Twentieth–Century Furniture as Precedent: Creating a Dialogue between History and Design in Furniture Design Studio

Abstract

Objective Within the accreditation standards of the Foundation for Interior Design Education and Research (FIDER), there is more emphasis on teaching individual knowledge categories than on course work that synthesizes and critically applies different knowledge types. This study explores a teaching method that helps students synthesize knowledge and use critical thinking when solving design problems. Research Design An undergraduate furniture design course provided a case study to examine how historically inspired projects improve students' abilities to critically apply various knowledge types to the design process. The course had 2 parts: a 6-week precedent project in which the students built a historic 20th-century furniture piece, using critical thinking to make connections between thinking, designing and making, and a 10-week design project in which the students applied new knowledge gained through this experience when designing and making their own furniture pieces. Analysis Students' design processes, their evaluations of the course, and comments by outside reviewers were used to qualitatively assess the project's effectiveness. Key Findings The analysis confirmed that the precedent project helped improve students' use of critical thinking when designing. Conclusion Although critical thinking plays an important role in the design process and scholars believe that this ability is a valuable competency for professionals, FIDER does not explicitly evaluate this area of instruction. Explicit evaluation of how interior design programs teach critical thinking as part of design problem solving could encourage educators to focus instruction on developing this valuable skill.