Why Failure is Important in Design
Failure; the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective. One of the most important things to learn as a designer is learning how to fail. The start of every design project is daunting, especially when you’re just starting out. If tasked with a complex problem to solve it can quickly become overwhelming when you can’t visualise the final solution. Every single project a designer has undertaken has included some type of failure. Whether it be missing a vital piece of research, not carrying out adequate testing or making a mistake with a prototype. However, the final solution is always influenced by the failures throughout the project.
Learning how to fail in design can improve your workflow and lead to more successful solutions. Take sketching for example. Sketching in design is one of the most important aspects of failing. Every design project starts by sketching. It doesn’t matter whether you are a fashion designer, architect or graphic designer, learning how to sketch and iterate is vital to create robust solutions. Lets say you are a product designer tasked with creating a new product. What’s the first thing a designer does when they have an idea? Do they make the idea straight away? The answer is always no, the first thing a designer does when they get an idea is sketch. A simple pencil and paper can save you hundreds of euros because you can work your idea before you bring it to production. A product designer can not start making a chair without sketching it out first.
Sketching allows designers to work out all the different kinks of a problem. Think of sketching as a small failure every time. Although it seems like you’re failing after exploring multiple solutions and not getting anywhere, you must think back to the start of the project. Are you better off now that you know all of these ideas won’t work or would you be better off like you were at the start with a blank slate? Failing is design can be difficult, but just know the more times you fail in a project, the close you are to the final solution. Once you learn to develop persistence, you will see the benefits of failing. In fact it shouldn’t be considered failing at all. “If you’re not failing, you’re not going to innovate”.
Designers never share their failed ideas on their portfolio. It can seem like some designers have exceptional ability to complete a project with no hiccups but the reality is they are failing just as much as you, maybe even more. So next time you run into trouble during a project, remember that embracing failure leads to better designs.