The best design solution

In a sense, it is a circular process, repeatedly rotating through each stage, but rather than returning to the same point in the cycle, if the rotations take the form of a decreasing spiral, then it can be seen that progress leads closer to the centre. It would be meaningless to imagine the process as a target with the bulls-eye as the perfect design solution, as for any brief there could be many equally valid alternative proposals, and every designer could produce a different response to the same set of circumstances. However, the centre can be regarded as the best design solution that could be achieved under the circumstances. If the spiral took the form of a maze, then reaching the centre would depend on the starting position and wrong decisions at turning points would lead to dead ends. Progress could only be made by retracing earlier steps and starting again. As most building design contains compromise, a good designer tries to get as close to the centre of the target as possible, or has to stop when time runs out.

The design spiral

How close the designer can get to the centre depends on ability, skill, conscientiousness, perseverance, inspiration or even sheer luck in taking the correct or best route and being able to recognise where they have already been. It can be a good idea to keep a record of these routes so as not to go down the same dead-end again. Or it might be that revisiting with a fresh piece of information enables the designer to unlock the gate to the next level. Sometimes though, a perfectly sound design proposal can be ignored in the search for a better one, which may not exist. One of the designer’s key skills is being able to recognise the target and to know when it has been reached.

To a large extent, the process of designing is a personal activity influenced by the way that the designer’s brain works; how they think. Some designer’s work predominately in the direction of ‘analysis, synthesis, appraisal and feedback’ which is a method of examining problems. They are ‘problem solvers’ concentrating on working out ways of putting the known elements together to create a product, which is then checked or tested to see if it is a satisfactory solution.

For others, the process is predominately reversed in the direction of ‘feedback, appraisal, synthesis and analysis’, which is a way of testing solutions. These designers are intuitive, speculating or postulating an idea or possible solution straight away, in advance of the complications of detail, and then checking to see if the answer contains all the necessary elements, or satisfies the brief.

Most designers will use a mixture of both methods as whilst a design solution can come purely from consideration of analysed or perceived problems, it is quite common to find that a proposed design solution redefines the original problem, satisfying needs which were not initially identified or understood. For example, a shop owner may be convinced that the main entrance door should be in a particular position in the front wall, in relation to the internal arrangement of counters and displays. But the suggestion that the entrance might be located in a different position, could lead to a much better internal arrangement, which the client had not even considered before.