Five Articles From 2020 You May Have Missed

Every year the design review staff decides on some of our favorite articles from the year that may have been overlooked or just didn’t quite make the top-ten most read articles. Our team puts together a really great list and then I have the tough job of whittling that list down to just five articles from the past year. 2020 was certainly a year like no other, but these articles provide design lessons to help you any year.

1. Lenses to Interpret the Visual Form of Products and Why it Matters by Catalina Johnson. Why should you read it? Catalina gives excellent tips for interpreting designs methodically through different lenses to help you determine when a design is good.

2. Sharing Your Design Work by Chris Mattson. Why should you read it? One of your most important skills as engineer is the ability to communicate ideas and this article will help you do that better.

3. Many Good Design Choices Can Add Up to a Bad Design by John Salmon. Why should you read it? It is important to consider the system in which a design exists. John gives the example of the airport which has many good design choices but since they don’t help optimize the design of the system of traveling you end up with a bad experience.

4. Embracing Failure: Your Design Mentor by Brandon Sargent. Why should you read it? Failure is never comfortable, but small failures can help you learn and get to the right answer faster. Brandon gives tips on how to make failure beneficial for your design process.

5. Storytelling in Design by McCall Barger. Why should you read it? Stories resonate with people. Think of the best products and they often use storytelling to make their point. McCall helps define storytelling elements and how to incorporate them into design.