A Discreet Charm: The first family of French product design on extracting elegance from efficiency

It is as if there were a natural law which ordained that to achieve this end, to refine the curve of a piece of furniture, or a ship’s keel, or the fuselage of an airplane, until gradually it partakes of the elementary purity of the curve of the human breast or shoulder, there must be experimentation of several generations of craftsmen.

From S. Lovell, “Dieter Rams: As Little Design as Possible”, 2010 Apr

Forward by Jony Ive

When I was a young boy growing up in London, my parents bought a wonderful juicer. It was Braun MPZ 2 Citromatic. I knew nothing about Dieter Rams or his ten principles of good design. But to a little boy uninterested in juicing, I remember the Citromatic he and

“The choices made by designers have a significant effect on the world. Yet so much of the discourse on design focuses on aesthetics rather than ethics. […] How do you make room for humanity, with all its wondrous variations, in a society increasingly driven by metrics, algorithms, and profit? How can ecologically responsible designers consider a pr

we carefully define, rather than just assert, what makes each product the best of its kind. Durability and low environmental impact make that list. Fleeting fashion and the illusion of luxury do not.

This being said, every luxury object should have some part, even small but spectacular, that is handmade.