Philippe Starck: a HumanKind Design Approach

In this very funny and witty TED speech, Philippe Starck speaks about the different types of designers and his approach to it. A must-see!

After there is people like me, who try to deserve to exist, and who are ashamed to make this useless job, who try to do it in another way, and they try, I try, to not make the object for the object but for the result, for the profit for the human being, the person who will use it. If we take the toothbrush — I don’t think about the toothbrush. I think, “What will be [finger in mouth] the effect of the brush in the mouth?” And to understand what will be the effect of the toothbrush in the mouth, I must imagine: Who owns this mouth? What is the life of the owner of this mouth? In what society this guy live? What civilization creates this society? What animal species creates this civilization? When I arrive — and I take one minute, I am not so intelligent — when I arrive at the level of animal species, that becomes real interesting.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/197