Remembering Bill Moggridge

Published on: September 21st, 2012


Cooper-Hewitt’s brief video honoring Bill Moggridge.

What is design? This is a central question we’ve been asking ourselves over the past few weeks as novices in the field of Design Studies, and perhaps the answer will become clearer as we continue to grasp the many concepts and ideas of renowned voices in design thinking. To contribute to our growing knowledge in the field, I’d like to use this opportunity to honor the late Bill Moggridge, designer and design thinker extraordinaire.

The design community suffered a great loss a few weeks ago, but Moggridge’s many successes and contributions to the fields of design and technology live on. Moggridge designed the first laptop computer, co-founded leading innovation firm IDEO, and most recently served as Director of the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, leading its major renovation and expansion initiative. Moggridge was a pioneer in human-centered design, focusing on human experience and interdisciplinary collaboration, the latter perfectly exemplified through the diverse composition of our Design Studies cohort. Moggridge’s forward thinking encouraged those engaged in design to expand contexts and value design in everyday life, and this is a legacy we will continue to uphold as scholars in a field that examines the history and various contexts of design and uses this knowledge to shape the future. In the spirit of Bill Moggridge, perhaps a better question to ask is what isn’t design?

Information for this post was gathered from a September 10, 2012 Smithsonian Design Decoded blog article, accessible through the following link:

Honoring Bill Moggridge

Program Contact

Caroline Dionne, Program Director

Program Update

Parsons is not currently admitting new students to this master’s degree program. Parsons is now offering a Graduate Minor in Design Studies that is designed to complement the MA History of Design and Curatorial Studies and other graduate programs across the university in design, liberal arts, and social research.