Unveiling new Dior chair, Philippe Starck predicts end of design: ‘Look at your iPhone – the number of products it replaces, it’s extraordinary’

Philippe Starck sees a time when technology will make design skills like his redundant, but for now is full of ideas, and this week presented a chair for Dior

The Miss Dior chair is all-aluminium and, the celebrated minimalist says on the sidelines of Milan Furniture Fair, ‘very ecological and totally recyclable’

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French designer Philippe Starck poses on the eve of the opening of the Salone del Mobile furniture fair in Milan with models of “Miss Dior” Medallion chairs he designed for Dior. Photo: AFP

Published: 4:45pm, 8 Jun 2022

Philippe Starck made his name making everyday objects extraordinary, but the French designer and architect believes the “dematerialisation” of modern life will soon make such talents redundant.

“What is the future of design? Well, there isn’t one, because you must understand that everything has a birth, a life and a death and for design it is the same,” he says on the sidelines of the Milan Furniture Fair.

He is there to present a new chair created for fashion house Dior, an update on the iconic version of the Louis XVI medallion chair that featured in the first boutique founded by Christian Dior in Paris in 1947.

Starck, 73, is one of the most prolific inventors of his generation, designing everything from top hotels, luxury yachts and best-selling furniture to juicers and toothbrushes.

“Miss Dior” Medallion chairs designed by French designer Philippe Starck for Dior are displayed on the eve of the opening of the Salone del Mobile furniture fair in Milan. Photo: AFP

He believes, however, that the advance of technology means talents such as his may one day become redundant.