These are large 4-6ft posters created for Katherine Bennett’s “Sparks and Connections” class. Students develop case studies of innovation, and based on what they learn, present “Archetypes of Innovation” – their theory of the different ways innovation happens.

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We’re looking for bright, articulate, intellectual, literate and social individuals.
Students with industrial design undergraduate degrees and various levels of professional experience comprise a slight majority of our student body. We prefer students with professional industrial design experience whose work has resulted in market-tested designs. However, we also accept candidates with a wide variety of undergraduate degrees and professional experience. In fact, breadth in the background of our students plays an important role in defining the transdisciplinary culture of our program.

We’re especially interested in individuals who can:

• Make appropriate and human-centered designs.
• Write and communicate effectively with language.
• Demonstrate an understanding of, and experience with, 3D form and design.
• Draw effectively and visualize via other methods and mediums.
• Select important projects and identify real needs.
• Research, investigate and analyze design topics.
• Experiment, think laterally and engage in creative idea-generation activities.
• Demonstrate consistently great visual design sensibility and ability, with an attention to style, proportion, shape, material, color, etc.
• Take a systems approach to design solutions and demonstrate an understanding of the business, technological and human related aspects of the design context.
• Create value for the human condition, in addition to satisfying an aesthetic appetite for consumption-driven style and fashion products (e.g. chairs, desk sets, most cars, and designer teapots).

The vision integration process uses iterative cycles of rapid visualization with expert feedback for developing complex, future scenarios and innovation for that future. This kind of design and visualization practice is common in industrial design and entertainment industries where skilled artists and designers can rapidly accelerate innovation discussions. However, the practice is novel when applied to strategic planning, forecasting and large scale social systems. “Vision Integration” is the term coined at Art Center to describe this experimental practice. There are of course many instances in history where “artists concepts” have been used to inspire change to greater or lesser effect. Vision Integration intends to formalize the practice and make it a repeatable and deployable process for teams. The forthcoming mVIP card deck is one application of this research.