| Tom
Karen is a British industrial designer of Czech
descent. He was Managing Director and Chief
Designer of Ogle Design from 1962 until 1999. He
oversaw the design of the Bush Radio TR130 radio,
the Raleigh Chopper, the Bond Bug, the Reliant
Scimitar GTE, the Anadol A1 (FW5), an
award-winning series of truck cabs for Leyland,
and the Marble Run. In 2001, Tom Karen received
an honorary degree from Loughborough University But for the Ford Anglia
story we have to go back to the 1950's when Tom
Karen worked for Ford.
While he was at Ford, he was responsible for
interior fittings such as instruments and
dashboards, and worked on the Ford Anglia 105E.
"I worked in
Ford’s Styling Studio in the 1950s.
The company had a very capable product planning
function that prescribed in great detail the
design parameters for every part that went into a
car. My job was to do the badging for the Anglia
105E model and my brief was to design separate
chrome letters spelling Anglia for the front of
the car. I did as I was told. But I
felt the separate letters were costly and each
one needed plugging in and fixing with a
clip. I stuck my neck out and designed a
badge made up of a single die-casting with a
single plastic component insert with the Anglia
name. I had models made of each design and showed
it to product planning. They costed them,
scratched their heads, and came down in favour of
my design – which went into production. I
was pleased and Ford probably saved more money
than the salary I was paid (about £800pa.)"
Tom Karen, Industrial Designer
(Article
Copyright © Design Week http://www.designweek.co.uk/voxpop/
what-was-the-first-thing-that-you-ever-designed-that-made-it-into-production/3039015.article )
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