MOROCCO IS ACCELERATING! feature - Alstom

train and plane brands to come together
in a vast conglomerate. They could then agree
on a self-managed international standard,
like for instance automatic piloting.
Who can say whether one day Alstom
will not form a partnership with Boeing?
Companies need each other. In the future,
at some point, everyone will combine.
We can imagine that there will be no more
rails, no more roads, no planes, but only
weightlessness, energy, electromagnets
and green jets … The real invention will be
in the way in which this is expressed.
X. Allard: Toyota is currently designing
cars that can park themselves.
Rail operators are working on intermodality
and studying the more individualised
approach that you are describing.
Ora Ïto: Yes that’s true. But I think
that mobility is continuing to regress. Take
for example the Concorde which, in the 1980s,
allowed my father to get to New York in three
hours. Today, it takes eight. Progress is not
a matter of ‘raw’ performance it now includes
sustainable development. Because today,
the most important thing is not to go ever
faster and further, it’s simply to save the planet!
X. Allard: What do you think about
sustainable development?
Ora Ïto: There is already a general
growing awareness of the need to sacrifi ce
a little individual freedom. The challenge
of sustainable development will now
be to reconcile individual pleasure and
the common good.
Design is accompanying this movement
towards the sustainable. Materials will
become more and more sophisticated,
and more solid. Glass or any other ‘invisible’
material will soon have the same structural
properties as metal. This gets us back
to my concept of ‘simplexity’: each object
is just an additional step towards the ultimate
phase where there will be nothing any longer.
In a few centuries time, Alstom will be
in the teleportation business!
X. Allard: What will remain
then as the expression of the brand?
Ora Ïto: History will remember that
it was Alstom who invented it!
Interview by
Carole Galland
Biography
1977: Birth.
1996: Invents the fi rst virtual brands.
His site becomes the second digital
work acquired by the Fonds national
d’art contemporain (FNAC).
2000: Ora Ïto works on designing real
products, developing transversal
design, architecture and communication
projects, in all sectors of activity.
2002: Oscar for the best design
for his Heineken bottle in aluminium
and its original packaging capsule.
2004: His fi rst lamp, One Line,
designed in a continuous long line is
celebrated at the Milan Furniture Fair
and awarded a Red Dot Design.
2005: The Centre européen d’art
contemporain offers him
the opportunity to hold his fi rst major
monographic exhibition at the Centre
culturel français de Milan, which
he ironically calls ‘Museora-Ïto’.
Customers: Adidas, the Air Group,
Thierry Mugler, Toyota, Biotherm,
Levi’s, Davidoff, Nike, Danone, Kenzo,
LG electronics, Guerlain, Ballantine’s,
L’Oréal, Sagem, Habitat, Christofl e…
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