Preconceived ideas?

By asking ourselves with some degree of humility whether that which we perceive to be so is simply what we have preprogrammed our minds to see, we may find that the problems we perceive are in fact nothing more than preconceived ideas. The danger, of course, is that real issues may be ignored.

So how do we deal with real issues? Albert Einstein famoulsy observed that problems can’t be solved by the same level of thinking that created them in the first place. Thinking about a situation in the wrong way can literally condemn us to relive the same experiences over and over again. Little will change until we change our thinking. Ideation, then, suggests change in our thinking about a situation. And from change in our thinking new ideas emerge that challenge the past.

The discipline of ideas

However smart, original or clever your ideas are in your head, without the conscious effort to externalise ideas they remain like bright, shiny sport cars with nothing to drive on. The power is there but the car is going nowhere. Indeed, ideas with no wheels!

Book review: Peter Cook Drawing

For my review of Peter Cook: 'Drawing - the motive force of architecture' (Wiley 2008), see www.drawing.org.uk

Ideas shape the world

The practice, learning and knowledge of design have been significantly transformed by new media and communication technologies. Yet behind new technologies lie ideas which not only direct innovation and experimentation but also form designer identities and personalities.

Ideamotion

When we generate and communicate ideas we also generate and communicate emotions. And whether the various emotional states are labelled "cool", "hot" or "so-so", there's necessarily emotion in ideation because an idea reflects subjectivity. This emotional flux of ideation I call Ideamotion.

Sketcherly ways of designing

Sketching out ideas, or conceptual sketching, embodies both active and reflective activities of a rational, intuitive or sensing nature that reveal insights into the processes of design. This suggests that conceptual sketching is much more than mark making on paper, from verbal and non-verbal modes to two- and three- dimensional gestural ways of expressing ideas in physical or virtual space. Sketching by other means, then, broadens the notion of sketching well beyond the traditional pencil sketch. This I call sketcherly ways of designing.

Idein

Plato, Shakespeare and Goethe, to name but a few, assigned significant value to dreams. And Strindberg (1849-1912), the writer, playwright and painter, famously said: 'I dream - therefore I am'. But dreams suspend wilful reality. We cannot tell the full meaning of dreams until their reflections materialise before the objective sense. And so with ideas - they have to be externalised. Indeed, I ideate - therefore I am!