Designing has become a crucial part of a business. We all know that a good design stands out and attracts people’s attention. A systematic design thinking methodology is required for the development of creative and innovative designs. This article lays down the top 10 designing methodologies for professional designers.
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What are designing methodologies? A designing methodology is a method for generating ideas and coming up with creative designs. Creativity and innovation are two significant outcomes of any designing process. Persistent and consistent thinking helps to generate them both. Following are the top 10 designing methodologies, which can be opted for generating new ideas for professional designing.
1. Six Thinking Hats
Six thinking hats is one of the best designing methodologies, involving a group of six persons wearing hats. The activity can also be carried out individually. This method was developed by Edward De Bono, who categorised hats into six different colours, namely white, yellow, black, red, blue and green. According to the roles assigned to their hats, every person provides a review or a suggestion for the design. That is how, the designer collects a lot of unbiased feedbacks, both good and back, and then, generate more ideas to develop his/her creativity for the design.
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2. Double Diamond
Double diamond is a design thinking methodology, which is used to produce creative ideas for designs. This technique can be applied in two ways- divergent thinking and convergent thinking. Divergent thinking involves thinking without any restrictions. Listen, communicate and learn everything about the design. Once you’re done, lay down a proper analysis of all that you’ve learnt. Convergent thinking involves thinking, while focusing only on specific segments of the design. They are analysed in accordance with the nature of the design and accordingly, more ideas are produced. This is one of the most common ways of creative thinking.
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3. Mind Mapping
Mind Mapping is a design thinking methodology involving brainstorming of ideas and arranging them in an intricate, yet easy to read manner. A team or an individual creates branches in the form of ideas relating to the main concentration of the design. There are two set of branches- inner and outer. Designing ideas from both the branches help the designers to study every aspect of the design and come up with a creative design. Considering its popularity in mainstream fashion designing, it should be practiced to produce good results.
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4. Deep Dive
Deep dive designing is a design thinking methodology, which involves a group or a team working together to generate ideas. It is a team based brainstorming technique. The key to a successful deep dive designing methodology is getting the best out of the individual minds in a team. The team should exemplify an ideal team effort in the positive direction, for finding ideas. It is one of the most productive ways of creative thinking.
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5. Brainstorming
One of the most popular designing methodologies, Brainstorming is used in designs involving mixed tactics. A group of people is summoned to produce raw and rough ideas, which the same team will refine later. Quantity of ideas is emphasized in this design thinking methodology, with a set of rules and a facilitator. With no place for criticism, the group is asked to work on the positive side and create a healthy environment for open discussion of the produced ideas. The ideas are then put into the practical use and the designing is executed.
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6. Donut
Donut design thinking is a structured and systematic design thinking methodology. It involves a circular track for generating ideas for a design. It lays down a systematic process towards the final end of the design. The first stage is identifying the design through proper research and observation. The second stage is selecting the core aspects, which are to be worked upon in the design. The third stage is coming up with as many ideas as possible. The last stage is finding the best from the list of potential ideas generated!
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7. Bootcamp Bootleg
Bootcamp bootleg is a design thinking methodology used for very complex designs. It is primarily based upon the ‘empathy’ element of the human brain, involving an in-depth understanding of the human beings. For this purpose, you are required to observe, question and listen. This will give you an idea of people’s mindset and how it really works. It involves various steps like ideation (generation of ideas), prototyping (testing the viability of the ideas), etc. This is an effective technique to address specific targeted segments of a design and to generate ways of creative thinking.
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8. Lateral Thinking
Lateral thinking involves thinking sideways of the given design and coming up with relative, but unique ideas. It is used to generate ways of creative thinking by changing concepts and perspectives constantly to drive out new ones. Requiring a sense of wit, this methodology is different from every other one. One uses his/her imaginative approach and discover the ideas in the negative spaces of the design.
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9. Spiral
The spiral model is a circulating design thinking methodology. It involves four steps- planning, designing, construction and evaluation. The planning stage is based upon gathering of data and forming a structured plan for carrying out various activities. The designing stage focuses on coming up with numerous ideas. The next step involves finalising the right kind of design suiting the nature of the ideas. This is followed by the stages of construction and evaluation, which are related to implementation of the previous two stages. The steps and implementation make it one of the best designing methodologies.
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10. Reverse Brainstorming/ Problem Reversal
Reverse Brainstorming, also known as Problem Reversal, is one of the most applicable designing methodologies. Instead of focusing on creating ideas, the designer focuses on the design in a different perspective and allows the flow of ideas in a more creative way. All the aspects of the design are looked upon in a completely converse method. Absurd, yet proven and applied by many designers, reverse brainstorming can be put into use for creative ideas.
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All the above points lay down the best designing methodologies, which could be opted for getting successful results. Obtaining an elegant and appropriate design is also a challenge. Implement these techniques to generate a viable and successful design. But if you’re confused in the concept of designing process, read our blog: ‘Step wise designing process: A productive approach’.
