"Form over function" is always treated in the forums like it's a one OR the other thing. It's not that the people, like me, who want function DON'T want design, we just don't want the design overriding the aspects that make it functional.
For example, I love thinner laptops as much as anyone, but if "thinner" means sacrificing battery, or having a worse keyboard, or losing ports I need, then I'm happy to have a little thickness. At the end of the day, a sheet of aluminum with an Apple logo stamped on it would be AMAZINGLY thin, but it wouldn't let me do my work.
The designers should work with the team to make the device as aesthetically pleasing it can be, without losing the features that make it functional. Ideally, nobody WANTS a notch in their phone/laptop display, but if it has to be there to accomodate the camera, then design it so that it is as good as it can be within those constraints. (For me, I'd live without a camera at all on my Macbook. I don't use it. But I realize I'm probably in the minority.)
If you design first, and tell the engineers to fit within the design, you end up making compromises on usability. Puck mouse, anyone?