Jay Osgerby on experimental thinking, invention and challenging conventional boundaries of design

The strength of the studio’s international identity derives from its commitment to experimental thinking, its exploratory attitudes to materiality and invention, and from its collaborations with some of the world’s most progressive companies, including some of its own. Defining projects include the iconic Loop Table for Isokon, the Tip-Ton Chair for Vitra (as seen at the RCA in Battersea) and of course the 2012 Olympic Torch for the London Games.

Examples of the studio’s body of work are held in the permanent collections of the V&A and the Design Museum in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Olympic Museum in Switzerland, the Vitra Design Museum in Germany, the Munich Design Museum and Centre Pompidou in Paris. In 2026, Barber Osgerby will celebrate its 30th anniversary.

Jay’s own design approach is characterised by his emphasis on experimentation and innovation, not simply in objects, but also in ways of working. He, along with Edward, have been responsible for rethinking the actual idea of what a creative studio should be, how commerce and art can create new structures and enterprises.

For nearly three decades, the studio's work has challenged conventional boundaries of design, with a diverse output encompassing architecture, interiors, sculpture, product, and exhibition design. This approach is shaped by the close relationship of its work with industrial processes and new technologies, but also its affinities with fine art. He is a Royal Designer for Industry - the highest accolade for designers in the UK. Only 200 designers can hold the title at any given time.

In what ways do you think you have challenged conventional boundaries of design?

By subverting the traditional expectations of what industrial design should do and by disregarding the interdisciplinary lines that existed for our generation, Barber Osgerby has consistently sought to redefine the purpose, language and context of design itself. Rather than seeing design as a service to industry alone, we’ve approached it as a platform for cultural commentary, experimentation and collaboration. The work has often deliberately blurred the line between product, art and architecture, whether through the use of unconventional materials, unexpected forms, or by placing design in contexts that challenge its assumed function. We’ve also resisted the pressure to specialise narrowly. Instead, we’ve tried to move between disciplines, from mass production to gallery work, from furniture to public installations, and from consultancy to studio-initiated cultural projects. This resistance to staying in one lane has not only expanded the types of projects the studio engages with, but has helped shift the perception of what industrial design can be, as something more than problem-solving - as storytelling, provocation and future thinking.

When you were at the RCA, you referred to it as being with people who are specialists in their fields working closely together.

It is an environment you have replicated in your professional practice. How important is it to you and your practice to embrace multidisciplinary working?

When I was at the RCA, the most formative part wasn’t confined to tutorials or critique sessions, it was the rhythm of being immersed in a community of people deeply engaged in their own fields, working in close proximity. There was a kind of natural exchange that happened: not a forced collaboration, but a subtle cross-pollination of ideas that shaped how the studio works to this day.

In the studio now, we’ve tried to hold on to that quality. Working across disciplines isn’t something that’s consciously striven for, it’s just how the best work happens. Whether it’s a material scientist, an engineer, or a craftsman, the richest ideas come at the intersection, when different ways of seeing problems come into contact. It’s rarely about adding complexity, more often it’s about refining, through dialogue. There’s a shared discipline in that process, a kind of collective search for the essential. That’s where invention happens. Not in isolation, but in the space between people. For me, multidisciplinary practice isn’t a strategy, it’s a condition. It’s how things become both meaningful and enduring.

Have the alumni of the RCA designed the modern world?

We graduated into the recession of the early 1990s. There was little work about and we had to fight and reinvent in order to survive in the business, let alone to prosper. We all grew up together, agile and resourceful. Today most of my contemporaries are known figures, recognised for a wide variety of interpretations of what the world should look like. It’s funny looking back. We were all kids really. The unifying quality was a passion, a compulsion to create at any cost. It just had to be that way.

Through your experimentation and innovation, have you had any projects that did not work?

Yes, absolutely. I think if you’re genuinely experimenting, trying to push something forward, then failure is not only inevitable, it’s essential. There have been projects over the years where things didn’t land as we’d hoped: perhaps the proportions were off, or the material didn’t behave as we imagined, or the idea, once realised, didn’t hold the clarity it had in sketch form. However, I wouldn’t describe those moments as wasted. In fact, they’re often the most instructive. You learn quickly when something doesn’t work, so you’re forced to ask why and that question often leads to something better. We’ve always tried to build a practice where there’s room for that kind of learning, where process isn’t hidden or overly polished, but open, iterative and at times uncomfortable. Some projects you revisit and rework. Others you let go. But they all leave a trace. There’s a quiet value in that. In knowing when to refine and when to walk away.

If you can single out one thing from all your designs, what is it that you are most proud of?

It’s hard to choose a single piece, not because there are so many, but because each one is part of a longer conversation and often the things you’re proudest of aren’t the most visible. But if I had to single something out, I think I’d choose Double Space, which was the installation we did at the V&A. It wasn’t just about the object or the architecture. It was about creating an experience - a moment of stillness and reflection within a public space. It brought together so many of the things that matter to the studio: collaboration, precision, material honesty, but also emotion and motion. The way people moved through it, how they reacted: it reminded me what design can do when it creates space for others. That piece also came with a lot of trust between us, BMW, the engineers, the curators and the museum.

When working on new designs, which is more important: functionality or how people will interact with the design?

I don’t really see functionality and interaction as separate concerns; they’re entwined. From the Bauhaus onwards, we’ve had this idea that form follows function, but what often gets overlooked is that human interaction is a function. The emotional, sensory and behavioural responses people have to an object are as critical as its technical performance. I’ve always been drawn to the idea of useful beauty which is something you see in the work of people like Jean Prouvé or Sōri Yanagi. Their designs are deeply functional, but they also have a humanity to them - a softness in how they’re used and understood. You don’t just use their work; you relate to it. So for me, it’s not about prioritising one over the other. It’s about creating a kind of quiet equilibrium. Something might be beautifully resolved on paper, but if it feels cold or disconnected in the hand, it hasn’t fully succeeded. The goal is to design something that earns its place, not through novelty or performance alone, but through the way it fits into someone’s life, with grace and purpose. That’s what I return to, with the idea that good design is not just efficient or elegant, but attuned. It listens as much as it speaks.

Can you tell us about a design by someone else that informed your own practice?

One that’s stayed with me for a long time is Sōri Yanagi’s Butterfly Stool. It’s such a modest piece - two identical, curved plywood shells joined by a single rod - but within that simplicity is a profound sense of balance, both structurally and spiritually. What struck me wasn’t just the form, which is quietly beautiful, but the way it reconciles opposites: craft and industry, East and West, strength and lightness. It doesn’t shout. It invites you in. There’s no flourish, no wasted gesture, just clarity and calm. The idea that design can be quiet and still hold depth has definitely informed our work. I’ve often found myself returning to objects like that, not for direct inspiration, but as reminders of what’s possible when you let materials speak, when you trust restraint and when you make something that respects the person who’ll live with it. It’s also a reminder that timelessness doesn’t come from trying to be timeless. It comes from being honest about the idea, the process and the people you’re designing for.

How have new industrial processes and technologies changed or informed your design process?

Technology has always been part of the work, but the most interesting aspect isn’t simply the newness but how the technology is made comprehensible and usable. Some of the biggest shifts in our world happen when technology and materials open up possibilities that didn’t exist before, but translating those possibilities into things that society can engage with is where creativity plays its part. That thinking led to the formation of Map Project Office in 2012, a studio dedicated to working with advanced technologies and shaping them into something understandable. One of the key examples of this was our collaboration with IBM on the Q System One, the world’s first integrated quantum computer. Quantum computing is complex and largely invisible and it exists at a level beyond human perception. The challenge was to give it an identity, to make it tangible. The result was an airtight, 3m x 3m glass cube, designed to house and protect the delicate quantum components while presenting them in a way that made the system feel like an object with presence rather than just an abstract concept.

The IBM project reinforced something I’ve always believed, which is that design is as much about communication as it is about form. Whether it’s a chair, a digital interface, or a new technology, design’s role is to mediate between innovation and human experience, making the unfamiliar feel intuitive. At the same time, I’ve always been interested in the relationship between technology and craft. Many ideas have come from that meeting point where precision manufacturing meets hands-on making, or where digital processes enhance rather than replace materiality. I still believe that physical experimentation is irreplaceable; sketching, model making and prototyping are fundamental because that’s where you really get to know a material and its possibilities. It also allows you to make mistakes that are better than your original intentions. No amount of digital simulation can replace serendipity and that kind of tactile learning.

You once said that at primary school your predicted career was to be a shepherd. Your studio practice supports the development of new generations of designers.

Do you feel in some way you are now guiding the next generation into a particular design direction?

Funny but true…! I guess that prediction wasn’t entirely wrong. I do spend a lot of time encouraging other people’s ideas, giving them space to develop and trying to ensure that they don’t get lost along the way. I have to say that we have been fortunate to have had many wonderful, talented people as colleagues over the years and much of the studio’s output would have been impossible without their skill and hard work. When teaching and sometimes in the studio, I try to help the younger designers find their own way of thinking, rather than follow a prescribed route. One of the most important skills in design is learning to look properly and to notice the smallest interactions and question the things that are usually taken for granted. I hope I’ve encouraged others to be curious, to stay open to different ways of working and to trust that good ideas almost always come from unexpected places.

Architecture is, at its foundation, the art and technique of designing and building.

Is there a pivot point where you move away from the cliché that you just build or design a building?

Well, some places just feel right when you’re in them and reaching this point is the difference between creating architecture and something that is simply a building. A space, an object, the way materials meet—these things all shape how people experience the world around them. The way a surface feels, how light moves through a structure, how a space adapts over time, these details are as important as the overall form. I’ve never seen architecture as separate from design more broadly. Universal Design Studio, which we founded in 2001, came from wanting to explore this connection.

The Loop Table signalled the studio’s crossover from architecture to furniture design. Architecture practice is the basis for a construction that can become a home.

Your design practice has created many beautiful items that live within a home. Is this linked?

Yes, completely. The Loop Table was architecture on a smaller scale. It was less concerned with the archetype and more an exercise in structure and balance. This way of thinking has shaped everything since. A space is rarely just its walls; it’s the things within it that make it feel lived in and human. A chair, a table, a light— they don’t just exist in a space, they define how that space is experienced and used. Furniture, in a way, is a kind of architecture. The Tobi-Ishi table (B&B Italia), for example, plays with weight and equilibrium, much like a building does. That interplay of scales is an interesting space to experiment in, to see how an idea translates into different contexts.

In 2001, you founded the architecture and interior design practice, Universal Design Studio.

In 2012, the family of studios was extended again, with the launch of the industrial design studio, Map Project Office. Can you tell us about this?

Universal Design Studio was created out of a desire to expand the reach of our design thinking beyond objects and into spaces, systems and experiences, while fostering a working environment that prioritises collaboration over authorship. From the beginning, it was important to us that Universal isn’t just an extension of our personal work or identity as designers. Instead, we want it to be a studio in the truest sense, a place where talented people can come together, contribute their own perspectives and develop work that doesn’t rely on a singular voice or ego to define its value.

When we started Map in 2012, the intention was similar, but applied to industrial design and the strategic front end of product development. We saw a growing need for a type of design consultancy that can sit upstream of the conventional brief, one that can partner with businesses at a foundational level, using design as a tool to frame questions, explore behaviours and navigate complex systems. Like Universal, Map is built around the idea of team-based intelligence, rather than star designers. It’s about consciously resisting the model of design as personal expression and instead creating a structure that allows for ideas to emerge collectively, with clarity and depth, unburdened by the need for a visible author.

Both studios continue to be shaped by this ethos: collaborative, curious and outward-looking places where design thinking evolves not through hierarchy, but through shared dialogue and the strength of diverse viewpoints.

Barber Osgerby celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. What's next?

Thirty years is a big milestone, though it still feels like I’m at the start of something rather than the end of anything. The work has never followed a set plan; it’s always been about responding to new ideas, new materials and the next interesting challenge. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that things evolve in ways you don’t always expect. Right now, I’m interested in ideas that move even further beyond traditional boundaries, where disciplines blend and ways of working shift. To mark thirty years, we’re putting together something that reflects not just the projects themselves, but the thinking behind them. It’s a chance to take stock before pushing ahead again. The last three decades have taught me that the most interesting steps are so often the ones you don’t see coming.