A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.
Headshot of Antonio Belton, a Black adult with a medium-dark skin tone, glasses, bald head, and gray and black beard.

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Antonio Belton

Lecturer

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Bio

Antonio (Tony) Belton (he/him) is an accomplished design leader with a career focused on transforming complex ideas into purposeful, manufacturable products that connect with users and strengthen brands. With expertise in design thinking, product strategy, and execution, Tony has guided cross-functional teams, shaped innovation pipelines, and refined user experiences across industries such as medical devices, diagnostic platforms, consumer goods, and structural packaging. His work bridges creativity and business objectives, resulting in solutions that thrive in the market.

Awards

Multiple Design and Utility Patents; IDEA Gold Design Award; Red Dot "Best of the Best" Award; IDSA Silver Design Award; Good Design Award; Chicago Museum of Science and Industry Design for Life Honoree

Personal Statement

Design, for me, is a dynamic dialogue between creativity and purposeful problem-solving. Throughout my career, I've been passionate about not just developing products but creating experiences that resonate and endure. My work reflects a belief in the transformative power of thoughtful design to improve lives, whether through healthcare innovations or everyday consumer goods.

In the classroom, I strive to foster an environment where curiosity leads the way. I emphasize building core skills that transcend technology and media, focusing on imparting the fundamental design thinking abilities that serve as the basis of good design. I encourage students to challenge conventions, embrace iterative thinking, and connect design decisions to real-world impact. My teaching philosophy centers on nurturing critical inquiry, collaboration, and resilience, equipping aspiring designers with the skills and mindset to innovate meaningfully in an ever-evolving landscape.

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

Core Studio 2 focuses on how material, form, and interaction shape experience over time. Building on the foundations of designing for others, this studio deepens students¿ engagement with making, refinement, and use.
Students work extensively with physical materials, exploring construction, surface, finish, and detail as communicative elements. Here, students deepen their builder practice by working through material constraints, assemblies, and refinement, learning how construction decisions shape experience. Digital tools are more fully integrated into the workflow, with 3D modeling used to develop form, assemblies, and tolerances, and 2D CAD supporting patternmaking, layouts, and fabrication planning. Sketching remains central as a means of refining proportion and communicating intent.
Interaction is introduced as a temporal and physical experience, encompassing affordance, sequence, and feedback. Prototyping emphasizes iteration and refinement, with students moving between digital models and physical builds to test how objects are handled, activated, and interpreted.
This studio reinforces building as a disciplined design practice, where material decisions, craft, and structure communicate meaning as clearly as form or function.

Who this course is for
This studio is for students who have completed Core Studio 1 and are ready to deepen their engagement with materials, construction, and use. It is well suited to students who want to strengthen their ability to design objects that are experienced through touch, handling, and interaction over time.

When to take it
Core Studio 2 is typically taken after Core Studio 1. The studio is designed to run alongside the core skills courses¿Designing Interaction, Sketching, and 3D Modeling¿reinforcing the integration of material exploration, digital workflows, visualization, and prototyping. Students are strongly encouraged to have taken, or to be concurrently enrolled in, a digital modeling core skills course, as 3D modeling is used regularly throughout the studio.

This course requires students to have a laptop that meets SAIC's minimum hardware specs and runs the AIADO template.

Class Number

1456

Credits

3