INDUS360 MH: History of Design

The challenges faced by design professionals today are rarely without precedent for we inherit from the past not only tools, techniques, and traditions, but also a vocabulary. It follows that we may gain valuable insights from the manner in which questions of design have been posed throughout the industrial era. This course will survey the major themes and controversies in the period from the Arts and Crafts movement at the end of the 19th century through Postmodernism at the end of the 20th century. Topics will include Arts & Crafts, Art Nouveau, Art and Engineering, the Bauhaus, the emergence of the American Industrial Design profession, and design in the postwar contexts of Italy, Germany, Japan and the United States. The class will find that the history of design is not ultimately about objects but about ideas.