ABSTRACT
There is a difference between knowing about materials and knowing how to design with them – the latter requires a type of contributory expertise, which cannot be acquired solely through lectures or reading and, therefore, it not only challenges how we understand the ole of materials within the design process, but also how we learn to design with materials. In a craft process there is a continuous dialogue between the maker, the material and the tool in the process of creating a physical object. It is relevant to study this dialogue for several reasons: in order to understand how the material can inform both the designer and the development of the product; not just to comprehend the technicalities but also the embodied cognition that takes place during this dialogue in order to appreciate the value of physically handling materials and tools. To reintroduce the material dialogue from craft into a contemporary design process fundamentally changes the way we design things and, thus, inevitably it affects both the constituents of the design process and the way we teach design.
