesthetics) in media – and also with creating new media channels to ensure the message reaches the target audience.

Data Visualisation

Also known as : Data Design

The graphical or visual representation of data. It highlights the most useful insights from a dataset, making it easier to spot trends, patterns, outliers and correlations.

Finished Artist

Also known as : Artworker, Desktop Publishing Artist

Responsible for translating the work of art directors and graphic designers into production-ready files for digital or print at the final stage. Has an understanding of design needs, as well as a knowledge of the more technical side of design software.

Graphic Design

General term that encompasses a lot of often-fragmented roles. Communicates certain ideas or messages through visual and textual content. Traditionally – but not exclusively – related to print design; branding & identity work, editorial, promotional, packaging and more. In more contemporary use it spans both print and digital arenas and a Graphic Designer would have general skills of design across both.

Illustration

The visual representation of a concept or idea through colour, shape, line and mixed media. Stretches from decorative work, through communicating concepts, up to being a complete form of expression in its own right. Can clarify complicated concepts, objects or even feelings that are difficult to describe in words. Illustrators can use the style of the work to communicate as much as the content.

Information Design

E.g. ‘How-To’ infographics, instruction manuals, recipes. The practice of telling a story with data.Helps people interpret information by providing a purpose, a storyline that’s simple to follow and clear conclusions. Uses logic & patterns that are easily understood by an audience and provides conclusions, so the viewer doesn’t have to make their own assumptions.

Signwriting

The design, lettering, manufacture and often the installation of signs, including advertising signs for shops, businesses and public facilities as well as signs for transport systems.

Visual Communications Design

Visual Communications Designers apply themselves to the visual environment, using knowledge of signs & symbols, typography, layout, hierarchy of information, human perception etc. to design a very broad spectrum of visual works. These extend through books and magazines, websites, apps, wayfinding, illustration, motion design etc. to more abstract systems of identity, branding and strategic planning.