AOS: You’ve gained fame as the originator of the First Things First manifesto (1964). How did that come about?
KG: The manifesto was written in the heat of the moment. I was at the back of a conference room when there was a sort of debate going on about why younger designers should join the Society of Industrial Artists (SIA). I went along because some of my chums were going, but all I wanted to join was a trade union. I joined the National Union of Journalists, and then the National Union of Teachers. I had been a founding member of D&AD in 1962 but I left after the first year because I thought the advertising people were taking over. It wasn’t that I didn’t like advertising, I just didn’t feel part of that scene.
The manifesto was meant to be an alert to the fact that monies, which were pouring into visual communications of all sorts, seemed to be going down the wrong channels. There were all sorts of things that we could have been about and we weren’t. I hardly expected it to raise any interest but I got this terrific reception.
AOS: Coming back to your own design work, would you say that over your career your style moved away from Modernism?
KG: At one time I would design exclusively with asymmetric typography and tended to favour sans serif – I still like it very much and use it in quite a lot of my books – but later I saw that that was too prescriptive a way of designing, and that one could design in different ways according to the subject matter. I certainly didn’t reject Modernism but I didn’t agree with those who said there’s only one way to design, and that is asymmetrically, using, preferably, Helvetica. That seemed to me terribly narrow-minded and over-simplified. I still think so, of course. And I think they think so now too, probably.
AOS: Have you been influenced by any other designers?
KG: I would name one: that’s Hans Schleger. Hans Schleger was a Modernist to his fingertips, but he also loved using features that you might well have thought belonged to the past. One of the most influential books for me was a book written and designed by Schleger and published in 1946 called The Practice of Design. I came to know him and be his friend later, but long before that he became important as a guy who seemed to have the cue for modern design.
Saul Bass and Karl Gerstner were also important to me. I wouldn’t say Karl’s design work was so much a model; I liked the way he flourished his ideas. Swiss graphic design to a large extent avoided intellectualising – it was concerned with formalising. Karl liked to formalise but he also liked to intellectualise. I regarded Hans Schleger like an uncle, and Karl Gerstner more like a brother, and Saul Bass I suppose a bit between the two.
DIETER RAMS:
1932
Born May 20 in Wiesbaden, Germany
1940s
1947
1948
Begins studies in architecture and interior decorating at Wiesbaden School of Art
Breaks from studying to gain practical experience and conclude carpentry apprenticeship
1950s
1951
1953
1953
1955
1956
1958
1959
1959
Resumes studies at Wiesbaden School of Art
Graduates with honours
Begins working for Frankfurt based architect Otto Apel
Recruited to Braun originally as architect and interior designer
Designs, with Hans Gugelot, the Phonosuper SK4 (commonly referred to as ‘Snow White’s coffin’) music system
Designs include L01 loudspeaker,T3 / T31 portable radio
Vitsoe & Zapf start first production of Rams furniture designs
Designs TP1 and TP4 portable record player and radio
1960s
1960
1960
1960
1961
1961
1961
1962
1962
1963
1968
1968
1968
1969
Designs 606 Universal Shelving System for Vitsœ & Zapf
Designs LE1 loudspeaker
Receives ‘Kulturkreis im Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie’ Scholarship Award
Appointed Head of Design at Braun
TP1 receives ‘Supreme Award’ at Interplas exhibition, London
Designs RT20 radio
Designs 620 Chair Programme for Vitsœ
Designs include F21 flash andT1000 All-wave radio
F21 receives ‘Supreme Award’ at Interplas exhibition, London
Appointed Director of Braun Design Department
Designs T2 table lighter
Awarded ‘Honourary Royal Designer for Industry’ of the Royal Society of Arts, UK for ‘distinguished design in furniture and light engineering products’
620 Chair awarded ‘Gold Medal’ at the International Furniture Exhibition in Vienna
1970s
1970
1972
1976
1978
1978
Designs HLD4 hairdryer
Designs, with Jurgen Greubel,MPZ2 citrus press
Appointed as Member of Supervisory Board of German Design Council
Designs, with Dietrich Lubs, ET44pocket calculator
Awarded ‘SIAD Medal of the Society of Industrial Artists and Designers’, UK
1980s
1980
1985
1986
1988
1988
1989
1989
Appointed Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts, Hamburg, Germany
Awarded ‘Académico de Honor Extranjero’ by the Academia Mexicana de Diseno, Mexico
Appointed ‘Honorary International Faculty Member’ of the Ontario College of Art, Toronto, Canada
Appointed Executive Director of Braun
Appointed Chairman of the German Design Council
First recipient of the ‘Industrie Forum Design Hannover’, Germany, for special contribution to design
Awarded ‘Doctor honoris causa’ by Royal College of Arts, London, UK
1990s
1992
1995
1996
1996
1997
1998
Receives IKEA prize and uses prize money for his own ‘Dieter and Ingeborg Rams Foundation’ for the promotion of design
Promoted from Design Department to become Executive Director Corporate Identity Affairs at Braun
Receives ‘World Design Medal’ from the Industrial Designers Society of America
Awarded the ‘Hessian Order of Merit’ for services to Hesse
Retires from Braun after co-designing, designing and overseeing designs of 411 products
Appointed Honorary Chairman of Design Council of Germany
20002002
2003
2007
2007
2008
2009
2009
2010
Awarded ‘Verdienstkreuz des Verdienstordens der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Commanders Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany)
Receives ‘Design Award ONDI’, Havana, Cuba for his special contribution to industrial design and world culture
Awarded Design Prize of the Federal republic of Germany for his life’s work
Receives Lucky Strike Designer Award from the Raymond Loewy Foundation
Retrospective exhibition ‘Less and More: the design ethos of Dieter Rams’ opens in Osaka, Japan
Retrospective exhibition ‘Less and More: the design ethos of Dieter Rams’ opens in Tokyo, Japan
Retrospective exhibition ‘Less and More: the design ethos of Dieter Rams’ opens in London, United Kingdom
Retrospective exhibition ‘Less and More: the design ethos of Dieter Rams’ opens in Frankfurt, Germany
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