Reading Response #4: Stage 2: Identification pg. 39-70

I found this week's reading, "Identification," to be rather tedious.  This chapter was soooo incredibly long and sleep-inducing!  It actually took me four sittings to finish the reading.  Identification talks about constraints, which define the project as the idea or the solution.  Little did I know, there are constraints for every aspect of design, including end user constraints (functionality and form, societal, safety), production constraints, designer constraints (information, time, materials, budgets), and responsibility constraints (unintended consequences, sustainability).

I like how Aspelund compares design to a river:  both require constraints in order to have form and direction.  If a river isn't constrained within its banks, then the water will end up flowing into unwanted places.  The same reasoning applies to design:  if a designer ignores constraints, then the project may lead into an undesirable direction, which could require the the designer to rework the project, or even worse, cancel the whole thing.  Designers need to think of constraints as a "frame and guide" that keep them from going into such areas.  Aspelund's design/river analogy definitely helps me understand the importance of constraints when it comes to design.  A designer must stay within the boundaries in order to create a successful project.