Prepared by
Rachelle Angelica Oh
Design Formation
DSGN 1200 – Design Explorations II
Langara College
100 West 49th Avenue, Vancouver, BC
Canada V5Y 2Z6
BIOGRAPHY
Naoto Fukasawa, a Yamanashi Prefecture Japanese-born industrial designer in 1956, began his life as an emerging designer during his first year at Tama Art University, Tokyo in the late 70s. “People who make others happy through industrial products.” A phrase Fukasawa found in a textbook clearly defined his career.
Having graduated from Tokyo’s Tama Art University in 1980 majoring in art and 3D-design, Naoto then moved onto designing for Seiko Epson. There, he designed several products that involved micro-technology such as wristwatches, wrist-televisions, and mini-printers. After which, he went to move on and join ID Two in 1989 at San Francisco, United States. He designed and worked on numerous Silicon Valley computing and electronics and related products. He also involved himself in Apple’s design language and concept.
Fukasawa returned to Japan to head IDEO’s Tokyo office and be a design consultant to major companies in Japan. He also began conducting a series of workshops for young designers called “Without Thought”. There, Fukasawa focused on the idea “is that people think that design is something that appeals to their emotions, but in fact people are linked to things every day in their environments, unconsciously, without even being aware of it. This ‘unthinking’ state makes actions smooth. Whereas, if we think closely about what we’re doing, our actions become awkward or wooden. Designs that make us feel this kind of simplicity don’t stand out, but entwine with people’s actions and with the environment, too” (Fukasawa).
In the first workshop Fukasawa conducted, he thought of the idea of a wall-mounted CD player later on to be produced
