Aethos Stool, JianMing Lin (3D Design '22)

Cushion Studies, Christina Daniels (3D Design '23)

Float Chair, Andrew Riiska (3D Design '23)

3D Design

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Department Philosophy

The 3D Design department is an experimental laboratory to explore human needs as expressed in the furniture and objects we live with.

Department Philosophy

The 3D Design department is an experimental laboratory to explore human needs as expressed in the furniture and objects we live with.

Through a process of questioning, making and discussing, our graduates develop a broad critical framework for evaluating design. It straddles the contexts of industrial design as it relates to mass production and fine design, situated in the overlap between design, fine art, and craft. Our approach is best suited for designers who wish to develop an architectural and spatial awareness in their work.

DESIGNER IN RESIDENCE

Scott Klinker

Scott Klinker’s work in furniture and lighting explores a space between design, architecture, art, and craft. While trained as an industrial designer, his vision is applied through an architectural lens – always questioning the ways in which humans inhabit space. With this approach, he sees across categories with the goal of remixing traditional disciplines into new hybrids.

In addition to overseeing the graduate 3D Design program, Klinker is principal of Scott Klinker Design Studio. His practice strikes a balance between industry projects and cultural projects, working with design-driven industry partners such as Herman-Miller, Alessi, Steelcase, Landscape Forms, Burton Snowboards, and others. Klinker’s industry projects have been recognized with numerous professional awards and his limited edition works are currently represented by Playground Detroit.

Visit Scott Klinker's Website

Program

Through a process of questioning, making and discussing, our graduates develop a broad critical framework for evaluating design.

Program

Through a process of questioning, making and discussing, our graduates develop a broad critical framework for evaluating design.

The program is best suited to hands-on makers who have already demonstrated some facility in crafting materials. This focus builds on Cranbrook’s legacy of teaching design – from Charles Eames in the 1930s to Michael and Katherine McCoy in the 1980s – but also fully updates the discussion to reflect the complexities of today’s context. Our group is a deliberate mixture of industrial designers, architects, craftspeople, and sculptors so that a diverse set of critical perspectives can inform the discourse. Our conversations draw on theories and strategies from related disciplines including literary theory, psychology, philosophy, and the social sciences – all fields that provide essential tools for expanding the parameters of design thinking. Through a process of questioning, making and discussing, our graduates develop a broad critical framework for evaluating design, and the cultural maturity and creative vision required to lead the emerging design professions.

Archive of 3D Alumni Work

Scott Klinker

The Cranbrook Experience in 3D Design

Scott Klinker

The Cranbrook Experience in 3D Design

Tube Form (Stool), Kyle Joseph

Culture Club v.2, Karen Lee

Conversation Rug, Dee Clements

Program

We’ve seen design discourse expand from mass production to now include significant areas of overlap with the fine arts, crafts, architecture and fashion.

This wider scope recognizes that human needs are multi-dimensional. They can be practical, emotional, intellectual, psychological, social, real or imagined. As design’s scope expands, the central question of human needs remains, but with a wide lens on the aesthetic and critical potentials for a creative authorship that may find an audience through mass production, craft production, one-off gallery works or conceptual proposals. It is the designers and artists themselves who will position their work within this expanded field of ideas, audiences, and industries. It is imperative, then, that they understand their cultural context, their methods, and the intentions of their work.

Program

A Week in 3D Design

Vineta Chugh, 2017

Program

A Week in 3D Design

Weekly critiques and discussion groups form the core of the department’s activities with periodic all-faculty, Academy-wide reviews. The department head consults with students to build individual programs based on their specialized goals and interests. In response to student needs, faculty coordinate projects that vary in duration and conduct reading and discussion groups with students. Additionally, designers and critics of national and international stature visit the department to conduct critiques and occasionally assign short-term projects.

The work undertaken by design students over the course of their two years of study is a combination of self-initiated research, grant-funded, team and collaborative projects, faculty assignments and industry-sponsored projects. In addition students develop an independent reading and writing program that requires the critical analysis and creative synthesis of ideas.

Austin Swick 2017

The program is free of the formal course structure typical of most art schools and universities.

Instead, the studio environment is the core of the curriculum with an emphasis on developing an individual body of work. The highly motivated group of students that comprise each year’s class provides a vital network of resources with which to engage in dialogue and critique. Because of this open course structure, students are strongly motivated to enter the department with a purposefulness that fuels the pursuit of independent growth. A highly charged studio environment allows individuals to work in the spirit of an ongoing experiment, with the focus on rigorous interaction among fellow designers and other Academy students.

Masamichi Udagawa + Sigi Moeslinger

2018 Visiting Designers

Visiting Designers

Cranbrook 3D hosts some of the most influential thought-leaders in design as guest speakers and critics in our studio.

Our guest list draws widely from both industrial design and fine design practices from around the world. Visiting designers often assign short-term assignments to test new ideas and methods with our group. Studio dinners with all visiting guests give students casual social time with designers of significant stature. These important moments inspire new ideas and build new connections that serve the careers of Cranbrook designers.