In the context of digital technology and cultural integration, the work aims to sort out the hardware design process and method of small household appliances, so as to improve the design efficiency and quality of small household appliances at the level of cultural symbol expression. The comparative analysis was conducted on the existing hardware design methods for household appliance products, and the innovative design methods for digital interactive design were proposed and interpreted. With the intelligent cultural and creative air conditioning fan as an example, the innovative methods were applied and optimized. From the stages of object symbol preparation, digital symbol modeling, and digital model output, the innovative design process under the dual path mutual verification of symbol deduction and digital model was obtained. The digital interactive design method has efficiency advantages compared to traditional household appliance design methods in terms of object target accuracy, diverse scheme divergence, functional implementation verification, and design output differences. It optimizes the compatibility of small household appliance product design in cultural connotation expression and provides new ideas for the design of small cultural and creative household appliance products that highlight cultural added value.