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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Steve Jobs has been Apple’s most recognizable
personality, but much of its cachet comes from its clean, inviting
designs. For that, Apple can credit its head designer, Jonathan
Ive.
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Ive, a self-effacing 44-year-old Brit, helped Jobs bring Apple back
from the brink of financial ruin with the whimsical iMac computer,
whose original models came in bright colors at a time when bland
shades dominated the PC world. He later helped transform Apple into
a consumer electronics powerhouse and the envy of Silicon Valley
with the iPod, the iPhone and, most recently, the iPad.
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In the wake of Jobs’ resignation as CEO, Apple must show that it
can keep churning out head-turning products even without its
charismatic leader. Apple’s chief operating officer, Tim Cook, is
now CEO, taking on the role of Apple’s public face.
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But in many ways the real pressure will fall on Ive to make sure
Apple continues its string of gadget successes.
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Ive, known to his friends as “Jony,” has led Apple’s design team
since the mid-’90s. Working closely with Jobs, Ive has built a
strong legacy at Apple, ushering in products that are sleek and
stylish, with rounded corners, few buttons, brushed aluminum
surfaces and plenty of slick glass.
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Apple’s pride in this work is evident even in the packaging: Open
up any iPhone box, for example, and see Apple proudly proclaim,
“Designed by Apple in California.” Six of Ive’s works, including
the original iPod, are even part of the collection at the Museum of
Modern Art in New York.
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People who have worked with Ive describe him as humble and sweet,
quiet and shy, but also confident, hard-working and brilliant.
Paola Antonelli, senior curator of architecture and design for
MoMA, said she knows “hardly anybody that is so universally loved
and admired” as Ive.
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“Products have to be designed better now for people to buy them
because of Jony Ive and Steve Jobs and Apple,” Antonelli said. “All
of a sudden people have gotten used to elegance and beauty, and
there’s no going back.”
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Design, as well as software that makes the gadgets easy to use, is
a crucial part of setting Apple products apart from those of its
rivals. Apple didn’t make the first music player or smartphone, but
it blew past rivals by making ones that looked cool and worked
well.
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Ive started out far from Apple Inc.’s Cupertino headquarters. He
grew up outside London and studied design at Newcastle Polytechnic
(now Northumbria University) in Newcastle, England. After finishing
school, he co-founded a London-based design company called
Tangerine. There, he designed a range of products including combs
and power tools. It was through Tangerine that he first got to work
with Apple.
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In 1992, while Jobs was still in the midst of a 12-year exile from
Apple, the company’s design chief at the time, Robert Brunner,
hired Ive as a senior designer. Thomas Meyerhoffer, who worked
under Ive at Apple in the `90s, believes Ive came because he
understood Apple was different from other computer
companies.
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“He came to Apple to take that even further,” Meyerhoffer
said.
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And Ive did, but not right away. Ive quickly became a leader,
working as the creative studio manager and helping to build Apple’s
design team during a period in which the company struggled to
innovate.
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Apple declined requests for an interview with Ive. But during a
1999 interview with The Associated Press, Ive said that for years,
designers would produce foam models of computers only to be sent
back to their drawing boards because of managers’ fixations with
focus groups and marketing figures.
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“We lost our identity and looked to competition for leadership,”
Ive said at the time.
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Brunner left in 1996 and suggested that Ive take over the post,
even though Ive was only 29. When Jobs returned from his exile and
became interim CEO in 1997, he named Ive as senior vice president
of industrial design.
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With Jobs again at the helm and Ive as his style guru, Apple
refocused around design and produced a hit that got the company
back on track. Apple shook up the personal computer industry in
1998 with the candy-colored all-in-one iMac desktop, the original
models shaped like a futuristic TV.
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Unlike previous product attempts, the iMac concept was immediately
embraced by the top decision makers at Apple, and the design went
through very few revisions.
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“We knew we had it when we saw it, and with Jobs’ support we were
able to make it happen,” Ive said in 1999.
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At a time when most computers were boxy and largely black, beige or
gray, the iMac was bulbous and flashy. People snapped up 150,000 of
them in the first weekend following its release. Apple sold 800,000
iMacs by the end of the year.
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The iMac changed the way consumers thought about personal computers
and about Apple itself. It gave Apple a vital boost that helped it
usher in a new era of consumer electronics that were quirky, fun
and colorful. The marketing team even teased consumers by
encouraging them at one point to collect all five – strawberry,
blueberry, grape, tangerine and lime.
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With Ive in charge of design, Apple then bought out the first iPod
in 2001, the iPhone in 2007 and the iPad in 2010. In recent years,
the company has largely dropped the bright color palette (though
you can still find it on some iPods) in favor of black, white and
silver hues. Yet they retained simplicity that made them
approachable to everyone – from the tech geek to Grandma – as well
as the curves, shiny surfaces and expensive appearance.
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As a result, Apple’s products are more popular than ever, allowing
the company to surpass rival Microsoft Corp. last year as the most
valuable technology company in the world.
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“He wasn’t responsible for them, but they definitely couldn’t have
done them without him,” said Leander Kahney, who has written about
Apple in several books and on his “Cult of Mac” blog.
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Ive and Jobs have worked hand in hand and, in many respects, have
contributed to each other’s success. Ive has always been in contact
with Jobs and speaks the same language as him, Antonelli said, and
they clearly have chemistry.
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Don Norman, who worked at Apple in the `90s as vice president of
the company’s advanced technology group, said that while Ive had
good design ideas “sitting on the shelves,” he needed Jobs to get
those designs off the shelves.
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“Jony has always been Jony – brilliant,” Norman said. “What he
needed was a Steve Jobs to say, `Make this happen.'”
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Now, the test will be whether Cook can continue to keep that focus
at Apple and encourage Ive to continue creating hits.
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In a sense, the challenge won’t be as difficult as it had been in
the 1990s. Now that Apple has developed a style, it can build on it
rather than try to reimagine it with each new product.
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And that, Norman says, is now in Apple’s DNA.
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—
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Online:
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Ive collection at MoMA:
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