Philippe StarckFrom Wikipedia, the

Philippe Starck
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Philippe Starck
Phillippe Starck 2011.jpg
Philippe Starck, 2006
Born January 18, 1949 (age 67)
Paris, France
Nationality French
Website Starck.com
Philippe Starck (born 1967)[1] is a French designer known since the start of his career in the 1980s for his interior, product, industrial and architectural design including furniture and objects that have a simple but inventive structures. [2][3]

Contents [hide]
1 Career
1.1 Starck Product
1.2 Hotels
1.3 Restaurants
1.4 Other projects
2 Philosophy
2.1 Democratic Design
2.2 Political messaging
3 References
4 External links
Career[edit]
The son of an aeronautical engineer, Starck studied at the École Camondo in Paris. An inflatable structure he imagined in 1969 was a first incursion into questions of materiality, and an early indicator of Starck's interest in where and how people live. Starck's designs brought him to the attention of Pierre Cardin who offered him a job as artistic director of his publishing house.[citation needed]

Starck Product[edit]
While working for Cardin, Starck set up his first industrial design company, Starck Product - which he later renamed Ubik[4] after Philip K. Dick's novel - and began working with manufacturers in Italy – Driade, Alessi, Kartell – and internationally, including Austria's Drimmer, Vitra in Switzerland and Spain's Disform. His concept of democratic design led him to focus on mass-produced consumer goods rather than one-off pieces, seeking ways to reduce cost and improve quality in mass-market goods.[5]

In 1983, the French President François Mitterrand, on the recommendation of his Minister of Culture Jack Lang, chose Starck to refurbish the president's private apartments at the Élysée. The following year he designed the Café Costes.[6]

Starck's output expanded to include furniture, decoration, architecture, street furniture, industry (wind turbines, photo booths), bathroom fittings, kitchens, floor and wall coverings, lighting, domestic appliances, office equipment such as staplers, utensils (including a juice squeezer and a toothbrush), tableware, clothing, accessories (shoes, eyewear, luggage, watches) toys, glassware (perfume bottles, mirrors), graphic design and publishing, even food (Panzani pasta, Lenôtre Yule log), and vehicles for land, sea, air and space (bikes, motorbikes, yachts, planes). The buildings he designed in Japan, starting in 1989, went against the grain of traditional forms. The first, Nani Nani, in Tokyo, is an anthropomorphic structure, clad in a living material that evolves over time. The thesis being: design should take its place within the environment but without impinging on it; an object must serve its context and become part of it.

A year later he designed the Asahi Beer Hall in Tokyo, a building topped with a golden flame. This was followed in 1992 by Le Baron Vert office complex in Osaka. Starck's buildings, while dedicated to work, are no less instilled with life and its constant effervescence. In France he designed the extension of the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (ENSAD) in Paris (1998).


Alhondiga, Bilbao, 2010
The Alhondiga, a more recent project, is a 43,000 sq. m culture and leisure venue in Bilbao that opened in 2010.[7] Starck, who loves ships and the sea, designed the new infrastructure for the Port Adriano harbour on the south-west bay of Palma de Mallorca, and was also artistic director for the interior. It opened in April 2012. He also designed Steve Jobs' yacht, Venus, which launched in October 2012.[8]