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Borrowed from the French and used mostly in the plural, this collective term describes additional equipment (French: accessoires). Accessories are used primarily in fashion design to set accents which are highly trend-dependent (compare: styling). In interior design, accessories are less dependent on fashion trends. Textiles, decorative items, pictures, candles, vases are used to achieve consistency of a design concept.

In everyday speech, this term is used as a synonym for “beautiful, balanced, tasteful, appealing”. In the true sense of the word however, “aesthetic” describes all the characteristics which we experience with our senses and which determine how we perceive our environment and objects – particularly whether we perceive them as beautiful or ugly. Balanced proportions, regular or layered forms and harmonious colour combinations are often considered particularly aesthetic, beautiful and pleasant. How we perceive beauty is partly rooted in biology, but also acquired culturally and sociologically (defined by our personal environment). All these factors determine whether we perceive a design as being aesthetic or aesthetically convincing or not. In some cultures, clean and harmoniously proportioned shapes are considered beautiful, while in other cultures however beauty means rich ornamentation.

Aesthetics is the theory of sensory perception (from the Greek “aisthesis” = perception). It doesn’t mean “beauty” itself, but rather the study of laws and basic principles of beauty (harmony) as they can be observed in nature or in art. It is also concerned with whether aesthetic characteristics are to be seen as objective or whether beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The focus isn’t on personal taste, but on the general human or social perception of what is beautiful (“golden section”).

Alessi, an Italian factory for metal goods founded in 1921, is a perfect example of the strategic transformation of a manufacturer of conventional household goods into a design-oriented company. As a producer of designs, Alessi became a renowned provider of lifestyle products. Starting in 1955, Carlo Alessi began commissioning external designers. With Alberto Alessi as a director, the range of goods reflected a cultural strategy which promoted mass products with artistic sophistication. The cooperation with Ettore Sottsass, beginning in 1972, also had a strong influence on the company. Michael Graves’ kettle, the Hot Bertaa and Philippe Starck’s Juicy Salif lemon squeezer became cult objects in the postmodern era.

The term “ambience” means “surroundings”, “environment”, “setting” in the sense of a special atmosphere exuded by a personality, a space or a piece of art. In interior design, ambience is achieved through targeted aesthetic presentation and stands for the atmosphere created by a space.

This term could be described as the opposite of design, as it means unformed, unshaped, somewhere between solid and liquid. Amorphous structures are fluid and not reminiscent of any solid, geometric or linear shapes. They can be organic in appearance, for example when a piece of furniture is designed with an unconventional shape.

The production and the design of a product are appropriate for the material involved when an excessive use of energy, material or a decrease in quality is avoided.

An archetype (from the Greek arche: beginning; typos: imprint; meaning original model, mold) can be a shape which is embedded in our cultural memory and which is an example of, or a symbol for, a specific function. For many of us, a house still has a rectangular ground plan and a gabled roof, even though a variety of other house types exist today. In product design, archetypes are forms which establish or embody a new product class. For example, cross handles represent the handles of a faucet, the Porsche 911 represents the sports car, Mart Stam’s “S34” steel-tube chair (1926) represents the cantilever chair.

Anything that creates a space and cannot be dissociated from it – both in terms of construction and design. In product design, architectural composition is based mostly on basic geometric shapes. Straight, nonexpressive, purist forms, no superfluous elements and a slightly “technical” appearance – this style is perceived as “architectural”. These objects appear as architectural, structural elements which are weight-bearing, functional and adjust to the room rather than developing a sculptural life of their own. Such products are often connected to the wall or the floor and provide structure to the room without interfering with the overall architecture. They usually are not decorative, but simply draw attention to the essentials.

One of the oldest art forms of human civilisation. Today, the lines between functional buildings and architecture are blurred – department store, concert hall, church and apartments are regarded equally worthy of the design process. The connection between architecture and geometry is as old as architecture itself. The concept of architecture as both shell and constructive framework, and the idea of axiality (alignment with the axes), find their source in Roman antiquity. These principles have been continually refined and are today expressed through modern construction materials such as steel framing, concrete, glass etc. Space is designed in terms of dimension, proportion, form and composition.