Oli Stratford
Writer, editor
and public speaker

‘Alternative Devices’, Disegno #42 (2026).

Image: Kane Hulse.

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‘Metamorphosis’, Disegno #42 (2026).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Beautiful Is Their Glance’, Disegno #41 (2026).

Image: Roel van Tour.

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‘Put Keyaki In Their Special Chair’, Disegno #41 (2026).

Image: Masahiro Sambe.

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‘Horse Sense’, Disegno #41 (2026).

Image: Disegno.

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Jaguar Type 01, Jaguar (2026).

Image: courtesy of Jaguar.

Contributing writer and editor.

Traces, Range Rover (2026).

Image: courtesy of Range Rover.

Contributing writer and editor.

The New Era #07 (2026).

Image: courtesy of The New Era.

Subeditor.

Wes Anderson: The Archives, Design Museum (2025).

Image: courtesy of Design Museum.

Contributing editor.

‘Panels Slide; Secret Doors Open; Sights Appear’, Disegno #40 (2025).

Image: courtesy of NGV.

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‘Freedom Through Constraint’, Disegno #40 (2025).

Image: Disegno.

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Futurespective, Range Rover (2025).

Image: courtesy of Range Rover.

Contributing writer and editor.

‘Through A Glass Darkly’, Disegno #39 (2025).

Image: Studio Brynjar & Veronika.

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‘Surviving What?’, Disegno #39 (2025).

Image: Etienne Malapert.

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‘The Courage of the Cucumber’, Disegno #39 (2025).

Image: Disegno.

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Assemblage, Universal Design Studio (2025).

Image: courtesy of Universal Design Studio.

Contributing editor.

Platform: Bethan Laura Wood, Design Museum (2025).

Image: courtesy of Design Museum.

Contributing writer and editor.

Edit #02 (2025).

Image: courtesy of NO GA.

Subeditor.

Designing Happiness, Helsinki Design Week (2025).

Image: courtesy of Helsinki Design Week.

Conference moderator.

Design Stories – New Perspectives on a Collection, Röhsska Museum (2024).

Image: courtesy of Röhsska Museum.

Contributing writer and subeditor.

‘Thirsty’, Disegno #38 (2024).

Image: Jasmine Deporta.

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‘Give Us This Day Our Daily Watts’, Disegno #38 (2024).

Image: Kane Hulse.

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‘Mementos’, Disegno #38 (2024).

Image: Disegno.

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‘A Non-Light Light’, Disegno #37 (2024).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Für Edward’, Disegno #37 (2024).

Image: Kristina Micotti.

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‘Unfinished’, Disegno #37 (2024).

Image: Disegno.

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Making The Plus, Hatje Cantz (2024).

Image: courtesy of Hatje Cantz.

Contributing writer and editor.

The Crit: Designers Review Themselves, Disegno (2024-).

Image: Disegno.

Podcast host.

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‘Rising, Dancing, Twisting’, Design Reviewed #03 (2023).

Image: courtesy of Mathmos.

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‘In Praise of Faff’, Design Reviewed #03 (2023).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Control’, Disegno #36 (2023).

Image: courtesy of Apple.

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‘Motley’, Disegno #36 (2023).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Less Volume, More Meaning’, Disegno #36 (2023).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Notes of Mustard’, Disegno #36 (2023).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘The Scourge of Perfection’, Disegno #36 (2023).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Sugar/No-Sugar’, Design Reviewed #02 (2023).

Image: courtesy of PepsiCo.

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‘User Manual’, Design Reviewed #02 (2023).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Aggregate: A Composite Account’, Disegno #35 (2023).

Image: Donald Milne.

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‘A Quiet Cut’, Disegno #35 (2023).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘I Can Feel Your Anger’, Disegno #35 (2023).

Image: Disegno.

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Dirty Furniture #06 (2023).

Image: courtesy of Dirty Furniture.

Contributing writer.

‘Will art bring life back to the office‘, Apollo (2023).

Image: courtesy of Art in Offices.

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‘Vacation, All I Never Wanted’, Design Reviewed #01 (2022).

Image: courtesy of Potato Head.

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‘The Doctor Will See You Now’, Design Reviewed #01 (2022).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Fibre to Form’, Disegno #34 (2022).

Image: Theresa Marx.

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‘Essential Forms’, Disegno #34 (2022).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘To Be Clear’, Disegno #34 (2022).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Design Me Like One of Your Buff Boys’, Disegno #34 (2022).

Image: Disegno.

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‘A History of Swiss Aluminium’, Disegno #33 (2022).

Image: Rasmus Norlander.

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‘Mea Culpa’, Disegno #33 (2022).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Emeco Abides’, Disegno #32 (2022).

Image: Ramak Fazel.

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‘The Electric Ribbon Trick’, Disegno #32 (2022).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Designing the Batman’, Disegno #32 (2022).

Image: Disegno.

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Plusminus, Vibia (2022).

Image: courtesy of Vibia.

Contributing copywriter.

Where Next? Conversations with Map Project Office, Map Project Office (2022).

Image: courtesy of Map Project Office.

Podcast host.

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‘The Biodegradable Aphrodite’, Disegno #31 (2021).

Image: Theresa Marx.

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‘The Sugar Pot’, Disegno #31 (2021).

Image: Disegno.

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‘The Biggest Machine On Earth’, Disegno #30 (2021).

Image: Delfino Sisto Legnani.

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‘Happy Birthday’, Disegno #30 (2021).

Image: Disegno.

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‘What Lies Beneath’, Disegno #29 (2021).

Image: courtesy of SCP.

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‘Za, Naoto Fukasawa for Emeco’, Disegno #29 (2021).

Image: Choreo.

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‘Honext’, Disegno #29 (2021).

Image: Choreo.

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‘Swipe Right’, Disegno #29 (2021).

Image: Disegno.

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‘The Only Thing Left to Design is the Foot’, Disegno #28 (2021).

Image: Daniel Rybakken.

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‘OB-4 by Teenage Engineering’, Disegno #28 (2021).

Image: Choreo.

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‘Bell Chair by Konstantin Grcic for Magis’, Disegno #28 (2021).

Image: Choreo.

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‘One Star’, Disegno #28 (2021).

Image: Disegno.

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Words on Wood, AHEC (2021-).

Image: courtesy of AHEC.

Podcast host and scriptwriter.

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‘In the Circumstances’, Disegno #27 (2020).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Zoonotic Spaces’, Lockdown Paper (2020).

Image: Humberto and Fernando Campana.

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‘The Tourists’, Disegno #26 (2020).

Image: courtesy of NASA.

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‘Here In My Home’, Disegno #26 (2020).

Image: Disegno.

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Vitra E-Paper #07 (2020).

Image: courtesy of Vitra.

Contributing writer.

Playground: The Design of Sneakers, Editions Norma (2020).

Image: courtesy of Editions Norma.

Contributing writer.

‘Sustained Assault’, Disegno #25 (2019).

Image: courtesy of Nike.

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‘Goodbye Old Baby New Year’, Disegno #25 (2019).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Nested Betters’, Disegno #24 (2019).

Image: Daisy Alexandra Ginsberg.

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‘A Company Voyage’, Disegno #24 (2019).

Image: Juho Huttunen.

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‘My Pretty Peacock’, Disegno #24 (2019).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Don’t Cross the Streams’, Disegno #23 (2019).

Image: Ugo La Pietra.

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‘Business as Usual’, Disegno #23 (2019).

Image: Disegno.

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‘The Good Neighbour Idea’, Disegno #22 (2019).

Image: Jermaine Francis.

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‘Tetris Effect’, Disegno #22 (2019).

Image: courtesy of Enhance.

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‘Material Liberation Front’, Disegno #22 (2019).

Image: Disegno.

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Cars: Accelerating the Modern World, V&A (2019).

Image: courtesy of V&A.

Contributing writer.

ensemble-com, Ensemble (2019).

Image: courtesy of Ensemble.

Contributing copywriter.

‘Du français au russe en français’, Disegno #21 (2018).

Image: courtesy of Iittala.

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‘Soft Work by Barber & Osgerby for Vitra’, Disegno #21 (2018).

Image: Barber & Osgerby.

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‘You say “chair”, I say “wooden object shaped in such-and-such a way”’, Disegno #21 (2018).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Most Yellow Cars Tend to be Signal Yellow Cars’, Disegno #20 (2018).

Image: Jermaine Francis.

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‘The Kenneth Pint Glass’, Disegno #20 (2018).

Image: courtesy of Camden Town Brewery.

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‘Strength Through Adverbsity’, Disegno #20 (2018).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Cities of Spectacle’, Disegno #19 (2018).

Image: Matthew Williams.

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‘Eventually Everything Connects’, Disegno #19 (2018).

Image: Ramak Fazel.

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‘Tears for a Cube’, Disegno #19 (2018).

Image: Disegno.

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Industrial Facility, Phaidon (2018).

Image: courtesy of Phaidon.

Contributing writer.

‘Spring Cleaning’, Disegno #18 (2018).

Image: Disegno.

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M Magazine, Molteni&C (2018-).

Image: courtesy of Molteni&C.

Contributing writer, editor and subeditor.

‘Design on the Fly’, Disegno #17 (2017).

Image: Jörg Koopmann.

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‘Sit Tight for Citrus’, Disegno #17 (2017).

Image: Disegno.

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‘The Driver’, Disegno #16 (2017).

Image: Andrew Bush.

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‘What is New is Young’, Disegno #16 (2017).

Image: Disegno.

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‘A Blanketing Field of Cotton Poplin’, Disegno #15 (2017).

Image: Murray Ballard.

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‘The Glitch’, Disegno #15 (2017).

Image: El Ultimo Grito.

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‘A Matter of Definitions’, Disegno #15 (2017).

Image: Disegno.

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‘Alternative Facts’, Disegno #14 (2017).

Image: Nama Khalil.

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‘Fake News!’, Disegno #14 (2017).

Image: Disegno.

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Was Ist Loos?, Kunsthalle Wien (2017).

Image: courtesy of Kunsthalle Wien.

Contributing writer.

Full House: Diez Office, König Books (2017).

Image: courtesy of Diez Office.

Contributing writer.

The Goldsmiths’ Review, The Goldsmiths’ Company (2017-).

Image: courtesy of The Goldsmiths’ Company.

Contributing editor and subeditor.

‘Three Postmodern Designers You Should Really Know‘, Mr Porter (2017).

Image: courtesy of Mr Porter.

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‘Contextual Illumination’, Disegno #13 (2016).

Image: Delfino Sisto Legnani.

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‘Yellow Inflatable Jacket, S/S17 Balenciaga’, Disegno #13 (2016).

Image: Ayzit Bostan and Fabian Frinzel.

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‘YEV-104, Yamaha’, Disegno #13 (2016).

Image: Ayzit Bostan and Fabian Frinzel.

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‘The Collector of Cracks’, Disegno #13 (2016).

Image: Disegno.

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‘NikeLab Windrunner x Kim Jones’, Disegno #12 (2016).

Image: Studio AKFB.

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‘Panini Colette’, Disegno #12 (2016).

Image: Studio AKFB.

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‘KUFTwist by KUFstudios’, Disegno #12 (2016).

Image: Studio AKFB.

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‘Return to Sarajevo’, Disegno #11 (2016).

Image: Fabian Frinzel.

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‘Coat from Outside, A/W 16/17 Junya Watanabe Man’, Disegno #11 (2016).

Image: Studio AKFB.

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‘Ghosts and Other Functionalities’, Disegno #10 (2016).

Image: Albrecht Fuchs.

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‘The Chair Men‘, Mr Porter (2016).

Image: courtesy of Mr Porter.

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‘Disparate Threads’, Disegno #09 (2015).

Image: Iwan Baan.

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‘Power Behind the Scenes’, Disegno #09 (2015).

Image: courtesy of Magis.

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‘A New Frontier’, Disegno #08 (2015).

Image: Nick Rochowski.

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‘Pagan Practice’, Disegno #08 (2015).

Image: Kalle Sanner.

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‘The Future of the RCA’, Disegno #07 (2014).

Image: Nicole Bachmann.

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‘Century Camera’, Disegno #07 (2014).

Image: Jere Salonen.

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‘Wrapping Architecture’, Disegno #06 (2014).

Image: Mårta Thisner.

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‘Forest as Idea Generator’, Disegno #06 (2014).

Image: Amira Fritz.

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Original Man: The Tautz Compendium of Less Ordinary Gentlemen, Gestalten.

Image: courtesy of Gestalten.

‘75 Watt in the Pearl River Delta’, Disegno #05 (2013).

Image: Revital Cohen and Tuur van Balen.

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‘UN North Delegates Lounge’, Disegno #05 (2013).

Image: Frank Oudeman.

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‘Iceland Emerges’, Disegno #04 (2013).

Image: Glamour Et Cetera.

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‘The Fix’, Disegno #04 (2013).

Image: courtesy of Fixperts.

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‘New Technology’, Disegno #03 (2012).

Image: Colin Christie.

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‘Illuminations’, Disegno #03 (2012).

Image: Colin Christie.

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Oli Stratford / Editor, writer and public speaker

olistratford[at]gmail.com

I am an editor, writer and public speaker working within cultural journalism. I have a speciality in long-form writing about design, and comic reportage and features, but write widely across all cultural fields.

From 2016, I have been the editor-in-chief of Disegno, one of the world’s leading design journals. My writing and editing has been published by Phaidon, Gestalten and Hatje Cantz, among others.

From 2015, I have also been head of editorial for the creative agency Disegno Works, delivering commercial projects for clients including Nike, Vitra, Jaguar Land Rover and the Design Museum.

I regularly chair public talks and moderate panel discussions for brands and institutions including Apple, Moooi, YKK, RIBA, Alessi and the British Council. I am also the host of the design podcasts The Crit and Words on Wood.

I have been part of international juries, lectured or led seminars at universities including ECAL, Design Academy Eindhoven, Goldsmiths and HEAD Genève.

Recent bylines

Wes Anderson: The Archives, Making the Plus, Platform: Bethan Laura Wood, Cars: Accelerating the Modern World, Industrial Facility Works, Playground - The Design of Sneakers, The New Era, Dirty Furniture, Apollo, Crafts, Mr Porter.

Recent clients

Jaguar Land Rover, Vitra Design Museum, ECAL, The American Hardwood Export Council, Pro Helvetia, The Goldsmiths’ Centre, Nike, Herman Miller, The Design Museum, Molteni&C, Vibia, Universal Design Studio, Vestre, Nothing, Stockholm Furniture Fair.

I am available for writing and editing commissions, subediting projects, and can also be booked to host or moderate conferences, panel talks and public discussions.

Portfolio