Everything that is mass-produced is designed. Every designed object has its own evident quality of beauty. But how can we help students understand the nature and form of beauty as something that is an integral part of the design process. In this paper we explore the notion of beauty as it is represented through aesthetics. Students’ experience of making designed objects, their engagement with the reflective practices of learning in a studio, their involvement with the community of designers, and their cultural experience combine to provide a background to their developing understanding of their own aesthetic values. We provide a discussion of aesthetics in the context of design education and use examples from a student’s work to demonstrate the development of aesthetic awareness in practice.

Keywords: aesthetics, reflective practice, design process.