Interview mit Ron Arad

In 1989, Ron Arad founded “Ron Arad Associates” together with Caroline Thorman in London. With designs for several international companies such as Kartell, Vitra, Driade, and Alessi, Ron Arad gained an international reputation as a designer. His most recent architectural designs include the National Design Museum in Holon, Israel, Y’s flagship store in Tokyo, Japan, and the Vallarta Tower in Guadalajara, Mexico. Ron Arad is professor of product design at the Royal College of Art in London.

The extraordinary language of form of the “PizzaKobra” lamp is further emphasised by its unusual name. Where did your inspiration come from?
Ron Arad: There are many good ideas that you carry around in your head for years – a subject, a form. The spiral shape of the lamp has already been incorporated in many other design concepts, but also in architecture. The form in combination with a lamp just made sense to me. PizzaKobra is not only flexible, but stable in any position.

What design philosophy did you follow when creating this lamp?
Ron Arad: It is less a philosophy than a logical combination of crucial design factors such as aesthetics, functionality, and performance. All these factors have to go hand in hand in the professional implementation of a design idea. If you put all these ‘ingredients’ together, you could actually refer to them as a ‘philosophy’.

“PizzaKobra is more than a table lamp, it is a project.” – In what respect?
Ron Arad: As a designer you have to surprise people time and time again. In the case of the PizzaKobra the form was there first, and we managed to combine cutting edge technology and design in such a way that it’s its high aesthetics which impresses the user first of all. A good form of course always creates high customer expectations and sets standards. But design is like love at first sight; people’s initial reaction to the PizzaKobra is always: “I want one, too!” And it is exactly this reaction that tells the designer that he has done a good job.