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MHS Library | Visual Communication Design

Marc Newson

Marc Newson's website

Marc Andrew Newson CBE (born 20 October 1963) was born in SydneyAustralia. Now based in London, he is a successful, influential industrial designer who works in aircraft design, product design, furniture design, jewellery, and clothing. He incorporates a design style known as biomorphism to his various designs. This style uses smooth flowing lines, translucency, transparency and tends to have an absence of sharp edges. (Wikipedia)

About Marc Newson on ArchDaily

Marc Newson is one of the most accomplished industrial designers of our time. A self-confessed control freak, Newson’s innovative perspective has been applied to everything from cutlery to spaceships. He regularly lends his skills to brands such as Nike, Ford and Qantas. His numerous international accolades include receiving a CBE for services to design and being appointed “Royal Designer for Industry” in the UK. Examples of his work are housed in most major permanent museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and one of his earliest pieces, The Lockheed Lounge, holds the record for the world’s highest price paid for a piece of furniture. 

 

Marc Pascal

Marc Pascal's website

In his working processes, Pascal constantly experiments with techniques and materials, seeking not only an envisioned aesthetic effect, but also determining the practicality and durability of the objects.  They are, after all, primarily intended for use.   The materials he works with include plastics, rubber, technical gypsums, ceramics, metals, and glass, and various combinations of these. The techniques include rotational moulding, blow moulding, slip-casting, dye-cutting, dyeing,  hand-weaving and casting.  This play between techniques and materials, new and old, has led Pascal to some interesting methods and design solutions.​

The first insight into the process and the evolution of the objects can be seen in the conceptual sketches.  They have boldness and freedom, and are obviously used as ways of thinking.  The drawing becomes exact when moved to the computer, used as a precision design and drawing tool.​ Read more here.

Radio National: By Design (Tunnels and bridges)

Engineering wonders: tunnels and bridges (ABC Radio National)

Since medieval times, we've depended upon bridges and tunnels to get us over and under the landscape. But technological advances have revolutionised the way they're designed and built. From the Snowy River Scheme to the Sydney Harbour Bridge, tunnels and bridges are among the most iconic engineering wonders of the modern world.

As part of the Australian Science festival By Design brought together a panel of engineers, architects and landscape architects to discuss the history and future direction of tunnelling and bridge building.

Broadcast Saturday 20 January 2007

Download podcast here.

Philippe Starck

Philippe Starck's website

About Starck (from his website)

“Subversive, ethical, ecological, political, fun: this is how I see my duty as a creator.” Philippe Starck.

Despite his thousands of projects - completed or in the making - his global fame and his tireless protean inventiveness, never forget the essential. Philippe Starck has a mission and a vision: creation, whatever shape it takes, must make life better for the largest number of people possible. Starck believes this highly poetic, political, rebellious, benevolent, pragmatic and subversive duty must be borne by all and he resumes it with the humour that has accompanied his approach since the earliest days: “No one is forced to be a genius, but everyone has to take part.”

 

His anticipatory concern for environmental implications, his profound comprehension of contemporary mutations, his enthusiasm for imagining new lifestyles, his determination to change the world, his devotion to a positive reduction, his love of ideas, his desire to defend the intelligence of usefulness - and the usefulness of intelligence - have accompanied one iconic creation after the other… From everyday products such as furniture and lemon squeezers, to revolutionary mega-yachts, micro wind turbines, electric cars, and hotels that aspire to be wondrous, stimulating and intensely vibrant places, Starck never ceases to push the boundaries and criteria of contemporary design. His technological miracles are vectors of democratic ecology, focused on action and a respect for the future of both humans and nature. Predicting the phenomena of convergence and dematerialisation, Philippe Starck has always devised objects that demand the most from the least. The solutions provided by his dreams are so vital, so essential that he was the first Frenchman to be invited to the legendary TED (Technology, Entertainment & Design) conferences, talks that bring together such illustrious speakers as Bill Clinton and Richard Branson.

Inventor, creator, architect, designer, artistic director...