About

Be organised and have the right materials that you need to do a design project. By having everything that you need at your fingertips, you will be able to concentrate on the job. Keep all the work that you do, and all the papers that you have collected in the design project. Photograph your prototypes to maintain a record of them.

​​​​​​​

FIGURE: The stationery that you will need to do a design thinking project. Tick-off each item when you have it.

​​​​​​​

​​​​​​​What you need

• Note pad, A4.
• White paper, A4.
• Clipboard, for A4.
• Plastic document wallet, for A4.
• Graphite pencil.
• Pencil sharpener.
• Plastic eraser.
• Highlighter pen.
• Scale or ruler.
• Tape dispenser.
• Set of colour pencils or pens.
• Scissor.
• Glue stick.

How to organise your design notes and sketches

• Keep all your work when you do a design thinking project.
  • Where possible, keep all your work together. Keep all your notes in one place, all your sketches in a single folder, all your data on the computer in a single folder, and so forth.
• As you learn about the design topic during the EMPATHISE stage, keep good notes and attach things to your notepad such as handouts, and printouts of information that you found.
  • Take notes in an A4 notepad.
  • Add the date to each note.​​​​​​​
• Sketch on A4 white paper with a graphite pencil.
  • Do one sketch per sheet of paper, paper is cheap.
  • Keep all your sketches in an A4 document wallet.
• Use the clipboard when testing and doing user research.
• Record and archive your work at the completion of a design project.
  • Scan all notes and sketches in date order. A document scanner can do it in a minute.
  • Photograph your models to record them.
  • Save everything to a folder on your computer and make a back-up. Share that folder with your teammates.

​​​​​​​

Tips

• Use the figure above when purchasing stationery, ticking-off the items as you get them.
• You don’t need special equipment to design. Graphite pencils and A4-size copier paper or Xerox paper are cheap and plentiful, and are the perfect drawing materials.
• Note that A4 stationery is not available in the USA, use letter size stationery instead.