Becoming a Toy Designer. It is not child's play, but a new profession that requires specific preparation. Conceiving, designing and making a toy is a very serious matter, especially when considering the target audience. Many aspects have to be taken into account, a number of issues have to be addressed: the age of the child, his or her manual dexterity, perception of colours and space, the relationships he or she establishes with his or her surroundings.
One can well understand how the toy designer must necessarily have a multidisciplinary approach to his work, able to combine and exploit different complementary skills and points of view.
The Toy Designer works, in fact, in close contact with other professionals: psychologists, pedagogues, experts in colour theory, delving into issues related to the realisation of the design, such as the analysis of shapes, the choice of language, the contribution of mathematics in games, as well as the prototyping and realisation of the product.
Course for Toy Designer: the specialisation of the Italian Design Institute.
The Italian Design Institute specialisation course is a full immersion course that trains future toy designers.
Interactive Toy Series "TSUMIKI" 〜English Version〜 from PPP on Vimeo.
Classes are held in Milan, in the most fervent city in terms of all-round design culture.
The course is developed with a preparatory study part on an online platform and with teaching materials offered by the organisation, before moving on to the classroom phase with frontal lessons, for a total of 32 hours, with some of the best lecturers in the sector.
IDI's Toy Design course programme.
- Play, memory and creativity.
- The fairy tale as a starting point and engine of the concept.
- Shapes and colors inn fairy tale.
- Analysis of basic geometric shapes.
- Analysis of primary colors.
- The breakdown
- Opposites, creative error, deformation
- The toy as imitation of the adult world.
- Prototyping and product realisation. Images from Manufacturing Companies, Asian Production
- In addition, the course also includes a practical exercise in the classroom setting up a new game or game-book concept.
The lecturer: Irene Guerrieri.
Roman, architect and designer, Irene Guerrieri has the passion for toy design for as long as he can remember. He graduated in Architecture in 1992 with a thesis on the design of a children's park inspired by the Pinocchio fairytale. He has realised important collaborations with several established companies in the sector: Mattel, Thun, Sevi, Trudi and Haba.
Friendship with Bruno Munari has certainly left its mark on her subsequent professional activity. In addition to designing for Asian companies, she was involved in the conception and design of entire toy-book series and received several awards in the field of graphic design and illustration for children.
