Good Examples of Interactive Design

The Good Food Fight - an excellent mix of content and interaction. The site is relevant and cleverly designed - each element on the page serves a purpose in the food fight game, so fun and information are well balanced.

National Grid - An excellent website which combines a quiz (content) with activities to do with your adopted virtual polar bear (interaction). It is engrossing and features a very wide range of interactive elements.

Turbochef - An interactive website designed to sell the benefits of this particular oven, this website makes good use of interactive elements and relevant imagery to outline the oven's benefits.

What is Interactive Design?

Interactive design is the designing of elements for digital and screen applications, which create an environment of interaction between the user and the medium. Interactive design is a combination of technical (e.g. code) and aesthetic (the visual appearance). Interactive design shares the same principles as graphic design in that there must be a problem for a design solution to exist, and that the situation and audience must be researched for a solution to be effective. The steps taken in solving an interactive design problem are typically as follows:design research, concept research (brainstorming), persona development, diagramming of the solution, prototyping (in large projects), implementation and testing. Jonas Lowgren identifies that interactive design is not only limited to the design of the digital, but at present is becoming an important part of industrial design where shape, materials and other factors play a part.

References:
“What is interactive design?" WikiAnswers. 19 March 2009. [ http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_interactive_design ]
Lowgren, Jonas. "Interaction Design." Interaction Design. 19 March 2009. [ http://www.interaction-design.org/encyclopedia/interaction_design.html ]