Freelance furniture designer Stephen Clark (Clark & Co Design) believes good design should be accessible to all. Having built his career with the likes of Next, Argos and Homebase, he now offers a range of design, development, visualisation and support services that puts that ethos to good use. Here, Stephen tells Furniture News about how he approaches his work, and shares his thoughts on the wider furniture design scene …
Where did you study?
York St John University.
What was the most valuable part of your education?
Product Design at YSJ is a practical course that requires you to split your time between the design studio and the workshop. The time spent in the design studio teaches you essential CAD skills, refining design practices and essential research techniques. The time spent in the workshops teaches you how to prototype designs and various manufacturing techniques. Most importantly, you are taught how to design a product that can actually be made.
What was your first design job?
Assistant designer at the Home Retail Group, designing furniture for Argos and Homebase.
Please outline some of your biggest achievements …
My biggest motivation throughout my career has been the drive to design furniture for the masses. I have a personal ethos that centres around the idea that ‘good design should not just be exclusive to luxury price points, good design should be accessible for all’ – and by following this ethos, I’ve worked for some of the largest furniture retailers in the UK, both as an in-house designer and as an external design agency, developing new and exciting furniture ranges that are of good quality, great design and easy to assemble.
My proudest achievement is simply seeing these furniture ranges become bestsellers. There’s nothing more satisfying than seeing your furniture in other people's homes.
What are you currently working on?
I’m currently working with a UK brand that launched around 20 new sofa and bed designs at imm cologne last month – it was an exciting opportunity to show off the wide capabilities of their manufacturing base, high quality and great value.
We’ve been working hard on developing these new products so they were ready to launch along with high-quality visuals, inspiring room sets and a new brochure that shows off the amazing benefits of working with their teams.
How do you mentally prepare yourself for work each day?
Creativity comes to us all in different ways. For me, fresh air and a good breakfast in the morning is the best way to kickstart the day and get the ideas flowing. I usually sit down at my desk with a cup of tea and make my way through the most difficult tasks first, giving me the rest of the day to explore and develop key concepts.
A blank sheet of paper can be daunting – what inspires you to fill it?
The key to starting is to remind yourself of the key development point and what you are looking to achieve. It could be a new space-saving dining table, or maybe there’s a new material combination coming through high-end trends. By starting with the customer need you can start putting pen to paper and working through ideas that develop upon these needs.
Designs are often compromised to make them commercial – how do you maintain your quality despite such pressures?
This is the biggest challenge of my ethos that ‘good design should be for the masses.’ Designing details into furniture often adds cost and can be difficult to achieve with materials like foil and board. The quality of a product should not be dictated by the price point to a huge extent. Yes, a fully assembled product will likely be stronger and harder wearing than something that is KD, but it should not be any less considered.
This is where experience in designing for mass manufacture becomes important. Knowing manufacturing techniques that allow details to be added with minimal cost, and knowing which details are worth the investment and which are not, can often be the difference between a design becoming too expensive and pushing it past a commercial price point. The key to developing product that delivers the key design details is knowing which are the most important to your customer and the target price point your customer is willing to pay.
Read the rest of our interview in February's issue.
