Ted Audio Collective.

Audio Collective.

This is Design Matters with Debbie Millman from Design Observer.com.

On this program, Debbie Millman talks with industrial designer Bill Mogrich about designing a laptop computer

and why many people have a hard time understanding what design is.

It doesn't occur to them that everything is designed, every building, everything they touch in the world is

designed. The world around us is something that somebody has control of and perhaps they

could have control of. Here's Debbie Milman.

Last year at the White House the British

industrial designer Bill Margridge received the lifetime achievement

award at the Smithsonian's Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum. This year he was named director of the

Cooper Hewitt itself. This position is just the latest phase in a storied career,

first designing high-tech products like the first laptop computer, then as a

founder of IDEO, the global design firm. Throughout his career, Bill Modridge has

advocated a user-centered design process in product development.

He is also a big proponent of interaction design. To talk about all of this and more,

Bill Mogridge joins me now in our studio in the School of

Visual Arts in New York City. Welcome to Design Matters, Bill. Thank you. Thank you so

much for being here. Such an honor. Such an honor. You did that so beautifully. Lots of practice. Prior to

your joining the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum, you described your

career in three phases. First is designer, then as manager of design, and

then as a communicator working as a writer, graphic designer, and video maker. I'd like to talk about all three of these

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