1953 EXHIBIT FOR THE SOCIETY OF DESIGNERS FOR INDUSTRY AS PART OF A DEPARTMENT OF TRADE EXHIBITION, SYDNEY

I initiated the formation of the Society of Designers for Industry (NSW) in Sydney sometime around 1953, based on the first that was formed by Fred Ward and Ron Rosenfeldt in Vic.

Peter Hunt was working for the Department of Trade at that time and secured us a free spot to advertise the new Society. I designed and drew the graphic panel on which was a list of members who could be found in the various states in Australia

Peter Hunt was our first President and I was Secretary/Treasurer; we had about 8 initial members and I remember one meeting at my unfinished house on top of the DeeWhy quarry. Few of us were ‘real ’industrial designers at that time as the professional name was not part of the lexicon in those days. Some were architects, commercial artists (later to become known as graphic designers), others display artists, advertising designers. There were a small handful who worked in some of the bigger industries like Ted Healey, Adrian Knaap, John Day, Carl Neilsen who regarded themselves as the ‘professional’ industrial designers. It was indeed the emergence of a new profession which eventually (1956?) became the Industrial Design Institute of Australia – it later dropped the ‘industrial’ to become more all-embracing of the wider range of designers for industry. I left to live in Canberra in 1957 and started the IDIA (ACT) branch which had very few members – mainly graphic because of the Government Printers’ Office which printed Hansard.

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