1.
GHOSTS IN THE MACHINE
“The first episode of this new series tells the
fascinating story of the birth of industrial design. Alongside the celebrated
names, from Wedgwood to William Morris, it also explores the work of the anonymous designers responsible for prosaic but classic designs for
cast-iron cooking pots to sheep shears - harbingers of a breed of industrially
produced objects culminating in the Model T Ford. Includes interviews with
legendary designer Dieter Rams and J Mays, Ford Motors' global head of design.”
2.
DESIGNS FOR LIVING
“In the crisis-stricken decades of the 1920s and
1930s, with the world at the tipping point between two global wars, design
suggested dramatically different ideas about the shape of things to come, from
theradical futurism of the Bauhaus to the British love
affair with mock-Tudor architecture and the three-piece suite
In Europe, the 'modern movement' promoted the
virtues of the machine and the machine-made with theories and products like
open-plan living, the fitted kitchen and tubular steel furniture which have
become absorbed into the mainstream of the designed world. In the USA,
designers like Raymond Loewy and Henry Dreyfuss explored and exploited the
dreams and desires of American consumers to develop a market-based approach to
design which has become one of the bedrocks of the modern consumer society.
Featuring Niels Diffrient and Tom Dyckhoff.”
3. BLUEPRINTS
FOR WAR
“The Genius of Design examines the Second World War
through the prism of the rival war machines designed and built in Germany, Britain,
the USSR and the USA, with each casting a fascinating sidelight on theideological priorities of the nations and regimes which produced
them.
From the desperate improvisation of the Sten gun,
turned out in huge numbers by British toy-makers, to the deadly elegance of the
all-wood Mosquito fighter-bomber, described as 'the finest piece of furniture
ever made', the stories behind these products reveal how definitions of good
design shift dramatically when national survival is at stake. Featuring desert
war veteran Peter Gudgin and designer Michael Graves.”
4. BETTER
LIVING THROUGH CHEMISTRY
“The story of design enters the 50s and 60s, when a
revolutionary new material called plastic combined with the miralcels of
electronic miniaturisation to allow designers to offer post-war consumers
something new: liberation
Designer Verner Panton pursued the see mingly
impossible dream of a chair made form a seamless piece of plastic hile Joe
Colombo porposed the Austin Powers-style “cabrilet bed”, complete with built-in
cigarette lighter and stereo. Mean while in Japan, designers at Sony were
shirinking radios from pocket-size to palme-size, paving the way for the ultimate
in portable lifestyle-the Walkman. But the optimis of the era came to an abrupt
end when concerns about the environmental impacto of palastic came to the fore.”
5.
OBJECTS OF DESIRE
“Picking
up the story of design frome the drab days of the late 70s, the final episode
tracks the explosion of wild creativity that defined the “designer decades” of
the 80s and early 90s. By addressing wants rather than needs and allying them
selves to the blatant consumerism of “retail culture” designers emerged from
the back rooms to claim a starring role in the shaping of modern life.
Designer
salso played a decisive role in making the worl-changing power of computer and
digital technology available to the masses through the design of keyboards, the
mouse and the “desktop”. And now, wiht concerns growing daily about our
insatiable appetite for “stuff” designers are also offering new ideas about
sustainable consumption for the future.”