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Nov. 7 - Nov.14, 2004 |
Translating Those Strong Ideas
Italian influence in work of industrial designer James Irvine, whose products are groundbreaking
By Mark Curtis
Inspired by design legends such as Castiglioni, Mari, Nervi and Sottsass, Milan-based industrial designer James Irvine is following in the footsteps of these Italian masters by creating products with a rare combination of usefulness, respect for the consumer and the occasional light-hearted touch. It's a recipe for successful product design that many more designers could emulate.
"I try to design things that are true to themselves and not too influenced by marketing factors. My clients are people, not industry," Irvine says. The 46-year-old London-born designer says he "creates things which (the average consumer) might want to own because they really want them, and not because someone has told them that they are a failure if they don't own them".
Industry likes his work too, of course. Irvine's client list includes Italian manufacturing stalwarts such as Artemide, B&B Italia, Danese and Magis. He has also worked on projects for big-name players such as Canon, Toshiba and Whirlpool. His products range from the small scale - coat hooks and storage boxes for Danese - to the large, a municipal bus fleet for Hannover, Germany. If design superstar status has eluded him thus far, unlike some contemporaries with similar credentials, it's likely the result of a consistently low-key approach to product design. "Some people think that design is a sort of styling thing, but I don't see it like that," Irvine says. "It is starting from what I know and how I feel it should be. It has nothing to do with minimalism, but more to do with cutting away to find the true strengths of my idea." It's a rigourous approach shared with past masters like Achille Castiglioni and current designers such as Alberto Meda, exceptional practitioners admired by Irvine.
For legendary lighting manufacturer Artemide, for example, Irvine's One-Two floor lamp combines both ambient and task lighting functions in a single aluminum shade. The lamp manages to be daringly simple in an aesthetic sense and yet at the same time project an elegance and even a sensuality. Irvine's One-Two is not unlike lighting work by his good friend Jasper Morrison, with whom he shares a design sensibility that espouses the value of understatement.
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