Dieter Rams

“Good design is making something intelligible and memorable. Great design is making something memorable and meaningful.”

“Not the spectacular things are the important things - the unspectacular things are the important things, especially in the future.”

“Products have to be designed in a way that they are comprehensible.”

“All too much of the man-made is ugly, inefficient, depressing chaos.”

“I believe designers should eliminate the unnecessary. That means eliminating everything that is modish because this kind of thing is only short-lived.”

“Design should not dominate things, should not dominate people. It should help people. That's its role.”

“Having small touches of colour makes it more colourful than having the whole thing in colour”

“I sit, I think, I make some drawings. As a designer, you cannot retire totally.”

“There is a lot of bad architecture. What we need more is to look at how our landscape should look in the next decades.”

“Quiet is better than loud.”

“As designers, we have a great responsibility.”

“I like to be in New York. Le Corbusier described it in the 1930s as a 'wonderful catastrophe.' It is still a wonderful catastrophe, but inspiring.”

“I don't like computers. I still like to do my drawings by hand.”

“I am not an early bird. I go to bed normally between midnight and 1 o'clock, so it is understandable that I cannot be an early bird. I wake up around 9 o'clock.”