We, as the Designer Interviews ("DI") had the distinct pleasure and opportunity to interview award-winning, most creative and innovative Paolo D'Arrigo ("PD").
I am a designer who explores the matter, appropriates it and gives it back to the world in the form of objects and furnishings. I was born in Rome in 1967. Design soon came into my life as an instinct and turned out in the most direct way, making me want to shape beloved and accurate objects. The practice of restoration and studies in sociology led me, later, to see in the profession of designer a faber of the relations between man, things and the world. I live design as an alchemy of nature and hi-tech. I practice form not as an aesthetic invention, but as the result of a process that is measured with the constraints of the material and pushes them further. I design with any material, wood and glass, metal and ceramic, contaminating them with technology. Each material is a map to follow, letting oneself be guided by its signs, following its implicit directions and revealing those that are possible and yet to be written. In this path, the know-how of the companies with which I work become a means and a boundary to explore and expand as much as possible. I pursue a beauty that communicates the unexpected. I do not plan to respond to a coded need. I start from common elements to reinvent gestures. Of every object I take care of the whole design, including communication.
Paolo D'Arrigo Designs
We are pleased to share with you original and innovative design work by Paolo D'Arrigo.
Paolo D'Arrigo Design - Coral Electric Radiator
Designer Interview of Paolo D'Arrigo:
DI: Could you please tell us more about your art and design background? What made you become an artist/designer? Have you always wanted to be a designer?
PD : My approach to design was natural, as a result of previous work experience and studies. I graduated in a technical institute and then I followed sociology at university, in the meantime I was already working in the world of entertainment and communication. All this, combined with a good manual dexterity, has flowed into the first works of self-made furniture
DI: Can you tell us more about your company / design studio?
PD : my studio is in Rome, in a picturesque courtyard that has become one of the most interesting creative hubs in the city. In addition to my collaborators, I work in synergy with professionals from various sectors around the design business, to cover all the needs of companies that rely on me for product design and creative direction.
DI: What is "design" for you?
PD : This is a question that could be answered with a flood of words, but I prefer to use a single phrase, which, today more than ever, I find particularly apt: for me, design should be the ethics of industrial production.
DI: What kinds of works do you like designing most?
PD : Everything can be, indeed should be designed, I have no particular preference, but I certainly love working with natural materials.
DI: What is your most favorite design, could you please tell more about it?
PD : I have many projects that I am fond of, I don't have a "favorite", but I am definitely satisfied with this latest product, Coral radiators, because I experimented for the first time with parametric design (AAD-Algorithm Aided Design) to find an innovative technical solution and aesthetic.
DI: What was the first thing you designed for a company?
PD : A bookmark, in 1996, for Progetti Srl, a company of accessories and complements by Bernini, a great family in the history of Italian design.
DI: What is your favorite material / platform / technology?
PD : As mentioned, I prefer to work with natural materials, in close contact with artisans and small companies, especially for self-productions, but in over 25 years of activity I have acquired a good experience on virtually all materials and production techniques.
DI: When do you feel the most creative?
PD : There is no particular time of day, perhaps early in the morning, in dormancy, some insights appear.
DI: Which aspects of a design do you focus more during designing?
PD : Before aesthetics, I try to develop my design process on the characteristics of functionality, innovation, sustainability, material consistency and technological research. I love materials, especially natural materials, but I am also strongly stimulated by technological innovations.
DI: What kind of emotions do you feel when you design?
PD : Design is my passion, a way of being, so it generates a wide range of emotions for me, from depression to euphoria.
DI: What kind of emotions do you feel when your designs are realized?
PD : Euphoria.
DI: What makes a design successful?
PD : If there was a one-size-fits-all answer to this question, there would be no designers.... The success of a product is an alchemy based on countless factors, in general it is determined by the balance, between concept and production quality, between narrative and utility. The success of a product must always be shared between designer and company, there may be a great design, but that will not be successful if the company is not structured, just as there may be a company with great production capabilities, but it will not produce successful products if it has not collaborated with capable designers.
DI: When judging a design as good or bad, which aspects do you consider first?
PD : The balance indeed.
DI: From your point of view, what are the responsibilities of a designer for society and environment?
PD : I am honestly wary of those who think that design alone can save the world, but it can certainly concretely help improve it.
DI: How do you think the "design field" is evolving? What is the future of design?
PD : For me, design is also an interpretation of society and its evolution/involution, so from this perspective it will be conditioned but at the same time an architect of the future social system. Right now it seems to me that we are witnessing a dichotomy, on the one hand there is a trend back toward local design, based on the typical craft production systems of specific areas, often related to specific materials, and on the other hand the advent of the metaverse is generating new approaches and new possibilities for the application of design thinking.