One can only imagine the shock among London’s snootier Mac owners when it emerged that the design genius behind Apple’s iMac, Powerbook, iPhone and iPod hails from Essex. Jonathan Ive, who is reported to command a cool million in his position as Vice President of Industrial Design, has a no-nonsense approach to designing:
“The design we practice isn’t about self expression. I don’t want to see a designer wagging his tail in my face. I want to see a problem solved, and in a way that acknowledges its context.”
Quite right, too. Although one can’t help but wonder whether the bright neon lights of Essex, present underneath millions of the county’s finest motors, have somehow influenced Ive’s choice of softly glowing colours in the Apple designs. And why not, if they did? Perhaps the same thunderbolt struck Dan Flavin. Both situations seem unlikely, but who can say.
Still, life never fails to surprise you. Take the case of John Darwin, missing for five years after he and his canoe vanished in 2002 (no previous mention of an affair between him and the canoe had been mooted). He recently turned up at a police station in London, apparently in good condition And how about this for turnaround – the unexpected coming together of the Belgian people over the humble chip. ‘A chip shop is like Belgium in miniature’, claimed the president of the union of chip-makers. News Hour suspects this is one slogan that the tourist board won’t be adopting, should there even be a Belgium to promote in the future.
All this, and Brad Womack didn’t find love on the most recent series of The Bachelor. What is the world coming to?
News hour, with Jerry Caesar 