Investigation of designers' colour selection process

Although many design process studies and design theories have been developed and presented, in reality designers have rarely followed standard rules. A design process is often more a form of personal self-expression. The type of approach that designers use in their design work depends on their preference, experience, and education background. Therefore, this work focused on understanding the design process and the colour selection method by collecting data from designers and their design process with the aim to summarize a general colour selection method. This work employs a semi-structured interview approach in a one-to-one interview format to investigate the process of design and collect their colour selection method. A total of 20 designers were interviewed from different design areas, working experience, age groups, cultural background, and workplace around Korea, China, South Africa, Mexico, and the United Kingdom. In the end, a three-step-method of colour selection was summarized and this highlighted the importance of colour association in the colour selection process.