Sir Jonathan Ive, Chief Design Officer at Apple, appeared at the Department of Engineering to participate in a Q&A session for Department staff and select students as well as a campus tour on the eve of his reception of an Honorary Degree in science by the University.
Students and staff were able to present questions to Sir Jonathan in a brief event moderated by Dr James Moultrie, Senior Lecturer in Design Management in the Institute for Manufacturing (IfM). Topics centred around design challenges and the intersection of engineering and design.
Sir Jonathan's visit was organised by Professor Roberto Cipolla of the Machine Intelligence Laboratory. The day included seeing Sir Isaac Newton’s notes and book collection at Trinity College and climbing the Trinity Clock Tower with Dr Hugh Hunt. There was also a visit to King's College with Professor Campbell Middleton, where the group viewed Alan Turing's papers and saw the roof of King’s College Chapel.
Dr James Moultrie and Sir Jonathan
Credited with introducing elegance, purity and beauty to the design of personal computers while serving as Chief Design Officer at Apple, Sir Jonathan was conferred with an honorary doctorate in science by the Chancellor at a special ceremony in the Senate House.
Sir Jonathan read Industrial Design at Newcastle Upon Tyne Polytechnic, now Northumbria University. Shortly after graduating in 1989, he co-founded the London-based design consultancy Tangerine, but in 1992 moved to the United States and joined Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, where founder Steve Jobs subsequently referred to him as ‘his creative partner’.
Now Apple’s Chief Design Officer, Sir Jonathan leads the team credited with introducing elegance, purity and beauty to the design of personal computers. Designers of the iMac, PowerBook, iBook, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and MacBook, his team has created products that have transformed the industry and have helped make technology approachable through design.
Professor David Cardwell and Sir Jonathan
The most feted industrial designer in his field and beyond, Sir Jonathan’s work has earned many plaudits and six of his products appear in the permanent collection of The Museum of Modern Art in New York. The Design Museum in London named him Designer of the Year in 2003; he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 2012; and a year later the BBC’s Blue Peter accorded him a Gold Badge. Winner of the Inaugural Medal for Design Achievement in 1999 and then in 2004 the Benjamin Franklin Medal of the Royal Society of Arts, he is a Royal Designer for Industry and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. Sir Jonathan was appointed CBE in 2006 and promoted KBE in 2012.
