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  David Coleridge Ryan was born in Wales, where many of his boyhood days were spent exploring the rugged Pembrokeshire coastline, along with his pencils and paints. His early years were spent as an engineer but his passion for art and design soon led him back to college where he discovered industrial design. He studied design at Cardiff, Wales, and later Manchester Polytechnic, England, where he received a Master of Arts (with Distinction) in Industrial Design.
Since then he has worked both as a designer and as a teacher of design. His design experience covers a wide range of projects in many countries including the UK, Holland, Ecuador, USA, Japan and also Italy, where he collaborated with his friend and mentor Enzo Mari on projects for Kartell. He has received many design awards including the Lighting Prize at Interieur 94, for his ‘Delft’ lamps; a Design Distinction in the ID Annual Review and a Good Design award for the ‘Rover’ series of seating; and two Gold Awards for furniture from the IDSA, one in 2002 for ‘LeanToo’ and the other in 2004 for ‘Light Lounge’. His work has been exhibited at the Design Centre London, the Chicago Athenaeum, Manchester City Art Gallery, and recently at the Tacoma Art Museum where many of his projects were on exhibition in “Fast Forward: The Shape of Northwest Design”. His work has also appeared in many publications including, The Best of British Product Design, New and Notable Product Design, Design Magazine, ID magazine, and most recently ‘LeanToo’ was featured on the cover of Innovation Magazine.
From 1988 to 1995 he was a Professor at the University of Illinois and head of graduate studies in Industrial Design. In 1990 he opened a design office in the USA, working for clients including Herman Miller, Steelcase, Muji, Brandrud, Metro Furniture and Starbucks. His emphasis in recent years has been on studying and designing new forms of seating. The latest fruit of this endeavor is the ‘Lexicon’ system for Brandrud, recently previewed at Neocon 2004 in Chicago.
He currently lives and works in Seattle, where the moody skies and rain, followed by luscious green vistas, bring back fond memories of his childhood in Wales. |
