Cover Feature www.thedesignermagazine.com 27
moment – two displays on a digital clock, says, it is downright misleading. In his
for example, one for the time, and the new capacity as teacher at the royal
other for the alarm. Or two clocks on a College of Art, he recently bought some
single face, for two time zones. radios for his students to take apart. “I THInk we gIve
The Industrial Facility approach – like Annoyingly, however, despite the ‘sound’
its name – is ruthlessly back to basics. grille printed on their side, these radios THe APPeArAnCe
Consider the curvaceous handles of did not have speakers, but only a plug for
kitchen knives, which are supposedly a head-jack. OF beIng A muCH
formed to fit the hand. Hecht says this Hecht dismisses the relevance of
is “pseudo ergonomics and aesthetics. It ‘trends’, preferring to work beyond them. LArger COmPAnY...
limits the many ways in which we hold So passion not fashion? “You could say
and manipulate this common domestic that.” I FInd IT quITe
object.” nevertheless, Hecht once
declared that he is not an emotional FASCInATIng,
pure and simple designer. He likes to start a project
Accordingly, they resurrected the simple “rationally with a clear head... emotions THeSe COnTrASTS
tapered oval, but, like everything else, it don’t really play a part in our studio.”
wasn’t that simple. The handle was made However, that’s not to say that his work beTween wHAT
of a new white polyester and melamine – or indeed the professional man himself –
composite, pleasantly cool to the touch is without much emotion. He has a quirky, PeOPLe THInk And
(more so than plastic) and involved maverick side expressed in an engrossing
new techniques of precision grinding second part of his exhibition called wHAT YOu
and forging to create a smoother, more under a Fiver. This shows an amusing –
durable join between blade and handle. provocative even – collection of mainly ACTuALLY Are”
“You can see clearly, then,” says Sam functional (and often inspired) objects
Hecht, “that it’s not just about common bought cheaply from supermarkets and
sense – there is that lovely quote from markets all over the world.
Picasso: creativity is nonsense.”
Hecht talked about the ‘banal’ HumOur and inspiraTiOn
products that escape design attention. There is humour, too, in Hecht’s own
One such on display is the Liteplug work - in a notebook with the same
emergency torch, which was given a shape and colour as an American passport,
complete functional and visual re-think. for example, and in the best-selling muji
“It is rewarding to examine these taken- ‘City in a bag’ mini bricks.
for-granted types of object. They are The beam pendant light has been
often at the juncture between a space inspired by a child’s drawing which
and architect and may be pretty sad and showed a beam of light coming from a
miserable - things like fire extinguishers, shade. The Two-timer wall clock evokes
smoke alarms, radiator valves and Salvador dali’s dripping timepieces. many
exposed plumbing.” products are emotional on the simple
As you might expect, decoration direct level of being unambiguously
is not important. “I’m not necessarily beautiful.
against it,” says Hecht, “but it must have And the catalogue to the exhibition
a relevance to what the product is trying starts with a piece of poetry by Philippe
to do. It has to have an idea to it.” Starck, though he is not overtly credited
Often decoration is there simply to (see box on page 25). You can’t get more
help a product sell. And sometimes, he emotional than that. designer
sam Hecht on...
desiGninG FOr KiTCHens
“Whirlpool asked us to look at the kitchen. We developed a design
in which Whirlpool became the maker of a complete kitchen,
rather than simply an appliance manufacturer. after all, BmW does
not simply make engines. We made a prototype but they did not
manufacture it - though they probably had more serious marketing
enquiries than for anything they had ever done before. it was deeply
frustrating.
so we persuaded alessandro Finetto [director, Global Consumer
design at Whirlpool europe] to let us do a real product. This was
step, our dual-fuel gas/induction hob, for the Kitchenaid brand.
my own kitchen is a complete revamp within our modernist home in
primrose Hill. it is very small but i am always much more interested
in the constraints of space and how things have to operate in very
limited, even difficult situations.
Above: Hob and sink
The idea of some ultra-modern kitchens is wonderful to consume
designed for Kitchenaid with the eyes but is not perhaps relevant to the realities of life. a
kitchen has to perform and work very well on a very basic level.
if we were approached we would certainly like to be involved in
kitchen design again.”
Sam Hecht p.indd 27 22/7/08 10:37:52
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