Posted: March 26th, 2015

Richard Buchanan

Richard Buchanan

Project description
In the 5-page paper, you will analyze design in terms of concept and reception
based on a reading provided to you electronically.

The assigned reading is Richard Buchanans Declaration by Design: Rhetoric, Argument, and
Demonstration in Design Practice, from Victor Margolins Design Discourse: History, Theory,
Criticism.
The authors thesis is that design is an art of thought directed to practical action
through the persuasiveness of objects, and, therefore, design involves the vivid expression of
competing ideas about social life. Buchanan claims that design is rhetorical, that modernist
design is simply one argument among many, and that essential to design is the relation
between designed objects and users.

Based on Buchanans point-by-point analysis of design, critique one item from the Modernist
design studio, Design Within Reach, located at 60 West Green Street in Pasadena, and
compare this item to a similar one of a different aesthetic found at a store of your choice.