Design
Design is the creation of a plan or convention for the construction of an object, system or measurable human interaction (as in architectural blueprints, engineering drawings, business processes, circuit diagrams, and sewing patterns). Design has different connotations in different fields (see design disciplines below). In some cases, the direct construction of an object (as in pottery, engineering, management, coding, and graphic design) is also considered to use design thinking.
Graphics
Graphics (from Greek γραφικός graphikos, "belonging to drawing") are visual images or designs on some surface, such as a wall, canvas, screen, paper, or stone to inform, illustrate, or entertain. In contemporary usage it includes: a pictorial representation of data, as in computer-aided design and manufacture, in typesetting and the graphic arts, and in educational and recreational software. Images that are generated by a computer are called computer graphics.
Design
Good design is a Renaissance attitude that combines technology, cognitive science, human need and beauty to produce something.
Paola Antonelli (2001), curator of architecture and design, Museum of Modern Art, New York, in A Conversation About The Good, The Bad And The Ugly
Design
People think it's this veneer — that the designers are handed this box and told, 'Make it look good!' That's not what we think design is. It's not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.
Steve Jobs (2003), as quoted in Rob Walker, "The Guts of a New Machine", The New York Times Magazine, 30 November 2003