Oliver Haslam on November 4, 2018, 6:02 am

Jony Ive Talks About How He Designed The 2018 iPad Pro In New Interview

When Apple announced the new iPad Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac mini, there was something missing. That something was design chief Jony Ive, and while he was not involved either on-stage or in any of the promotional videos used during the event, he was seen in the crowd and during the hands-on moments. He’s also been trotted out in the post-event publicity push, with Ive having been interviewed by The Independent.

During the event, Ive discussed the process that led to the creation of the new iPad Pro, with Ive’s interviewer, The Independent’s David Phelan, noting that Apple’s design maestro had an air of “a humility that puts him as part of a team at Apple.”

The first question related to how Ive sees his responsibilities as far as creating a product that will be both loved by users and commercially successful at the same time.

“I think your responsibility actually goes further back than that,” he says. “It starts with the determination not to fall into the trap of just making things different. Because when a product has been highly regarded there is often a desire from people to see it redesigned. I think one of the most important things is that you change something not to make it different but to make it better.”

Ive then transitioned into speaking about improving an existing product, something Apple had to do with the iPad Pro. He said that when doing so, designers don’t need to make users “fall in love with it again.”

If you are making changes that are in the service of making something better, then you don’t need to convince people to fall in love with it again. Our sense of habit and familiarity with something is so developed, there is always that initial reaction that is more of a comment on something being different rather than necessarily better or worse. In my experience, if we try very hard to make material improvements, people quickly recognise those and make the sort of connection they had before with the product.

The full interview is well worth a read if you’re at all interested in how Apple goes about designing products, Ive specifically, and we’d suggest checking out.

(Source: The Independent)