William Lidwell: Becoming Leonardo, How Great Designers Think

How do great designers think? Imagine if you could crawl inside the minds of great designers to see what makes them tick: how they go about solving difficult problems, how they deal with adversity, and how they ultimately pull it all together to create successful design. What would you see?

Author and designer William Lidwell discusses his research exploring the top 10 defining heuristics—the cognitive strategies used to make decisions and solve problems—employed by great architects, designers, engineers, and innovators that enable them to achieve breakthrough design.

UPDATE: Check out William Lidwell's updated Third Edition of his book Universal Principles of Design released May 2023. https://www.amazon.com/Universal-Prin...

These heuristics turn out to be as counterintuitive as they are compelling, and contradict much of the prevailing wisdom of design thinking and user-centered design. By understanding, practicing, and ultimately mastering these heuristics, you will be on your way to becoming a modern-day Leonardo.

0:00 William Lidwell - How Great Designers Think
4:37 Heuristics
7:15 10 Heuristics of Great Designers
9:15 #1 Elegant Simplicity over Conspicuous Featurism
18:35 #2 Inside-out Craftsmanship over Bait-and-Switch Craftsmanship
24:38 #3 Embracing Failure over Fearing Failure
30:03 #4 Never Leave Well Enough Alone over If it Ain't Broke Don't Fix it
35:56 #5 Reframing Problems over Accepting Problems
42:16 #6 Customer Doesn't Know What's Right over Customer is Always Right
51:21 #7 Analogical Insights over Analytical Thinking
56:40 #8 Eat Your Own Dog Food over Observe Dogs Eating Food
59:52 #9 First Principles over Fashion Trends
1:04:29 #10 Zealous Missionaries over Indifferent Mercenaries
1:07:02 10 Heuristics Full List