Everyday Engineering: What Engineers See

By Ideo and Andrew K. Burroughs

World-renowned design and innovation firm IDEO uses first-hand observations to inform and inspire its work. As it did with the groundbreaking observational primer Thoughtless Acts? , IDEO once again brings its instructive methods tobear 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 daythe often-overlooked details of buildings and roads, the joinings and interfaces of our infrastructurewe 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.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 081186054X
• ISBN13: 9780811860543
• Release Date: September 2007
• Publisher: Chronicle Books
• Length: 204 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 4.3" x 6.3"
• Age Range: 13 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 8 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

Appreciate a "thousand words"

Unlike other reviewers, I find this to be a rare gem of a book. Yes, the pictures indeed capture the mundane (intentionally so), but the written pieces that introduce each chapter are a wonderful introduction to the mind of a real-world engineer: how someone with an interest, knowledge and skill thinks about the realities of things that are made and how they fare in a partly predictable world. I recommend reading the well-written text; skimming through the pictures does not do the book justice. I like that it stands in stark contrast to "theory of engineering" or celebrations of iconic feats (of which there are many and which of course have an important place). This is the humble genius of everyday. Thank you for opening our eyes.