Terence Conran sitting in his Cone Chair in the 1950s. Photograph by Ray Williams/Design Museum

This article titled “Terence Conran at 80 – interview” was written by Rowan Moore, for The Observer on Sunday 6th November 2011 00.02 UTC

It is, says Terence Conran, all about making. That’s what he has loved doing ever since he was inspired by teachers at Bryanston school in Dorset to make pottery and art. He created and endowed the Design Museum in London in 1989 “to encourage this country to become a workshop again”; we “need to encourage people to make things”. Its job is “to educate, at all sorts of levels, from schoolchildren to industrialists”. Now he is giving the museum the building it currently occupies in Southwark so that it can sell it to help pay for a planned new venue in Kensington. The museum, as is only polite, is honouring Conran’s 80th birthday with an exhibition about him, despite his protestations: “I don’t want to be seen… I’ve always kept my name out of the Design Museum.”

He delivers almost unchanged the message of the V&A’s Britain Can Make It exhibition of 1946, famous in its time, whose note of desperation suggested that maybe, in fact, Britain couldn’t or wouldn’t make it, as decades of industrial decline subsequently confirmed. Then, he says, there was “a terrible attitude at schools. They would say, ‘Johnny, if you don’t do your homework you’ll end up in a factory’ – but what’s wrong with a factory?”

Conran has never stopped railing against this attitude. In the 1970s, when Margaret Thatcher was education secretary, he urged her to include design in the curriculum of schools. “To my amazement she agreed.” She “had no interest in design. There were Stubbs horsey pictures all over the walls of her office – nothing visually inspiring, unless you were a horse lover. But she had the view that a better educated consumer would boost industry. She was right, but it was the foreign manufacturers that benefited.”

Later, as prime minister, she opened the Design Museum. Prince Charles had been invited but it didn’t work out after he questioned why the white cuboid museum lacked a pitched roof. Thatcher herself nearly “turned her back on it. She was furious to discover there were foreign products there.” Now, even as the limitations of an economy based on financial services are so apparent, Conran is not much closer to being heard. “The message hasn’t got through on the making side,” he says, much as he might have done in the 1950s.

You wonder whether, after so many decades, he might try a different tack, but Terence Conran hardly comes across as a failure. He sits in a glassy eyrie in Shad Thames, the district of old warehouses near Tower Bridge whose revival he led, chain-smoking large cigars and wearing his invariable blue shirt. He is surrounded by things denoting his interests – a sign saying “Plain Simple and Useful”, a steel ruler, a photograph of the Eiffel Tower seen between the legs of a girl. He is slowed a little by recent illnesses but not blunted. Deyan Sudjic, director of the Design Museum, is in attendance, contributing helpful glosses.

And of course Conran is not a failure. He has done enough in his eight decades for several lifetimes. He has had more good meals and good wine, more money and more wives than most men manage. His innovations include the first flat-pack furniture in Britain, the second espresso machine, the promotion of open-plan living, the chicken brick; and, he says, he has “undoubtedly changed the sex life of Europe” by his promotion of the duvet. He has opened shops, restaurants, businesses, written several books and created the Design Museum.

He has had a good time along the way, launching enterprises through alliances with friends, lovers and interesting people. He learned how to make black squid risotto from the artist Eduardo Paolozzi – “it was absolutely thrilling” – who also taught him how to cut an onion. In return, Conran showed him how to weld.

He tells how he founded his first restaurant, the Soup Kitchen: “I had an American girlfriend who was financed by her dad rather generously to do Europe. She had an apartment in the Rue Jacob in Paris and found me a job in a restaurant” where “I ended up in the absolutely terrible greasy basement washing pots and pans and saw that the chefs were not exactly trustworthy – they found a way of strapping fillets of beef to their inside leg.” So: “I had to find a way of not employing chefs and we had this idea of a huge cauldron that made extremely good stock.” All that was then needed was to add different ingredients and sell it at a shilling a pint.”

And he created Habitat. After he launched his flatpack furniture (“obviously predating Ikea very considerably”) he found that conventional shops had no idea how to present it and sell it. So he decided to “try doing a shop where there is knowledge and enthusiasm” and where his products could be put in the company of others of a similar spirit. Habitat, he believes, changed people’s lives: “It was an opportunity to acquire these products that allowed you to lead a contemporary lifestyle, sold at prices that people could afford.”

It certainly did the thing with which it is usually credited, which is to play a leading role in the transformation of postwar British taste. Along with Elizabeth David’s writing on cookery it opened palates and interiors to international influences. For her it was French cookery; for him it was the legacy of the Bauhaus and modern design as seen in Milan or in the work of the Americans Charles and Ray Eames. “It is hard to overstate how uninteresting London was then,” says Conran. “It really was the era of Spam fritters.”

For all his love of making, Conran’s success was led by consuming, by a nascent culture of image and selling fuelled by such things as colour magazines. Later he rode the Thatcher boom to his advantage, working property deals and floating Habitat as a public company.

“For the first time in my life I had a load of money,” he says and he “wanted to do something meaningful and useful with it”, out of which desire came the Design Museum. He bristles at the suggestion that he is not primarily a designer – “like the last president of the United States, I did not know what an entrepreneur was” – but his greatest inventions have been in the realm of business, of buying and selling, rather than in design.

For myself, I find there are limits to the Conran palate and palette. I have never loved a Conran restaurant or a Conran object, for all that I appreciate his considerable contribution to opening up the possibilities of consumption, or like duvets and espresso machines, or recognise the thought and effort that have gone into his creations. They seem a little too managed, manipulated, packaged and don’t quite communicate the fun he has got out of life, as if constrained by some invisible boundary.

To help me understand him better his office send me Inspiration, a photographic book of the things he likes best, his “most personal book to date”. Here are images of Picasso, and a basket of radishes, and bare-breasted Japanese girls, all arresting, but also levelled, made equivalent and drained of difficulty and content. This levelling makes things easier to sell, but it also makes them less interesting.

It is magnificent that the Design Museum is there at all, and it shows many fine exhibitions, but over the years it has failed fully to capture the abundant energy, diversity and outrageousness of design in a digital, globalised age. I ask Conran if the museum should exhibit things he doesn’t like, such as the postmodernism now on show at the V&A, and he pulls a sour face that clearly means “no”, but if the museum is to show what is going on, it should be open to everything. The exhibition on Conran will be called The Way We Live Now, but I suspect that much of contemporary life won’t be there.

It would take more lifetimes for Conran to do everything that he has done and also be as brilliantly innovative a designer as, say, the Eameses. “What I have done,” he says, “is to make things available, in the restaurants and in the shops and in the Design Museum.” He’s right, but the very best effect of his work to date would be if this making available expanded into worlds he hasn’t dreamed of.

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1. What has been your favourite project this year ?
I don’t have one specific favourite project, but we particularly enjoy designing exhibitions and pavilions because they afford us the opportunity to try out new ideas. These designs can work as prototypes for spatial, organisational and material possibilities in our larger
projects. But exhibitions and pavilions also generate really nice moments for public communication and interaction over a short period of time, as so many people visit these events.

Sometimes you can design a building that you are very proud of but often – especially if this is not a public building – not so many people will truly get to experience it. So pavilions provide a wonderful opportunity for the design to truly be consumed.

2. UNStudio has been producing chairs/ furniture do you think its important for architects to investigate other creative disciplines?

We have always liked to test and investigate other areas of the discipline, but I never actually think in terms of scale. We like the idea of the non-existence of a proper scale and this is very much related to the way we combine ideas. I have never considered architecture and design to be mutually exclusive. In the same way as I sometimes like to think that art and architecture are not so different from one another.

Sometimes I will see a piece of furniture as architecture; as containing a variety of cultural references. Conversely a building can be seen as a product. We like to test these boundaries.

3. UNStudio Asia was set up in 2009 , do you envisage it becoming bigger than UNStudio ? 

We have set up the office in Asia as a full UNStudio office rather than a project office and we have structured it in the same way as UNStudio Amsterdam. But for us it is not about size. It is instead about the contemporary conditions of our profession. Once you have achieved a particular profile, it becomes impossible to ignore the highly fascinating opportunities which can be made possible by working in other locations. So our ambition is to become better, rather than bigger.

4. How did UNStudio come to collaborate with Premier Composite Technologies?
We worked with Premier Composite Technologies in 2009 developing a prototype composite façade solution for a project we were working on in the Middle East. At that time we explored together the opportunities and the full potentials of the material and created ‘all in one’ units that could be attached to building slabs without the necessity for further substructure. So, we were of course very interested to continue this collaboration when PCT invited us to design their stand for 100% Design 2011.

We are always interested in working with innovative technological possibilities to create material effects, so when we get an opportunity like this to work with a client, we like to search alongside them for the optimal geometrical or material potentials.

5. Are you currently using PCT materials in an architectural project?
We are currently working with PCT on a number of investigations into where FRP and composite solutions can provide practical advantages alongside geometric and material
effects.

6. What properties do composite materials bring to architecture, in particular UNStudio’s work?  
What have composite materials changed in terms of the way buildings can be designed and constructed?

The full potential of composite materials is something that we are still examining. It is an investigative process, in a way similar to discovering the true potential of brick. Brick can be used in so many different formal, geometrical ways, but it took centuries to discover the real potential for what you can do with it. We know already that composite materials
offer extensive aesthetic possibilities and freedom of design. They present the possibility to mould complex, fluid forms and produce seamless, efficient geometric shapes with
a wide variety of surface finishes and effects. On a practical level these materials are extremely lightweight compared to their more traditional equivalents such as concrete, but they are also highly efficient to work with. They substantially reduce the need for substructures and can be installed very quickly, which of course enables time and cost saving on site. They are also highly durable and resistant to corrosion and provide improved thermal insulation. So the advantages to both design and construction are many. But their true potential for use in architecture is still not fully known and that is why we are so interested to work with these materials. When we discipline them completely
these materials have the potential to change our design strategies and – with a very simple set up – make it possible to build at a much faster pace and make projects much more affordable.

You’ll be able to see UNStudios Collaboration with PCT
at 100% Design London (Stand No. E130)

Website:www.unstudio.com/
Website:Premier Composite Technologies

Kelley is launching his first off the shelf range at 100% Design – an accessible collection with all the hallmarks of his bespoke furniture.

What made you want to become a designer in the first place?
I never wanted to become a designer, but instead always just wanted to make things. As time progressed I got more and more into furniture and therefore by default I have started to design as well as make.

Where did you study design?
I’ve never studied design as my initial training was as a guitar maker back in the late 70′s early 80′s. The rest is watching and learning from others.

What was the first thing you designed?
Probably a spacemans outfit when I was a child, very Blue Peter made from paper tubes and tin foil.

Image:Nest of tables MDF Forms finished in 10% polyurethane paint finish, individually lined in black felt.

Image:Nest of tables MDF Forms finished in 10% polyurethane paint finish, individually lined in black felt.

How do you define good design?
Functionality, simplicity and longevity.

What would you be if not a designer?
Possibly wealthier and less stressed. To be honest I have no idea as this has been the thing that drives me on and on.

Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
Not sure on this one because after a period of time all I can see are the faults with the work. My original Blue Desk is up there as it was the first thing that gained me international attention and still does the job today.

Anything in your career you wish you’d done differently?
No. I’ve made good and bad decisions and learnt equally from both. No point in regrets, just keep learning, improving and moving forward.

Which designers do you most admire?
Dieter Rams, Paul Cocksedge, because he is definitely out there, Paul Smith, Peter Saville and early Jamie Reid graphics

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
Dieter Rams early 60′s hi-fi for Braun. Luckily I have some of it and use it everyday. It is stripped down to the bare bones and just does what it’s meant to do, play records, sound great and looks good almost 50 years on.

Tell me about your design style at home?
A mixture of things really, from 19th century Windsor chairs, to Dieter Rams, 70′s sofas and a few bit’s of mine. Plus a lot of graphic stuff ranging from 1930′s railway posters to early Jamie Reid stuff. I’d like to think the link is quality, but who knows?

Whats next for you ?
4 big commissions for a client on the bespoke front, representation, finally , over in NY. The launch of these new pieces at 100% Design and still working on a mass production piece that I hope to launch next year, that will then be the thing I’m most proud of when it appears.

If you could ask yourself one question -what would it be ? and what would be the answer ?
Why do I get asked questions like this?
I have no idea.

Image:Douglas fir boxes Douglas Fir plywood and Polyrey laminate interior in a variety of colours

Paul Kelley will be exhibiting at 100% Design 2011 more details here:www.100percentdesign.co.uk/

Website:www.pk-designs.co.uk/

What was the first thing you designed?
As far as I can remember it was when I was a kid with my sister and we were making grand plans to prepare our summer holiday to the Mediterranean seaside. We had this flimsy inflated boat and we were making anchor with paper clips and fish traps with bottles and many other objects. The boat always ended up with a puncture and sank.

How do you define good design?
In my opinion it is fairly impossible to judge whether a design is good or not, as there are many different aspects. Is a design good because people buy it and it appeals to the masses? Or a good design is defined by its utilitarian and functional aspect, a clever use of materials, innovative manufacturing process, it’s the ability to generate emotion or even how much profit it can generate. It’s probably a bit of everything.

What would you be if not a designer?
Maybe a pilot or an astronaut if I didn’t need glasses to see well. I am attracted to flying objects.
Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
I am never satisfied with what I do, that is why I need to move on all the time.

Anything in your career you wish you’d done differently?
It is always tempting to look back and regret decisions made with hindsight, and then ask ‘what if’. It’s necessary to analyse the past but I believe it is more stimulating to ask ‘what if’ when looking into the future rather than the past.

Which designers do you most admire?
There are some great designers and products out there and an exhaustive list will take some time. The designers I work for are generally people I really admire and they are reasons why I ended up there. Generally, I admire and I get inspired much more by choreography and artists for instance.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
I still can’t find a decent toaster. Lego is a fabulous invention.

Tell me about your design style at home?
I live in a 1915 mansion where you can see the work of time and the moulding are quite eroded. But I like to mix modern, simple furniture in that enviroment (that must be my French and Swiss side) and then there are objects you can’t define, you just like them and it works.

Marc Von S Products will be exhibiting at 100%Design 2011
Website:www.marcvons.com

We visited Sena Gu and just had a quick look around her studio in Holborn – she was working on some pieces for her new show at 100% design 2011.

Sena is originally from South Korea and studied Ceramics & Glass at Royal College of Arts. She now sales her products all over the world
and is revisiting 100% design because last year she managed to get lots of orders not only from the Uk but but also from other counties such as Australia, USA , France and Spain…

You can read Sena’s Q&A with Despoke
Visit her website:www.sena-gu.com/

Where did you study design?
I studied Ceramics & Glass at Royal College of Arts. We had a design group during the course and I’ve got a lot of inspiration about design from my personal tutor, Gitta Gschwendtner.

What was the first thing you designed?
A teapot with leather clothes, I made it during the BA. I felt that the patterns on ceramics were similar to a tattoo on a human body since the patterns cannot be changed once it’s been placed on. I just wanted to break away from the stereotypes of the way ceramics are decorated and then I thought of clothes for ceramics like human’s clothes. Trying to think outside the box still brings me new ideas or
at least it provides me a starting point for my design.

How do you define good design?
A good design to me would be a design that makes life more comfortable, easy and perhaps happy?

What would you be if not a designer?
I would’ve loved to have become a florist if not a designer. I just love flowers !!

Image:Lemon Squeezer 2007 105 x 95 x 145 mm ( W x H x D)
Porcelain
Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
That would be the Lemon Squeezer because that is the one that I believe expresses my design intentions and characteristics the best as well as what I wanted to say through the object, such as humour and vitality, and it brings new emotion by breaking away from the stereotype.

Which designers do you most admire?
That would be Alexander Girard and Marcel wanders.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
I love Alexander Girard’s wooden dolls and Eames Elephant. I’d also love to design for children someday.

Tell me about your design style at home?
It’s quite modern and simple but I like using objects, something colorful or unique and extraordinary, to emphasize my theme.

www.sena-gu.com

Sena Gu will be exhibiting at 100% design 2011

What made you want to become a designer in the first place?

R: Just a love of drawing and making things really.

H: I always just loved sawing up wood and taking things apart when i was little, so i suppose as i got older, becoming a designer is just a natural progression of that.

Where did you study design?
H+R: We both studied at Brunel University, West London which was where we met. We did the BSc Industrial Design course, which was nice.

What was the first thing you designed?
H: Uhhr… There was probably something earlier, but the first thing i remember of any actual design process was for a candle holder at school. Mine was rubbish.

R: A fuse tester, my dad still uses it in his office. Can’t say it looks that stylish though.

How do you define good design?
H+R: With difficulty! It totally depends on the application, but i like design that is engaging. Something that makes people stop for a second and think wow… clever! And that doesn’t have to be in a flashy way.. it could be in it’s manufacture, interface or any aspect. Of course functionality, form, environmental considerations etc etc come into it but that’s just “design”… “good design” should have something more.

What would you be if not a designer?
H: Probably a rock star or a footballer or something!?

R: I think I would quite like to learn a craft I’m not sure which one particularly but mastering a skill like glass-blowing or weaving would keep me interested.

Fashion Week Floor Stencil from not tom on Vimeo.

Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
H: All of them!? Doing the Catwalk and flooring for London Fashion Week I’m quite proud of. Its a high profile client and the pressure on all aspects of the job was pretty high. So when we sat back when it was done i think we both felt pretty good. But Pixel going into production is also quite exciting.

R: I am proud of recent work we did on London Fashion Week, we did a flexible temporary furniture installation in the reception area, it was great to see how people interacted with this and used it in different ways.

Anything in your career you wish you’d done differently?
H: It’s too early to say, but generally there’s no point regretting things.

R: Not so far but it’s early days. Oh, except….. I wish I’d written tea making into Harry’s job description. That is a fairly major regret actually.

Which designers do you most admire?
H: A lot of them. Most of the big ones are at the top for a reason, so they go without saying, but Max Lamb i really like for his material explorations. He probably doesn’t need any more column inches but Yves Behar / Fuse Project i like, not just for the design work, but for the way in which the business is run. I like how they work with startup clients in sort of investment by design way. It’s a good strategy and as startup funding gets harder to come by, i think it could be really important. And i have to mention Eames, boring i know, but incredible.

R: I’m quite a fan of Industrial Facilities work.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
H: I”l answer both questions with “Any Eames Chair”

R: Something universally useful like the metal bottle cap system.

Tell me about your design style at home?
H: Hmmmmm… Dunno!? I’ve never really thought about it too much… I’ll describe my flat then you can make your own mind up! It is a first floor studio in a renovated victorian corner terrace. It has white walls and wooden floors and the door is painted a dark purpley brown, although it’s rented so i can’t take credit for any of that. We put some pictures on the walls and filled all the shelves with our crap and brought too many chairs. Normally it’s quite messy and the duvet cover is either sort of blue or sort white and floral. We’ve actually jut moved there quite recently and it has a dishwasher… which is my hero.

R: I live in a cliche (warehouse) so we’ve had to knock most of the furniture/ walls up since we moved in so it’s all quite rough and ready. We made some rolling open units from plywood for a flexible kitchen and our bedroom doors are 2.4 metres high and constructed from raw OSB so it has a very paired down look. There is the odd quirk in there as well such as a row of cinema seats and a tractor tire as a coffee table.

Website: www.not-tom.com

I came to design via my training as a Silversmith. I was keen to take the sensibilities and style contained in my one off work to a broader audience to make it more accessible. In 1992 I met Alberto Alessi who showed me their factory; he had seen work of mine in an exhibition with two other silversmiths that was touring German museums.

In part it was this encounter that inspired me to move into the area of design or manufacturing. The other reason, was that it was difficult to survive as a silversmith and production offered a way of generating bread and butter, on top of this I was really interested in what you
could do with processes attached to manufacturing such as I had seen at Alessi.

What was the first thing you designed?
The object that I am best known for and which was the first object that went into full production is the F!NK Water Jug in 1993, it launched the FINK label and is still one of our best selling products.

The jug is sold all over the world in such places as the MOMA shops in New York, but it is mainly sold in Australia through 50-60 high end retail outlets. The other object that bears a mention is a sensuous heart shaped broach which I designed in the late 80’s and was made in small production runs, this was then introduced to the F!NK range in the mid 90’s

How would you describe your method of designing?
My/our methodology of designing generally comes from the perspective of the maker. Myself and many of our designers have an in depth understanding of how to manipulate and push materials, what forms and aesthetic styles can be achieved with various processes.

Even though we do utilize digital design technology in many of our designs we also like to start with hand making exploratory methods.

This methodology has two paradigms. One is to hand make the object as a fully functional prototype using the event as an opportunity to explore and develop its potential like sketching in 3D, imagining and projecting how the material will be manipulated and formed in a production sense. The other approach is to design a new tool or technique to make certain objects then to test it and then feed back these results into designing appropriate objects. In some ways this
methodology is more interesting as you never know exactly what will come out the other end.

These two paradigms are really only generalizations as sometimes I combine the two. One thing to note is that I rarely do 2D drawings and if so they are usually to record an idea or image that I have conjured in my head. I cant express the importance I hold in cognitive visualization!

How do you define good design?
Something that lasts both physically and aesthetically and is not throw away product that does not meet the test of time (unless of course it is meant to be easily recycled). Good design is something that sets a precedent and doesn’t plagiarize other designs. Good design is something that the owner will love for a lifetime.

What do you do when you are not designing?
I hang out with my partner and two daughters or play with my large marine fish and coral aquarium.

Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?

I would probably have to say the F!NK Water Jug, even though there are several others. It’s success really has allowed F!NK to develop as a company thus allowing us to support many other designers and grow an industry in Australia. It’s style and look didn’t really fit with the time of it’ coming, but now after 18 years it suits its counterparts.

In its manufacture we use several unusual techniques that we have evolved to allow it’s unique shape. It pours beautifully as you don’t have to struggle to hold it and it does not drip. Its elegant body leans forward and with a graceful curve to its spout it says “pour me”.

The FINK Water Jug has been voted one of the top 10 ever Australian designed products. Used in some of the most famous restaurants and hotels in the world.

Who is your biggest influence?

To be honest probably Mother Nature, I spent a lot of time travelling in the outback of Australia and the landscape as well as the Aboriginal culture has had a great influence on my work. I was not really exposed to many designers work early on in my career in Australia, so I had to find my own way. Having said this I did get influenced by my lecturer in Art school silversmith Ragnar Hansen and I did admire the designs of
Christopher Dresser and what he achieved so early on.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?

Could be the three legged sugar bowl that Christopher dresser designed in the late 1800’s which could be still considered contemporary today, Alessi re-released it a few years ago.

I also really love Sarha Hadid’s ‘Moraine” lounge.

What, in your view, is the most pressing design problem?

The fear and lack of risk taking that design companies showing with new products. With the incredible amount of new technology that we have available to us we are not really matching it with products in fact there seems to be a regression and revisiting of the past.

We seem to be churning out un surpassed amounts of crap design that is just a slight alteration on many other designs. So I guess the pressing problem is to STOP so much crap that just gets thrown out and focus on something which is a little more sustainable.

If you could go back in time, what advice would give your graduating self?

Trust your instincts more and say NO often. Jump on good ideas straight away otherwise someone else will do it.

ROBERT FOSTER trained in traditional ‘Silversmithing’ at the Canberra School of Art in Australia, and has successfully worked as a designer and maker of unique functional objects for the past twenty two years. Foster’s craftsmanship is deeply rooted in a highly developed sense of aesthetics and technical proficiency.

Foster works predominantly in hollowware, sculptural lighting and furniture, and his work is held by all of the major institutions in Australia including collections at the Australian National Gallery and the Australian Parliament House. He has had significant exposure overseas and has pieces in notable collections such as the Victorian Albert Museum in London and the Museum fur Kunst and Gewerbe in Germany, as well as in several international private collections. Foster brings to his work the combination of the natural inquisition of an engineer with the creativity of a designer. His diverse understanding of process and
his constant need to challenge visual language have made him one of the most contemporary notable designer makers.

Foster established his production company F!NK+ Co. in 1994 and is the designer of the iconic F!NK Water Jug. The company now has over 19 innovative and distinctive objects within its product range.

F!NK+Co. sells its range to selected galleries, design shops and museums world-wide. The company is also regularly commissioned by major restaurants, hotels and corporations world-wide to design and produce a unique range of objects, sculptures, corporate gifts, awards and trophies.

www.finkdesign.com/

The studio’s output is as diverse as its approach; each brief is a new beginning and no style or single approach is applied. There are always new problems to solve and new techniques to explore, designing should be a constant evolution.

Working with a range of companies from large multinational brands to smaller, more intimate local collaborations, the studio and its portfolio continue to grow and evolve as new opportunities arise. The studio’s work has been exhibited internationally and is distributed through some of the world’s leading design outlets. His work is regularly featured in the media. Most recently the studio has been awarded the prestigious Blueprint design award for the NET chair.

As well as running the design studio Sam has also taught at a number of British design schools as well as delivering lectures for the British council and the ICA.

What made you want to become a designer in the first place?

I was taught at foundation level by Jay Osgerby, who went on to become half of Barber Osgerby. I was experimenting with all the creative disciplines but none of them felt comfortable. He came in set us a brief, I think for me it was the presence of this brief that initially made sense. Up until this point everything I had done had been subjective, there was no right or wrong. Jay talked about reasons for details, why and how we can make critical decisions about our work based on a brief. I discovered that the discipline of design suited my way of thinking and creating. So I don’t think I ever really set out to be a designer, I was introduced to it at the right time by the right person.

What was the first thing you designed?
A flat pack cardboard chair that was part of the first brief set at foundation. I’m sure I’d designed things before but nothing that resembled my idea of what design means to me now.

How would you describe your method of designing?
I’m not sure I have a method, that makes it sound like I know what I’m doing! I never know where each brief will take me so I think it’s important to stay flexible. I do have a process I go through but I don’t think it’s radically different to other designers. It’s not really changed since my first projects.

How do you define good design?
Something that appeals to a group of people, serves a purpose and somehow enhances their life without offending anyone else!

What do you do when you are not designing?
Cooking, sport, looking, listening& learning.

Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
The net chair for Mark Furniture. I don’t think anyone will ever know how much went into that chair. There were so many amazing people involved in it’s development, it was an incredible learning experience for everyone.

Who or what is your biggest influence?
My peers, my family and the students I teach have the biggest influence on me.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
The answer to this question will change day to day depending on what I’ve just seen. There’s so many great pieces of design out there to choose from. However there’s one thing that whenever I see it I think, “I wish I’d thought of that.” Its a plastic cover that slots over the nuts on lorry and bus wheels and shows when they’ve come loose. It’s such a painfully simple observation and could save lives, I look at that and think the stuff I do is all a bit self indulgent.

What, in your view, is the most pressing design problem?
Do we really need more stuff? Thats a design problem that all creatives should consider. If you can make small changes to an object to make it function better, have less impact during manufacture and still work well for the intended user then that’s all good in my book.

If you could go back in time, what advice would give your graduating self?
I think I’d just say, “Hang on in there. It’s going to take a while.” I think any of the creative industries require you to be patient and highly motivated.

www.samjohnsondesign.com/
www.markproduct.com/

Having worked in in NZ, Australia & China, Ed has been back in NZ for
over 12 years – predominately with Formway Design Studio based in
Wellington.

Formway Design Studio is a internationally recognised research & design
studio who are best known for their work in the highly challenging
commercial furniture sector. Their work is licensed for manufacture by
some of the most successful companies in the United States such as Knoll and Kimball Office.

Ed’s tenure with Formway Design has included leading several significant research & design projects, Design strategy and GM of Marketing. Currently Ed is leading the research consultancy component of Formway Design, leveraging well developed user insight techniques and broadening the studios exposure to sectors well beyond commercial office furniture.


What made you want to become a designer in the first place?
1977, I’m 8 years old, Star Wars comes to the Embassy Cinema. Enough said.

What was the first thing you designed?
The first thing I designed after graduating was a Miniature Golf Course – which on retrospect gave me pretty clear insight on understanding the customer experience – considering I found myself handing out the clubs and balls on opening day… 
Strictly speaking – my first ‘real’ job as an Industrial designer was either a Gun Lock for handguns or a Dustpan & Broom set for Raven, it was a bit of a blur

How would you describe your method of designing? 
Identify the opportunity first - get absolute clarity abound the product opportunities, needs, and intent. Everything else is negotiable.

How do you define good design?
Still wondering about this one myself. Good design huh? I often ask out loud if we as designers are designing for designers, our peers as opposed to to whomever the product or service is targeted toward. Cutting to the chase - my good design litmus test comes down to the ability of a product to delight the user, on a continual basis. Few & far between.

What do you do when you are not designing?
Immersing myself with my young kids, Tosh 4 & Olive who is 2.
The untouched, brilliantly naive world that is their imagination is a wonderful place to hang out with them. Awesome. That and drinking really good coffee, eating good food.

Image:Hum Workdesk
Which design of yours are you most proud of and why?
The HUM worksystem we designed & licensed to Formway & Kimball Office is a source of pride, perhaps because of the new research methods we developed throughout the project, and the look we recognise on customers faces when they understand that this was a product whose design was totally driven by human behaviour.

Who or what is your biggest influence?
On a day to day basis  all of my colleagues here at the design studio continue to keep me on my toes, good friend and workmate Kent Parker is probably the most underrated & talented designer in New Zealand and continues to push boundaries yet consistently creates commercially successful products.

The creative team at Alt Group in Auckland astound me on a regular basis, inspiringly led by Dean Poole & Ben Corban this practice is living proof that great design comes from both creative passion and bloody hard work.

Which product do you wish you’d designed/do you think is an example of good design?
Trees are up there. That and the Chemex -  ”An elegant hand blown glass filter decanter that dates back to 1941. Wonderfully low tech, the Chemex results in a clean cup. We recommend coffees with refined acidity such as Kenya, Mocha (Ethiopia) and our delicate Colombia. Comes with a pack of filter papers ”  Looks good, works well, lasts forever.

What, in your view, is the most pressing design problem?
In plain language, unless its saving lives or our planet do we really need another toaster/chair/car/cell phone?  and if the answer is yes then a) what has been sacrificed to make it, and b) what will eventually happen to it. 
 
If you could go back in time, what advice would give your graduating self?
Get out and about with the design houses, seek advice & feedback from anybody willing to listen to you. Learn how to tell a compelling yarn. Enjoy yourself, no matter how serious you think your problems are, believe me you will kill for those same problems in 20 years time.

Website:www.formwaydesign.com/
Website:www.chemexcoffeemaker.com
Website:www.knoll.com/

Chris Jackson for Despoke