"If you want to be good at something, you must first sharpen your tools". Tool is the product of human society and human civilization and the crystallization of human wisdom, representing the level of development of productive forces at different historical periods. In the long course of history, human creative consciousness and labor creation are a process of mutual promotion. Design is carried out on the basis of consciousness: and lead to the formation of experiences, and the tools are selected and improved according to the accumulated experience to form a richer design concept process. This paper reviews the concept of Chinese traditional tool design, tries to change the research ideas and breaks through the traditional mode of tool design research, focusing on "tools", "design concept", "needs", "knowledge change" and other elements. And under the vision of design historiography, the historical longitudinal combing and the unit-specific research are combined and mutually confirmed to explore a more reasonable research paradigm of the history of Chinese traditional tool design ideas.