• Prof. H. Kumar Vyas, renowned teacher and practitioner as part of the initial league of Industrial Design educators in India, was born in 1929 in Uganda. 

• He received early training in Industrial Design at the Central School of Art and Design, London.

• Thereafter, he gained 5 years of professional practice experience at the Douglas Scott Associates, London. 

• He was invited in 1962 to be among the foremost Industrial Design faculty members at NID, Ahmedabad; with the objective of building the faculty development program for core design disciplines that continued till 1969; resulted in an established model of value systems and the ethos of design education in India.

• Prof. Vyas has published numerous design articles, papers, and also books. Among his notable books ‘Design and Environment – a primer’ (Hindi version: डिज़ाइन एवं परिवेश) laid out the design processes that involves designing for people and spaces (context: environments and spaces in India for the people of India).

Professor H. Kumar Vyas
Father of Indian Design Education (1929 - 2017)



“The History of Design cannot afford to exclude as an integral part the History of the Design Process”

- Vyas, H. (2006). Design History: An Alternative Approach. Design Issues, 22(4), 27-34

Prof. H. Kumar Vyas was born in 1929 in Uganda. He joined the electrical engineering department at the Faraday House college of Engineering. In less than a year, he joined Industrial Design at the Central School of Art and Design. Vyas learned design under the esteemed group of teachers - Prof Bruce Archer [1], Prof Douglas Scott [2], and Dr. Rayner Banham [3]. His five years of professional practice as a designer initiated at Douglas Scott Associates, London, wherein his work on redesigning London’s Routemaster double-decker bus [4] has been among his popular landmark projects.

Back in India, in 1962, he was invited by NID Ahmedabad to join in as a faculty member of Industrial Design. At NID, he paved strong training for the first cadre of Industrial designers. In addition, he developed the first Faculty Development Program (1962-63); which continued till 1969, including the disciplines of Graphic Design, Product Design, Furniture Design, Ceramic Design, and Textile Design. The foundation program [5] was also developed by Kumar Vyas along with Hans Gugelot of The Ulm.

The pioneering works by Vyas spearheaded novel design education methods and processes: a fresh take on the Bauhaus and the Ulm approach to Design. His discoveries and insights established a new revolution of design education in the context of the environments involving spaces, objects, people, and issues within the lens of the Indian land. Vyas has authored a good number of articles, papers, and books [6] in design.

In 2006, as Chairman, The Education Council, Vyas formulated the Saadhan-Sadhana-Sadhya philosophy [7] and the creation of the Institute of Design, Maharashtra Institute of Technology (MIT), Pune, India.