A key contention concerned Forstall’s fondness for skeuomorphic design; that is, graphic interfaces that resemble real-world objects. Apple’s user-interface conventions under Forstall tended to look like their real-life counterparts. Virtual wooden shelves were used to display eBooks in the iBookstore app; Apple’s Podcast app looked like a reel-to-reel tape recorder; iOS’s multiplayer gaming service, Game Center, was styled like a Vegas casino table. Faux leather and wood-grain patterns had found their way into many of Apple’s most popular apps.
Such skeuomorphic design allows neophyte users to be immediately familiar with an unfamiliar device, operating on the assumption that nothing is simpler than an interface that works exactly like objects do in the real world. The original Macintosh desktop computer, for example, was conceived as a skeuomorphic version of an office desktop as seen from above. Because everybody knew how the items on a traditional desk were used in the physical world, that knowledge could be implicitly transferred to its digital counterpart.
More recently, however, Apple had heard loud criticisms concerning its use of “tacky” skeuomorphic elements. According to some, visual references to obsolescent office furniture and audio equipment were beginning to look dated and out of place. Forstall, after Jobs’s death, was reportedly Apple’s major champion of skeuomorphic design, which put him in the line of fire not only in the eyes of external critics but from some within Apple too.
Jony Ive was never a fan of skeuomorphism, according to one unnamed Apple designer speaking to the New York Times.13 In an interview with the UK’s Telegraph, Jony visibly “winced” when the subject came up, but refused to be drawn into a detailed discussion. “My focus is very much working with the other teams on the product ideas and then developing the hardware and so that’s our focus and that’s our responsibility,” he said. “In terms of those elements you’re talking about, I’m not really connected to that.”14 Cook’s reshuffle corrected that.
Apple’s management shake-up represented a major design shift in software and, by the time iOS 7 was released in 2013, most of Forstall’s skeuomorphic references were nowhere to be seen.
The mobile software was flat and modern looking. Gone were references to felt and leather, as well as 3-D effects like highlights and shadows. “No virtual cows were harmed in the making of this,” joked Craig Federighi, senior vice president of software engineering, as he showed off iOS 7’s calendar app during the launch event. He added that other apps were cleaner, too, because “We just completely ran out of green felt. And wood too. This has to be good for the environment.”15 The iOS 7 design was minimal, bearing a curious resemblance to the phony operating system that Jony’s group used when designing the iPhone and iPad hardware in the mid-2000s. They had the same flat look, and some of the icons were very similar. The reversion back to the mock-up OS hinted at the animosity between Jony and Forstall, suggesting that Jony’s instincts for software design had been downplayed to Forstall’s for several years.
On the other side of the calculation, Jony’s overhaul of iOS was consistent with his approach to hardware. Jony’s hardware has always been about bare, utilitarian minimalism. He disdains decoration—as he says, every tiny screw is there for a reason—and his goal is to make design disappear. In contrast, skeuomorphism is about making software look like something it isn’t, like a roulette table or a yellow legal pad, and decoration is essential. Skeuomorphic software is the opposite of Jony’s minimalist hardware. One strips away everything that isn’t necessary; the other puts it back in.
This paradox within Apple ended with iOS 7. With the ornamentation taken out, Jony’s software was in sync with his hardware, stripped to their essentials. In addition, iOS 7 showed good design taste, especially in the use of typography. It featured a typeface called Helvetica Neue, a fine, detailed Swiss-designed typeface that’s enabled by the detailed retina displays of Apple’s latest devices. The entire operating system was infused with a deep appreciation for print-graphic design.
As Apple’s mobile devices mature, the shift to put Jony in charge of hardware and software is hugely significant. Jony and his design team will continue to improve the hardware, but changes are likely to be incremental, not fundamental. There are only so many ways a thin glass rectangle can evolve. These days, the design frontier is software, not hardware.
Sally Grisedale, the fellow Brit who worked with Jony in the mid-nineties, said Jony has always been adept at software. “[Jony and OS design] are a perfect fit,” she said. “It was always about the hardware software integration. . . . This whole piece of hardware-software interaction is the most exciting arena and he has sort of been leading the way for years. This is not new for him; he has always thought that way and it was just a question of scale and scope. Perfect fit.”16
Larry Barbera, one of Jony’s old design colleagues, also thought Jony was well equipped to refresh Apple’s software. But he also pointed out the need for him to build relationships with programmers. Despite being immersed in the software side of the business for years, Barbera said, “Jony needs to evangelize the software folks by creating a vision for all to buy in to. I’m sure that half of Jony’s battles will be in winning over the hearts and minds of the software folks.”17
Jony’s appointment to software came at a crucial time. Apple’s competitors are catching up, as the Android continues to mature and attract the kind of user who likes more control and more choices. Microsoft’s Windows 8 won plaudits for its clean, ambitious touch interface. “This is a defining moment, where hardware fulfills its promise and simply gets out of the way,” wrote Alex Schleifer, design and creative director at Say Media, a San Francisco advertising company. “A shape of glass existing solely to contain an experience. The user interface will be how we remember a device, fondly or not. The way it looks and reacts. It will live in our cars and living rooms, become part of the architecture, cover our landscapes. It will affect the media we consume, the way we look at the world, and how we learn and communicate. Here’s to the age of the user interface.”18
In an interview published in Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Cook shed little light on the top-level changes and direction at Apple, beyond deflecting inquiries with some standard Cook-style remarks: “Creativity and innovation are something you can’t flowchart out. You know, small teams do amazing things together. Collaboration is essential for innovation.”
He did, however, go as far as to opine warmly that “I don’t think there’s anybody in the world that has better taste than Jony Ive does.” Cook added, “Jony and I both love Apple. We both want Apple to do great things.”19
“Jony Is Irreplaceable”
Before he died, Jobs revealed the degree to which he empowered Jony inside the company. “He has more operational power than anyone else at Apple except me,” Jobs said. “There’s no one who can tell him what to do, or to butt out. That’s the way I set it up.”20
Jobs didn’t explain exactly what he meant. According to Apple’s organization chart, Jony reports to Cook; yet, according to Jobs, Cook can’t tell him what to do. If such an arrangement seems unusual, it’s because Jony has enormous operational clout. His IDg, as the most powerful in the company, calls the shots with engineering and manufacturing. The company has invested billions in Jony’s demanding manufacturing methods. Budget and feasibility has never been a factor as Cook’s operations group implemented Jony’s IDg’s designs.
For many years, Jony had transcended his role as IDg head, particularly by growing into his unusual partnership with Steve Jobs. Jobs saw Jony as a true collaborator and innovator.
“He understands business concepts, marketing concepts. He picks stuff up just like that, click,” Jobs told Isaacson. “He understands what we do at our core better than anyone. If I had a spiritual partner at Apple, it’s Jony. Jony and I think up most of the products together and then pull others in and say, ‘Hey, what do you think about this?’ He gets the big picture as well
as the most infinitesimal details about each product. And he understands that Apple is a product company. He’s not just a designer.”21
Friends and ex-friends alike acknowledge that Jony has carefully guarded his image as a soft-spoken English gentleman—but that’s he is also a practiced corporate player. Generous and protective as he may be of his IDg team, Jony has a healthy ego and isn’t shy about claiming personal credit for ideas or innovations. His jousts with Forstall and Rubinstein reveal another more aggressive facet of his character: He isn’t afraid to take on executive colleagues. To judge from the outcomes of the corporate contretemps that have come to light, Jony Ive possesses both the determination and the corporate firepower to prevail when he chooses to engage in such turf battles.
In the creative sphere, there’s little doubt that Jobs groomed Jony as his absolute successor, though without the CEO title. Cook would keep the trains running on time, but Jony, as the product champion, was endowed with operational muscle across the company.
The result has been that, in many ways, things have stayed the same. “We’re developing products in exactly the same way that we were two years ago, five years ago, ten years ago,” said Jony. “It’s not that there are a few of us working in the same way: there is a large group of us working in the same way.”22
Jony clearly seeks to maintain Jobs’s values: To Jony, as it was to Jobs, making “great products” is much more important than the balance sheet. “Our goal isn’t to make money,” Jony told a surprised audience at the British Embassy’s Creative Summit in July 2012. “Our goal absolutely at Apple is not to make money. This may sound a little flippant, but it’s the truth. Our goal and what gets us excited is to try to make great products. We trust that if we are successful people will like them, and if we are operationally competent we will make revenue, but we are very clear about our goal.”23
Jony explained that he learned this lesson from Jobs when Apple was poised to go under. “Apple was very close to bankruptcy and to irrelevance [but] you learn a lot about life through death, and I learnt a lot about vital corporations by experiencing a non-vital corporation,” he told the conference. “You would have thought that, when what stands between you and bankruptcy is some money, your focus would be on making some money, but that was not [Steve Jobs’s] preoccupation. His observation was that the products weren’t good enough and his resolve was, ‘We need to make better products.’ That stood in stark contrast to the previous attempts to turn the company around.”
Jony is also committed to maintaining Jobs’s renowned focus. Jobs always said that focus isn’t a question of saying yes to projects; it’s saying no. Under Jony’s guidance, Apple has remained highly disciplined in “saying no” to products that are “competent” as opposed to “great.”
“We have been, on a number of occasions, preparing for mass production and in a room and realized we are talking a little too loud about the virtues of something. That to me is always the danger, if I’m trying to talk a little too loud about something and realizing I’m trying to convince myself that something’s good,” he said.24
Clive Grinyer, Jony’s first business partner, expressed confidence that Jony would catapult Apple to even greater heights.
“Jony never was just the designer,” said Grinyer. “He always played a much more strategic role at Apple. That includes also the user interface, for which he also helped make the decisions. . . . Jony is now in the strategic position. I always felt very optimistic about Apple, because so much of Apple’s success has been due to Jony. Steve unlocked Jony. Steve took Jony away from printer lids and gave him the job he was capable of. . . . Steve gave Jony the confidence to bring out his innate design talent and create amazing products. And from now he will carry on as normal.
“Apple was already a pretty amazing company, but the level they have reached in the last ten years is because they have had Jony, empowered by Steve, to produce that incredible panel of work.”25
Grinyer took his argument one step further. “Believe it or not, Jony’s leaving would be worse for Apple than Jobs’s leaving. Jony is irreplaceable. If he were to go, to get another design leader with that sense of humanity, vision, calmness and ability to keep the team together, would be impossible. Apple would become something different.”26
As Jony has said, “A big definition of who you are as a designer, it’s the way you look at the world. And I guess one of the curses of what you do, is you are constantly looking at something and thinking, ‘Why? Why is it like that? Why is it like that and not like this?’”27
Very likely, as a man who see himself “constantly designing,” Jony Ive will continue to do precisely that at Apple into a future that will feature new designs, new products—and some happy surprises.
Reading the Weft and Warp
There are intriguing symmetries and continuities to be observed in Jony’s life and career. His father was an education reformer whose work directly affected his son’s design schooling. Jony’s first school projects were futuristic phones in white plastic. A prototype tablet got him his job at Apple.
Jony’s career has been marked by connections (Grinyer, Brunner) and coincidences (Brunner moving to Apple). But if there have been a few lucky breaks, it is equally true that he made his own luck.
Jony was always crazy for design. As a kid, he wasn’t just talented, he was a design prodigy. He was aided by his dad, whose personal passion was instilling a passion for design in Britain’s school kids. His education at Newcastle Polytechnic was very hands-on, likewise developing his ongoing interest in making, which would be apparent again later in his love of making prototypes and pioneering new forms of mass production.
Jony’s early experience as a consultant at Tangerine built in him a consultant’s mentality and workflow, which Jony brought to Apple, where the design studio operates like a consultancy, only within a large corporation.
“I had been concerned that moving away from working independently for a number of clients on a broad range of products would be difficult,” he once said. “Surprisingly this has not been an issue, as we are really designing systems that include so many different components—headphones, remote controls, a mouse, speakers as well as computers.”28
Some of Jony’s first work at Apple, including the Newton MessagePad and the Twentieth Anniversary Mac, were harbingers. Jony hired many of the core members of his team when Apple was in difficulty, and he protected and nurtured them during Apple’s darkest days. It was this team that would contribute so much to Apple’s smash hits in the years that followed.
His collaboration with Steve Jobs, starting with the iMac, became nothing less than one of the most fruitful creative partnerships in history. Together they reset Apple’s engineering-driven culture and created a much more tightly integrated design-driven approach, where “design” (meaning creative engineering, whether it’s hardware, software or advertising) permeated everything the company does.
The products that followed sent Jony deep into new materials and manufacturing methods, driven by his desire always to find a better way. The iPod was a product of Jony’s simplification philosophy. It could have been just another complex MP3 player, but instead he turned it into the iconic gadget that set the design cues for later mobile devices. Two more delightful innovations, the iPhone and iPad, were products of thinking differently, of creative engineering at work in rational problem solving on many levels.
The unibody process is Jony’s genius for simplification applied to process manufacturing. With his work in machining, it’s not unreasonable to say he achieved some pinnacle of making on an industrial scale. No wonder D&AD, in 2012, named Apple the best design studio and best brand of the past fifty years. D&AD awards are the Oscars of the industry, and Jony has ten of them, more than any other designer.
The process of simplification is design 101, a mind-set that every design student is taught in school. But not every student
adopts it, and it’s rarely applied with the ruthless discipline practiced by Jony. Indeed, if there’s such a thing as a single secret to what Jony Ive does, it is to follow slavishly the simplification philosophy. That approach has accounted for many of the major breakthroughs, as well as for some products that failed and others that Apple hasn’t released. Caring enough to commit the enormous time and effort to get something right has also been Jony’s hallmark, from his earliest college projects onward.
Jony’s ultimate goal is for his designs to disappear. The shy boy from Chingford is happiest when the user doesn’t notice his work at all. “It’s a very strange thing for a designer to say, but one of the things that really irritates me in products is when I’m aware of designers wagging their tails in my face,” he said. “Our goal is simple objects, objects that you can’t imagine any other way. . . . Get it right, and you become closer and more focused on the object. For instance, the iPhoto app we created for the new iPad, it completely consumes you and you forget you are using an iPad.”29
Andrew Hargadon, a design and innovation professor at the University of California at Davis, who worked in Apple’s design studio before Jony took over, said not only has Jony made computers and smartphones indispensable, he’s also driving a cultural shift for better design.
“When the iMac first came out in jelly bean colors, so many other different products came out following that lead. There were staplers in six jelly bean colors. The iMac turned consumers into design aficionados to a much greater degree than they were before,” Hargadon said. “That’s probably the single greatest effect, that we nowadays expect many things to have better designs. Because of Apple, we got to compare crappy portable computers versus really nice ones, crappy phones versus really nice ones. We saw a before-and-after effect. Not over a generation, but within a few years. Suddenly 600 million people had a phone that put to shame the phone they used to have. That is a design education at work within our culture.”30
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