Is your gut telling you there’s more than one ‘right’ answer?
Are you ready to be a whole new ‘engineer’ –solving problems by inventing new things, and reinventing old ones?
People, passion and innovation lie at the core of MIAD’s Product Design major. Product Designers and Product Design Engineers marry invention and empathy to ask questions and reimagine what people need.
Imagine going beyond function and reliability to create and improve a product’s value, comfort, aesthetics and user interface. Imagine taking an open-minded approach using design thinking skills to find the best solutions to human needs.
As a Product Design major at MIAD, you’ll unleash your creativity and passion to improve people’s lives and experiences while making the world more sustainable and driving our economy.
Right: Thaddeus Zurawski, Ignis Portable Campfire, 2019 Senior Exhibition, Product Design
MIAD is Wisconsin’s only four-year, independent, non-profit college of visual art and design, offering a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree that is fully accredited by the North Central Association, which accredits colleges, and the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD), which accredits visual art programs.
Most important, MIAD nurtures your growth in a community dedicated to shaping your creative life and career.
Right: Ramon Davis, Jr., Home Rx Medication Dispenser, 2021 Senior Exhibition, Product Design MacKenna Mau, Spark Campfire Kit, 2019 Senior Exhibition, Product Design General Motors sponsored project student presentationMIAD’s Product Design program is one of the most highly rated product design programs in the country.
→ MIAD students have won 37 International Housewares Association Awards
→ MIAD is 1st in the nation in awards from the Society of Plastics Engineers, Association of Rotational Molders and winSell Design Competition
→ MIAD’s Product Design program is uniquely positioned at the core of thriving Midwest art, design, industry, manufacturing and transportation businesses.
→ In 2022, the median annual wage for a Product Design Engineer was $87,737.
MIAD’s Product Design major welcomes students from a variety of backgrounds and will assist you throughout the application process, including preparing a portfolio.
Through their coursework, MIAD students experience the fundamentals of creative invention, marketing, psychology, ergonomics, technology and engineering. You’ll have the opportunity to design products in collaborative situations, often for outside clients with multidisciplinary teams, further developing your skills in visual and verbal communication while experiencing a professional setting.
-Judd Lord, Senior Director of Industrial Design, Delta Faucet Leader of a 14-year sponsored, multidisciplinary studio relationship with MIAD that has culminated in internships and patentable designs for the company.
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“Delta brings blue-sky projects to the table, and we’re always impressed by the creativity of the MIAD students’ solutions.”
In fall 2021, Product Design students took part in a semester-long partnership sponsored by Generac to gain real-world experience that included in-depth market research, design concepting and visualization, full-scale prototypes and final models. Students took on the challenge of developing a compact, lightweight and affordable light tower.
“We brought this project to MIAD students because … I knew that our company would benefit from their innovative ideas and fresh approaches to our product. We are proud to be able to help train and provide real-world experience to the product designers of tomorrow.”
-MIAD alum Casey Dougherty ’10, Generac’s Director of Innovation and Design
Left: Light Tower design presentation at Generac
Designers are able to explore the “What If” more than ever with embedded smart and emerging technologies that enable interfaces in objects from smartphones to clothing and soft goods to sophisticated medical care products. Other technologies, such as Additive Manufacturing [AM], provide the ability to manufacture new shapes while Design for Manufacturing [DFM] reduces time in development to market workflow for faster production cycles.
Delta Faucet has two products in their line currently using AM technology and sees an opportunity for more in the future. In fall 2020, Delta Faucet engaged MIAD’s Product Design department to engage is a real-world application of this technology as applied to a bathroom sink faucet.
Szymon Salamon, Gusset Delta Faucet Design, 2020
After serving in the US Army, David Gabriel completed his B.F.A. in Product Design at MIAD. The summer before his senior year, David interned in Huntsville, AL, at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center working with the Deep Space Habitat Human Factors Engineering Group. David’s task during his internship was to redesign a spaceship kitchen area for NASA’s Moon Operations spaceship, which is a steppingstone to a trip to Mars. David continued working with NASA throughout his senior year, including for his senior thesis project. He developed an interior concept for the Lunar Base.
Emily Siira ’17 Senior Industrial Designer Milwaukee Tool
During her time as a student at MIAD, Emily Siira consulted on Nobo’s – a Pewaukee-based healthcare technology start-up – B60, a first-of-its-kind wearable hydration monitor. Siira was in charge of creating the 3D digital model of the product in SolidWorks, and created digital images of the product, which were used in Nobo promotional materials at CES.
“[A] hands-on approach is the most effective way to learn, and the MIAD program engages that on all cylinders. The unique opportunity to be involved in client-sponsored projects within studio courses offered a foundation for how to apply the variety of learned skills to real-world problems.”
We imagine you have a lot of questions at this point about your future. We’re here to help. We’ll work with you to create and build a portfolio –through one-on-one meetings and through our Scholarship Portfolio classes.
Together with our faculty, we’ll inspire, motivate, educate and prepare you for a future as a Product Designer or Product Design Engineer.
Learn more at miad.edu/productdesign.
Allison Klosinski, Anchor Port Access Tool, 2019 Senior Exhibition, Product Design
