Types of design

Graphic design is the process of choosing and organising words, images and messages into a form that communicates and influences its audience.

We've talked to well known graphic designers and to some of their clients to find out what’s involved in commissioning, designing and delivering a piece of graphic design.

You can watch videos of leading graphic designers, including Nevil Brody, Quentin Newark and Morag Myerscough, talking about their work.

   
What is graphic design             The graphic design process     What a graphic designer does

Brand design is the process of creating a distinct identity and personality in order to communicate and promote an organisation, person, product or service. We explore how it works and what it can do for you.

Packaging on a supermarket shelf has less than three seconds to grab the attention of a consumer. Those three seconds are exceedingly important when you consider that more than 70% of purchasing decisions are made at the shelf. Add to this the fact that supermarkets can contain on average 40,000 packs to choose from, then you realise what a tough job a packaging designer has.

Packaging designers have helped established and challenger brands transform the success of their products and improve the sustainability of their packs.

Read on to find out how packaging graphics and structural packaging designs influence our perception of a brand.

How do good ideas become marketable products? The product design process affects the look, feel and functionality of the things we use everyday.

Well-designed furniture can be good for business, good for your body and for your budget. This overview of the furniture design industry is aimed at designers and anyone interested in buying or commissioning furniture design.

Find out more about furniture design by watching filmed interviews with leading furniture designers BarberOsgerby and PearsonLloyd and browse through articles and case studies sharing examples of successful furniture design, whether that’s shelves we stack our books on or seats that support us through a day at work.

     
  Watch a film about PearsonLloyd                     Watch a film about BarberOsgerby

The way the interiors of our homes are designed can affect our happiness, our productivity and our health. This guide to interior design outlines the virtues of designing the interior of your home and debates the case for employing a professional versus doing it yourself.

Fashion designers and textile designers help create the clothes, soft furnishings and functional materials that the UK spends millions of pounds on each year.

Fashion and textiles are big business in the UK, as well as playing a big part in our everyday lives.

Interaction design is concerned with the way people interact with technology. Designers in this field consider our understanding and responses to different technological systems and design them accordingly, often to make things easier and more appealing, but sometimes to provoke certain kinds of behaviour and response.

We've collected case studies, articles and podcasts about interaction design

The internet is the single most powerful tool for global information exchange and interaction ever to have been invented. New media – as the web and digital media were initially dubbed – are no longer new, but they are still rapidly changing and reaching further into people’s lives, in a growing number of ways.

With the development of a widespread and faster broadband infrastructure, including mobile broadband, the website has evolved dramatically from its early role as a basic linked information holder into a realm of motion video, high-end graphics, complex interactions, rich media and powerful data mining.

Transport design brings many different forms of design together to get people from A to B and keep society and the economy moving.

We've compiled a free online resource that explains what service design is and what it can do for businesses and public services.

A profile of architect Eva Jiricna, designer of Joseph stores who's use of glass, and more specifically light, set her work for Joseph apart from earlier retail design standards

A profile of the work of Zaha Hadid, architect, Zaha Hadid Architects.