Hasta La Ideas

What’s it like to start up a college-level industrial design program from scratch? Soon we’ll be able to ask our own Allan Chochinov, whom as many of you know has been tapped to chair the School of Visual Arts’ new MFA in Products of Design Program. And while New York City is a great location for such a program and one that will be able to draw on copious local talent, any school that decides to offer education in industrial design is good for our field and should be noted. Thus we turn our attention to the University of Iowa, whose College of Design is now wrapping up the first year of their new industrial design program.

While the U. of I.’s program doesn’t have The Choch in charge, program director David Ringholz has been hard at work establishing what is one of only ten ID programs in the American Midwest. One of the early challenges was that the actual classes were ready before the fabrication facilities were—their state-of-the-art ID lab is scheduled to be useable by the fall semester of this year—but that hasn’t stopped students from signing up:

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