Abstract

To teach design effectively foundational design thinking needs to be understood. Treating the design process as a mysterious mental talent provides little scope for teaching the subject. This study explores the origin of designs and how experience impacts the sophistication of design ideas across educational domains. Secondary and tertiary students were given a common architectural brief and students’ outcomes were compared and contrasted to seek commonalities or differences in their approaches to solving design problems. Additionally, interviews were conducted with participants and a panel of design experts to further explore the students’ design practices. The results provide insight into design cognition from multiple viewpoints. We argue that designs come from various forms of copying; metaphors, analogies and icons are used as preconceptions by which a design problem is understood. Moreover, experience had a direct link to expertise which is evident across educational domains.