What is a Design Critique?

This leads to the question of what is a design critique? A design critique is any type of meeting in which designers present unfinished materials to colleagues to get feedback. This feedback can range in breadth from positive comments about asects that work to aspects that don’t work and should possibly be revised. Using feedback from peers to improve design concepts is the primary purpose of the design critique, it gives the designer to a chance to make improvements to the design. Typically, in these types of open feedback processes some ground rules or norms are adhered to, usually a set of 3-4 questions are posed to a group (should be at least 5 people) and they focus commentary on how the designs answer those questions. Keep in mind, the purpose of this type of meeting is to evaluate existing ideas for future direction or changes.

Running a Design Critique in Class

Setting up a design critique in class can be rewarding for the students and produce better designs. Begin by setting a hard date for the design critique and let students know about it about a week ahead of time. This allows them to prepare materials, a head of time. Next, you will want to write design questions, these should be specific to the projects which are being brought to the design critique. These questions can be sent to the group attending the meeting ahead of time to let them know what to look for in the designs. During the actual meeting, either the teacher or a designated student will lead the meeting, each group whose work is being critiqued should have a designated member to take notes of the commentary being given at the meeting. Usually a critique will have type of project being shown, but it can show multiple people/group’s work on the project.

Norms of Design Critique

Since most students will answer the design questions with simple one-word answers such as “It’s good” or “I don’t like it”, be prepared to elicit more information from them. Be prepared to use complex questions to them to longer answers and ask them to explain why they feel that way. The information they give to the design should be specific and concrete to improve design and it should be specific to the project goals and outcome. Remind students that their comments should also be constructive in nature and give them a few examples of what constructive feedback is.

Design critiques can be immensely beneficial to the students as designers to improve their design, but it also teaches them how to talk about and express design ideas and concepts.