Teaching Material Design

This paper presents and advocates a method for teaching about materials in industrial design courses. The method has been developed by the authors in the academic sphere while teaching over the last six years on a number of degree courses – both the three-year basic programmes and the two-year specialist ones – at four Italian places of learning: the Politecnico di Milano, Sapienza University of Rome, the University of Palermo and ISIA (the Higher Institute for Artistic Industries) in Florence, which is now recognized as being equivalent to a degree course. Behind the research is a focus on a specific area of the design field which has until now been undervalued and not sufficiently expanded upon by teaching programmes, as it has always been seen as something which is simply there to be exploited. However, it has become more prominent in recent years, thanks in part to rapid technical and scientific development and the arrival on the scene of numerous new materials with unprecedented capabilities.