LSBU design graduate George Mabey named ‘One to Watch’
Graphic designer, Malcolm Garrett has selected LSBU Engineering Product Design graduate, George Mabey for the Design Council's Ones to Watch projectThis year, the Design Council celebrates its 70th birthday and to mark the occasion, they are running a campaign titled 'Ones to Watch', targeted at future talented up-and-coming designers.
The project will follow the progress of 70 graduates who represent the future of British design - which the judges will be scouting for throughout the next few months.
Malcolm Garrett RDI – the influential British graphic designer who created the iconic artwork for bands like Buzzcocks, Magazine, Simple Minds, Duran Duran and Peter Gabriel – was asked by the Design Council to choose five graduates for the "One to Watch" list.
Malcolm chose recent LSBU graduate, George Mabey after seeing his innovative design for a scooter that folds down to the size of an A4 piece of paper at the recent New Designers showcase.
"Being picked as a 'One to Watch' was a real honour," says George. It makes all the hard work feel worth it and having your product acknowledged by the Design Council is about as good as it gets.Seeing people's reactions when the scooter goes from a small package of unassuming aluminium to a fully rideable scooter within ten seconds never gets boring."
George's work has been described as "simply ingenious" by Malcolm Garrett – who is also a tenant at LSBU's Clarence Centre for Enterprise and Innovation .
Malcolm said: "George Mabey's A4 Scooter is one of those ideas that spring from the most unlikely of places. Taking inspiration from a simple child's toy, the designer has produced an 'impossible' engineering solution to a problem no-one had previously thought to consider. It is simply ingenious. It's not that the world needs a scooter that will roll up to the size of an A4 box, but the fact that this was made possible suggests the kind of mind that could achieve great things when tackling unforeseeable problems in other unlikely situations.
Dr Deborah Andrews, course director of BSc Product Design said:
"George is a fantastic, innovative designer who always tackles design problems with enthusiasm and has a real understanding of form and function as well as end-users.
"He worked incredibly hard during his Engineering Product Design course and he really deserves this recognition; we all wish him well in his future career."