The Design Classifications are located in the back of the last volume of the Manual of Classification . When you access a Design Class and Subclass on the Bibliographic Information Disc, you will notice that the Design Patents are the last in any Patent Title List. All Design Patents begin with a D . The Bibliographic Information Disc covers design patents from 1975 to the present. When you access the full record for a design patent on the Bibliographic Information Disc, you will notice that there is no abstract.
Design patents are purely visual, so there is no written description.
When you are using the Official Gazette to look at Design Patents, you will find them at the end of the issue. The image found in the Gazette may be enough to indicate to you if your idea has been previously patented, without examining the full patent. Complete design patents are found on film in the last patent cabinet, after the utility patents. Complete design patents are also found on the USAPat CD-ROM . When you are looking for information about design patents, they come last .