Architonics Top 400

Which designers are accessed most frequently at Architonic.com? To find out we have extracted the statistics for all the direct accessing of designers who are listed in the Architonic Product Library, the world's largest data base for high quality design. 'Direct accessing' means that the access was not via a link from a product or a manufacturer, but specifically via the 'Designer' sub-menu. This means that users have actively looked for the individual designer, a method which makes it possible to make sure that designers who are represented at Architonic with a large number of products under different manufacturers do not appear disproportionately often in the rankings.

The Top 50 are not particularly surprising because it is the usual suspects who share the leading places – with the eccentric French designer Philippe Starck ahead of them all. When he announced to the German weekly "Die Zeit" that he would be putting an end to his work as a designer in the near future because he is 'ashamed' of everything which he has so far designed and now regards design itself as 'vulgar elitism', reactions were divided. While some commented that "in his place I'd be ashamed, too", others regretted the impending departure of a designer who has had such a strong influence on the design world since the Eighties with his capricious creations. Philippe Starck is probably indifferent to all these reactions, and as difficult as this may be for him to accept, this is perhaps what makes him so appealing to the general mass of design enthusiasts.

Apart from Starck the top places are shared between contemporary designers like Patricia Urquiola or Antonio Citterio, and long-established figures such as Arne Jacobsen, Alvar Aalto or Achille Castiglioni.
What is however noticeable lower down the list, where the less well-known designers appear, is that the results are strongly influenced by the highlighting of selected Architonic members by their portrait and product photos. These are accessed proportionately more frequently, which turns this list into a ranking which is specific to Architonic.