How to Fail Early and Often to Achieve Success: Iterating and Prototyping, and Refining Your Ideas

A key aspect of good design is the ability to “fail early and often” using low cost, rapid techniques to work through ideas and gather feedback early in the process. Being able to create prototypes of varying levels of fidelity can facilitate iterations, allowing the exploration to be your way of finding answers to specific design questions and arriving at a more successful design sooner than if you took a more linear approach. In this seminar led by renowned designer Carla Diana, participants will gain exposure to various techniques for creating prototypes of physical products and digital systems, learn ways of evaluating ideas based on project-specific criteria, and walk away with the confidence to apply a cycle of prototyping, iteration and refinement to your next project.

Carla Diana is a hybrid designer keenly focused on realizing new visions for smart objects and the Internet of Things. In her studio she works on future-specting projects in areas such as domestic robots, wearable devices and sentient kitchen appliances, combining experience in industrial and interaction design to create solutions that bridge the gap between the physical and the digital. Diana has had a long-standing working relationship with the product innovation firm Smart Design and has received the honor of being named the firm’s first Smart Fellow. In addition to her professional design work, she is a faculty member in PennDesign’s Integrated Product Design Program, where she developed the first course focused on smart objects. She holds an MFA in Design from Cranbrook Academy of Art and a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from The Cooper Union.

This is the third event in the iDesign Seminar Series, organized in conjunction with the 2017 iDesign Prize by by Integrated Product Design Master’s Program. The series was opened by Amy Schwartz, PhD, Principal for Empathic Innovation and Director at IDEO.