When I started studying design in 2004 I was primarily drawn to old Scandinavian design classics. The architecture of Alvar Aalto and Eero Saarinen, the Ericophone, the ceramics and textile patterns of Swedish designers such as Stig Lindberg and the glass of Iittala. I remember writing a paper on Eero Aarnio’s playful plastic chairs, describing and analysing them in detail as well as in general, and contemplating on how they are still relevant. Now I found out they will be on exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. When I joined my department one of the teachers later commented that he thought I was ‘afraid of making something new.’ He thought my forms were very funny and always had an air of something old, possibly outdated, and he still wants me to make something ‘new.’ But, there is something about these old things that I don’t find anywhere new… There is a clarity and a sensitivity, a subtlety of colour… I just keep coming back for more.

before i’ve always strived for perfection. now i no longer think perfection is just about a stunning end result. for me, at this point, it is more about figuring out a way to have an enjoyable process that takes me to a good and unexpected destination. sometimes places i’ve never heard of. daring to let go of control and then stumbling upon something. it may be something very near, but now seen from another perspective, and that gives a new understanding. but it can only happen if you let go…

laissez-faire
(noun)
a policy or attitude of letting things take their own course, without interfering.

mean
(noun)
(a mean between frugality and miserliness)
MIDDLE COURSE, middle way, midpoint, happy medium, golden mean, compromise, balance; median, norm, average.

(adjective)
(the mean temperature)
AVERAGE, median, middle, medial, medium, normal, standard.