Real Dictionary

design
uncountable noun: Design is the process and art of planning and making detailed drawings of something.
verb: When someone designs a garment, building, machine, or other object, they plan it and make a detailed drawing of it from which it can be built or made.
verb: When someone designs a survey, policy, or system, they plan and prepare it, and decide on all the details of it.

design in American English
a plan; scheme; project
to make designs
to make preliminary sketches of; sketch a pattern or outline for; plan
intransitive verb: to make drawings, preliminary sketches, or plans
noun: an outline, sketch, or plan, as of the form and structure of a work of art, an edifice, or a machine to be executed or constructed
transitive verb: to prepare the preliminary sketch or the plans for (a work to be executed), esp. to plan the form and structure of

design in British English
noun: a plan, sketch, or preliminary drawing
verb: to work out the structure or form of (something), as by making a sketch, outline, pattern, or plans