We, as the Designer Interviews ("DI") had the distinct pleasure and opportunity to interview award-winning, most creative and innovative Tobia Repossi ("TR").
Tobia Repossi is a designer with twenty years of experience in product design for furniture, electronic appliances and accessories. He has worked formajor Chinese market-leading companiesas well as European and American brands and for dozen of startups from China and Silicon Valley. His designs have been sold in Apple Stores and in other famous shops and have been selected for international awards.
Tobia Repossi Designs
We are pleased to share with you original and innovative design work by Tobia Repossi.
Tobia Repossi Design - CP 21 Table
Tobia Repossi Design - Camera Vista Inventory Tracker
Designer Interview of Tobia Repossi:
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?
TR : My grandfather was a painter, and my father was a sculptor later taken to design in the seventies and eighties. It's a family tradition. I was involved at a young age in a creative environment.
DI: Can you tell us more about your company / design studio?
TR : TR & Partners has been on the industrial design market for more than twenty years, with experience in product design for furniture, electronic appliances and accessories. We have worked for major Chinese market-leading companies as well as European and American brands and for startups from China and Silicon Valley. Our designs have been sold in Apple Stores and other famous retail chains and selected for international awards.
DI: What is "design" for you?
TR : Design is the thinking, conceiving and creating and producing process of an object with functionality reproduced in copies.
DI: What kinds of works do you like designing most?
TR : We are mostly involved in the design of electronic devices and consumer goods..
DI: What was the first thing you designed for a company?
TR : When I was a child, as an exercise with the help of my father, I designed a thermometer that could be easily understood by kids.
DI: What makes a design successful?
TR : Even if clients think that the key elements are the aesthetic values of the object, its functions or tech specs. I strongly believe that it is usually the distribution channel to make or break the success of a product.
DI: When judging a design as good or bad, which aspects do you consider first?
TR : I'm not very interested in the appearance of an object, I love designs that disrupt their market, solve a problem creatively or have a strong degree of innovation.
DI: From your point of view, what are the responsibilities of a designer for society and environment?
TR : Sustainability must be the focus, but designing a new product creates always sustainability doubts. We try to alwa
DI: How do you think the "design field" is evolving? What is the future of design?
TR : The future of design will be strongly related to machine learning, AI and robots. I'm not saying that design will not be central., in the conceiving chain of a product, but designers in the future will need to shift from mere creative to technicians able to control machine-based software that will design for them.
DI: When was your last exhibition and where was it? And when do you want to hold your next exhibition?
TR : We run an exhibition called CONNECTED OBJECTS: Design for our Times in Cyprus recently. It was a showcase of all the latest products we designed and wanted to express how connected is design in our times and how it can be possible to design successful objects and products from everywhere in the world regardless of the environment and geography.
DI: Where does the design inspiration for your works come from? How do you feed your creativity? What are your sources of inspirations?
TR : I speak a lot about cross fielding and synesthesia, which for me is the key ingredient to add to the standard design thinking process developed by Bruno Munari, refined in Politecnico of Milan and later taken by Stanford and IDEO into the Design Thinking method that we all know.
DI: How would you describe your design style? What made you explore more this style and what are the main characteristics of your style? What's your approach to design?
TR : We don't have one, I hate the world style and I believe it's the death of industrial design. Our style is to design things that work better that what is available today and have a strong degree of innovation.
DI: Where do you live? Do you feel the cultural heritage of your country affects your designs? What are the pros and cons during designing as a result of living in your country?
TR : I divide myself between China, Near East and Europe. Recently Covid has been a great impact on travelling, but I am a strong believer that geography is less and less important. As a result of that, I'm am the typical example of the "Nemo Propheta in Patria" syndrome and I don't have many Italian clients.