Book: Everyday Engineering, by Andrew Burroughs, IDEO

Everyday Engineering: What Engineers See
by Andrew Burroughs, IDEO
Hardcover: 204 pages
Publisher: Chronicle Books (September 6, 2007)
Book page | Amazon page

Abstract

From soaring industrial structures to the humble manhole cover and streetlight, everything in the built environment is engineered. By observing the world we walk through every day—the often-overlooked details of buildings and roads, the joinings and interfaces of our infrastructure—we can learn to see the world as engineers do. As it did with the groundbreaking observational primer Thoughtless Acts?, IDEO once again brings its instructive methods to bear on the world around us, this time with an eye toward the inherent but unheralded presence of modern engineering. By observing the built environment we walk through every day—the often-overlooked details of buildings and roads, the joinings and interfaces of our infrastructure—we can learn to see the world as engineers do, and adapt this perspective to critical thinking. Through simple pictures of how objects and environments behave over time, Everyday Engineering invites anyone in creative fields, business, and design to see the world through IDEO’s eyes.

Andrew Burroughs has been a consulting design engineer for twenty years-fifteen of those with IDEO, arguably the foremost design and innovation consultancy in the world. Since 2004, Andrew has led IDEO’s Chicago office. IDEO uses first-hand observations to inform and inspire the design of delightful and useful products, services, and environments.

– Book review by Robert Blynn (published on Core77)
– Book review by Bob Jacobson (published on Corante)