The Design Universe: A Journal’s Perspective

Abstract

This year, the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design will be thirty five years old. So this is a good time for celebration and also for reflection. The design universe has grown steadily over the past decades: Renewed awareness of the role of design in our personal daily lives and the creation of social wealth; recognition that design is a discipline in its own right worthy of knoweldge creation and propagation (i.e., research and education); creation of a plethora of journals that have design as their main theme or catering to a significant design-oriented audience; and finally, an insipient understanding and acceptance that design is approached by different people from different angles, yet what unites designers of all colors is stronger than what differentiates them.