Application of Lean Philosophy Approaches in Furniture Design Processes

Abstract

Methodological approaches observed and applied regarding “Lean Philosophy”, which is a concept originating from production, became important tools that can offer solutions to different problems in several disciplines. In recent years, Lean Philosophy has been widely applied in different fields as "Lean Architecture", "Lean Design", "Lean Construction", "Lean Management", "Lean Hospital", "Lean Accounting". The main purpose of this study is to draw attention to the gains of Lean Philosophy, which can be defined as eliminating all kinds of waste and any activity that has no added value in the end use, to furniture design and production. Considering the effects of the design process on the whole enterprise, it is thought that design activities can contribute to a sustainable and more efficient interaction by incorporating concerns as modularity, inventory management, reduction of material consumption, reduction of labour and energy consumption, besides form and function concerns. As a qualitative research, this study embraces the document analysis method as a means of data collection and analysis. Existing prominent Lean Philosophy tools for manufacturing systems were analysed and some of them were adapted to design processes.