PurplePrice Mag · · 2 min read
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The name Porsche immediately brings sports cars to mind, but in design history it counts twice: for the shape of the 911, still recognisable after more than sixty years, and for Porsche Design, the studio that since the 1970s has designed watches, sunglasses, pens and all kinds of objects.
From design office to the 356
In 1931 the engineer Ferdinand Porsche opened a car design office in Stuttgart. Commissioned by the German government, he developed the car for the masses that became the Volkswagen Beetle; under Nazism he worked for the regime, and after the war he was imprisoned for war crimes. Meanwhile his son Ferry Porsche built his own car in a former sawmill in Gmünd, Austria: the 356, road-certified in 1948, the first car sold under the Porsche name, with a rear engine and many Beetle components.
The 911
The 356's successor was presented at the 1963 Frankfurt Motor Show as the 901, renamed 911 after an objection from Peugeot. The shape of the body was largely the work of Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, known as “Butzi”, the founder's grandson, who had studied industrial design at the Ulm School of Design: a pared-down, continuous line, with round headlights and a roof sloping down to the tail, which later generations of the 911 have always kept.
Porsche Design
When the family decided to step out of the management of the car company, in 1972 F. A. Porsche founded the Porsche Design Studio in Stuttgart, moved in 1974 to Zell am See, Austria. Its first product was the Chronograph I, one of the first watches with case and bracelet in matte black steel. Then came sunglasses, among the brand's most copied designs, pens, pipes, lamps, knives, household appliances and even trams for the city of Vienna, many signed “Design by F. A. Porsche” for other companies. F. A. Porsche died in 2012; since 2015 the studio has been called Studio F. A. Porsche, while the Porsche Design brand, based in Ludwigsburg, is part of the Porsche group.
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