Why Design Is a Form of Thinking
The question of what design actually does is often answered by referring to its outcomes. We speak of products, interfaces, brands, or services and describe design through the artifacts it produces. Far less attention is given to the process from which these artifacts emerge. In this perspective, design becomes a discipline that communicates information, shapes products aesthetically, or visualizes ideas. Yet such a view is fundamentally incomplete. It reduces design to its communicative and functional qualities while overlooking one of its most fundamental capacities: design produces knowledge.
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Aesthetics as a Form of Knowledge
Everyday language contributes significantly to this misunderstanding. Aesthetics is often equated with beauty, style, or good taste. Within philosophy, however, the concept has a far broader meaning. Since Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, aesthetics has been understood as the science of sensory cognition. Its central concern is not what is beautiful, but how human beings perceive and understand the world. Perception, from this perspective, is not a passive reception of external stimuli but an independent mode of cognition.
This distinction has profound implications for design. If knowledge is generated not only through language or analytical reasoning but equally through images, spaces, materials, and relationships, then design acquires an epistemological dimension. Designers do not merely create artifacts. They shape the conditions of perception and, in doing so, influence how people recognize relationships, organize information, and interpret reality.
Long before contemporary design theory, Plato addressed this issue in the Allegory of the Cave. The prisoners mistake the shadows on the wall for reality because they have never experienced anything else. Their understanding of the world is determined not by the objects themselves but by the images presented to them. The allegory is commonly interpreted as a philosophical reflection on knowledge, but it can equally be read as an early meditation on media and perception. Our conception of reality is never independent of the forms through which reality becomes visible.
Design intervenes precisely at this point. It determines which information becomes visible, which relationships are emphasized, and which interpretations appear plausible. Design is therefore never neutral. Every design decision organizes perception, and perception forms the basis of knowledge.
Thinking Happens Through Designing
This perspective is reflected in several influential positions within design research. Donald Schön described designing as reflection-in-action. Knowledge does not precede the design process; it emerges through it. Every sketch changes the situation. Every design decision opens new questions. Designers do not simply respond to clearly defined problems, they gradually develop an understanding of the problem through the act of designing itself.
The design process is therefore not the visualization of pre-existing knowledge. It becomes an instrument through which knowledge is created.
A similar argument can be found in the work of Nigel Cross. In his concept of Designerly Ways of Knowing, Cross argues that design constitutes a distinct mode of knowledge production. The natural sciences explain existing phenomena. The humanities interpret cultural conditions. Design, by contrast, explores possibilities. Designers investigate not only what is, but what could be.
Richard Buchanan extends this argument even further. For Buchanan, design is no longer primarily concerned with shaping individual products. Instead, it organizes relationships between people, artifacts, information, and social practices. Products, interfaces, and services form complex systems of interaction that guide behavior and create orientation. Design structures relationships rather than objects.
Christoph Niemann and the Logic of Visual Metaphors
Seen from this theoretical perspective, the work of Christoph Niemann becomes particularly significant. His illustrations are not remarkable because of technical virtuosity. Their importance lies in the way they reorganize perception.
Niemann frequently begins with ordinary objects: a croissant, a pencil, a bicycle, or a coffee cup. Through subtle interventions, however, their semantic relationships shift. A shadow completes an object. Two unrelated elements suddenly occupy the same conceptual space. The drawing does not change the object itself; it changes the way we perceive it.
https://www.christophniemann.com
What is striking is the economy of these interventions. The visual modification is minimal, yet its conceptual consequences are substantial. Knowledge is generated not through additional information but through the creation of a new relationship between familiar elements.
This reveals an essential characteristic of visual thinking. Design often produces knowledge not by adding information, but by reorganizing it. Designers rarely invent entirely new worlds. Instead, they rearrange existing structures in ways that allow new meanings to emerge.
This observation resonates with the work of Jerome Bruner. Bruner argued that human understanding extends far beyond analytical reasoning. People make sense of the world through narratives, metaphors, and relational structures. Meaning emerges when seemingly unrelated elements are brought together. Niemann’s illustrations operate according to precisely this logic. They do not illustrate arguments; they create moments of recognition.
Images as Instruments of Thought
This understanding was further developed within visual studies through what became known as the Iconic Turn. Images are no longer regarded as mere illustrations of linguistic statements. They possess an epistemic quality of their own and are capable of generating forms of knowledge that cannot be fully translated into language.
This position was articulated decades earlier by Rudolf Arnheim in Visual Thinking. Arnheim rejected the traditional separation of perception and cognition. For him, perception is not a preliminary stage of thinking; it is thinking itself. Spatial relationships, proportions, and visual structures possess cognitive significance. Images do not merely illustrate thoughts, they generate them.
This insight fundamentally changes our understanding of the design process. Sketches, diagrams, and prototypes are not only tools of communication. They externalize thought, reveal relationships, and make visible possibilities that often cannot be articulated verbally until much later. The design sketch becomes an epistemic medium.
Kelli Anderson: Design as a Cognitive Instrument
A contemporary example that exemplifies this understanding of design is the work of Kelli Anderson. Positioned at the intersection of graphic design, product design, and experimental publishing, Anderson develops artifacts that function less as carriers of information than as instruments of inquiry. Projects such as This Book Is a Camera and This Book Is a Planetarium invite readers to experience optical, physical, and astronomical phenomena through direct interaction. Rather than communicating knowledge that already exists, these objects generate knowledge through engagement. Design becomes an experimental framework in which understanding emerges through exploration rather than explanation. Anderson’s work therefore illustrates a central argument of Rudolf Arnheim: visual structures do not merely represent thought. They actively participate in its formation. Design is not simply a medium of communication; it becomes a cognitive instrument that organizes perception and enables new ways of knowing.
https://kellianderson.com
While Christoph Niemann reveals how visual metaphors can reorganize familiar meanings through subtle shifts in perception, Anderson expands this principle through interaction. In her work, understanding does not arise solely from seeing but from manipulating, experimenting, and discovering. Both approaches demonstrate that design is not merely concerned with representing ideas. It is a practice through which ideas are generated.
Design as a Cultural Practice
The history of design demonstrates how dramatically the discipline has expanded. While design during the Industrial Revolution focused primarily on the form of manufactured objects, contemporary practice encompasses digital interfaces, services, organizations, and processes of social transformation. As a result, its responsibility has also changed. Design no longer influences only the appearance of artifacts; it increasingly shapes the conditions under which people perceive information, make decisions, and interact with one another.
Design organizes attention. It structures orientation. It makes complexity comprehensible, or obscures it. Anyone who designs therefore shapes not only objects but also the conditions of action.
Christoph Niemann’s work illustrates this with remarkable clarity. Its strength lies not in technical refinement or illustrative elegance but in its ability to reorganize perception. Through a small visual intervention, an entirely new conceptual space emerges. The viewer does not receive more information; instead, familiar information becomes visible in a different way.
Perhaps this captures one of design’s most fundamental characteristics. Design does not begin with the form of an object. It begins with the organization of perception. Designing therefore means far more than making things visible. It means creating new possibilities for understanding. Design is not merely a discipline of communication. It is a distinct mode of knowledge.
References
Arnheim, R. (1969). Visual thinking. University of California Press.
Baumgarten, A. G. (2007). Reflections on poetry (K. Aschenbrenner & W. B. Holther, Trans.). University of California Press.
Boehm, G. (1994). Die Wiederkehr der Bilder. In G. Boehm (Ed.), Was ist ein Bild? (pp. 11–38). Wilhelm Fink Verlag.
Bruner, J. (1990). Acts of meaning. Harvard University Press.
Buchanan, R. (1992). Wicked problems in design thinking. Design Issues, 8(2), 5–21.
Cross, N. (2006). Designerly ways of knowing. Springer.
Dewey, J. (1934). Art as experience. Perigee Books.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception (C. Smith, Trans.). Routledge. (Original work published 1945)
Mitchell, W. J. T. (1994). Picture theory: Essays on verbal and visual representation. University of Chicago Press.
Niemann, C. (2017). Abstract: The art of design (Season 1, Episode 1). Netflix.
Niemann, C. (2019). The paper. Abrams.
Plato. (1997). Republic (G. M. A. Grube, Trans.; C. D. C. Reeve, Rev.). Hackett Publishing. (Original work ca. 380 BCE)
Schön, D. A. (1983). The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. Basic Books
