You Can't Innovate Like Apple

What Apple does is no mystery. If you really want to know how to do good design delve into design methodology; it's the basis of the study Industrial Design.

One of the key factors is creating a rigorous set of criteria for your product, including emotional criteria. Then diverge with a plethora of ideas that meet all criteria. Evaluate each idea, select a number and develop them into concepts. Evaluate the concepts and select a product. Refine the product.

The naive approach to design is starting out with something and altering it until it looks good. However you should start out with multiple designs and improve all of them, then select the best. It's called quality through quantity. Actually this is a method that can be applied to any type of problem, not just design.