It was worked out without benefit of a lawyer, and we considered it merely a written explanation of an understanding rather than a legal document. It is our feeling that, if a client decided he no longer wanted to work with us, we would not want to hold him to a contract, and vice versa. No contract can control the quality of a creative service such as industrial design. We have never tried to tie anything down legally, and we have never had a lawsuit.

• Reply
• Quote

Here was a temptation to prettify a familiar object. Happily, we resisted it. We made the jar square with tapered sides, thereby giving the consumer a saving storage space, providing a jar that wouldn't roll off the kitchen table, and handing the manufacturer a thumping sales advantage. It was another lesson in the basic simplicity of good design.

• Reply
• Quote

At the expense of forfeiting originality, and it is a great temptation to hide locks and access panels, we try to make things obvious to operate, not only in airplane interiors but in everything we do.

• Reply
• Quote

A client, proud of a new product, has been known to take it home for inspection by his wife or, worse, by the guests at a large dinner party. Usually their criticism fails to evaluate consumer appeal, production methods, competition, costs, and distribution. It's also highly likely that they aren't potential customers.

• Reply
• Quote

Somehow these recollections of the past give us comfort, security, and silent courage. By embodying a familiar pattern in an otherwise wholly new and possibly radical form, we can make the unusual acceptable to many people who would otherwise reject it.

• Reply
• Quote

A genius, it seems to me, is a man or woman who combines an enormous amount of "know-how" with the purity of outlook of a child.

• Reply
• Quote