nationality: Czech

experience and education:

2007 - In-house designer Electrolux, Italy - collaboration with Lunar Design, San Francisco, USA
2006 - Artist of scientific expedition to Madagascar
2005 - internship in Sweden - Star design project, NASA, JSC Houston, USA - IDEO workshop
2004 - Scholarship of Ingvar Kamprad - study at IKDC, University of Lund, Sweden - workshop Volvo sport car - workshop Sony-Ericsson packaging design - Master degree, AAAD Prague, Czech republic
2003 - establish Tactoo collection
2002 - 2003 exchange study at Universita Pontifica Perú, Lima
2002 - member of File- studio
2001 - exchange study at Polytechnic school in Haamenlinna, Finland
1999 - cooperation on organising Vitra Design Museum workshops in France
1998 - attended the summer Vitra workshop in France
1998 - 2004 - Academy of Art Architecture and design, Prague
1996 - 2000 - worked at the Jan Cincera packaging design studio
2004 - Master degree, PFJU Èeské Budìjovice
1995 - 2000 - Pedagogy faculty of the South Bohemian University
1994 - 1995 - military service
1989 - 1993 - High School of Applied Art in Prague

You know you've achieved perfection in design, not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing more to take away. (Antoine De Saint-Exupery)

prizes & awards:

2006 - Excellent design award for Ixy upholstered chair
2005 - "The National Design prize 2005" for set of upholstered furniture Koxy
2004 - 1.st prize in Cesta èasem, cesta do budoucnosti- Koxy,
2003 - Good design award for PET bottle Aqua (cooperation with Filip Streit) - the Prize "Czech Chair" for Black Hole chair (File studio)
2002 - Excellent design award for Rattan bath
2001 - Good design award for collection of bathroom equipment - Good design award for city bike - 1st prize in competition Eta-vize.
2000 - Special prize in competition Future of the bathroom Design department of IKEA - Human behaviour and gestures
1996 - 1.st prize Young packaging design competition

exhibitions:

2000- Biennale Internationale Design 2000, Saint-Étienne (F)
2001- Economical Lighting, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Prague (CZ) I Excellent Design, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Prague (CZ)
2002- Prague session, Glasgow I Excellent Design, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Prague (CZ) I Belda Collection, Prague I with File studio Tendence Fair Frankfurt am Main I 100% design, London(UK) I Design Blok, Prague I Design Blok, Brno
2003- Exposición Anual 2003, Lima,(Peru) I Ambiente Fair, Frankfurt am Main I Excellent Design, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Prague (CZ) I Art and Interior, Prague I Visiony/ 67a Mostra Internazionale dell'Artigianato, Firenze I Das Möbel, Vienna, (A) I Geometric jewellery, Hergertov cihelna, Prague I Jak se dìlá design, Design centrum, Brno I Milky way confrontation, Prague I Design Blok, Prague I Design Air, Prague I Annual design exhibition, Obecní dùm, Prague
2004- Excellent Design, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Prague (CZ) I Art and Interior, Prague I Designmai, Berlin (SRN) I Czechmania, Berlin (SRN) I DesignAir, Birmingham (GB) I Biennale Internationale Design 2004, Saint-Étienne (F) 2005 - Art and Interior, Praha (CZ) I Excellent Students Design, Design Centre, Czech Republic, Prague (CZ) I Re: Design Europe, Berlin (GER) I Furniture Fair, Stockholm (SWE) I Czech this out!, Wiena (A) I Excellent Student Design, Design Centre of the Czech Republic, Brno (CZ)
2006- Czech Design 1990 - 2005 Brussels (BE) I It all in Your head, Salone del Mobile, Milano (I) I Design Match, 2006 CZE : SVK Prague (CZ) I Couch for Sigmund Freud, Design centrum Praha (CZ) I Couch for Sigmund Freud, Austria Cultural centrum, Wiena (A) I Tactoo collection 2006, DesignBlok 2006, Praha (CZ)

Jan, would you please introduce yourself?
I was born in Czechoslovakia and studied design in Czech Republic and Sweden. Since 2002, I am self-employed designer although design is rather my hobby. I cooperated with lots of companies amongst which IKEA, NASA, Lunar Design, Moser, Postrin Design, MM interier, Tactoo, File-studio, Paramo etc. Now I work in Industrial Design Centre of Electrolux in Italy.

What motivated you to go into designing? And where do you get the ideas from?
When I was eight, I read a small article about design in some magazine, and at that moment for the first time I thought that I would like to do design. Then I forgot about this dream for some time and design came to my mind again, when I was at the university, attending the pottery classes. This turned my interest back to design and after winning the first price in design competition, it was clear that design is my destiny. I am usually trying to study the current subject first and during this research the solution, most of the time, turns up. Most often, I find the best solution during watching people’s behavior in various situations.

Where do you see yourself, after, let’s say, five years down the line?
I would like to do the design in all of its sectors as so far. Yet I would like to move forward to the real cutting edge on the world design field. I also found out that there are only positive comments about design. I would like to engage in professional critics of this discipline. Nevertheless, I will pursue design critics after I finish my active career of designer.

Any parting words of wisdom?
I am not parting yet; I am right at the beginning!

"Jan Ctvrtnik focuses on user-centered design based on good research", Coolbuzz

Boiled potatoes in salted water with cumin

Once the potatoes are boiled, drain the water and mash it - just a little to keep some bigger pieces of potatoes. Then take sauerkraut, chop it to the small pieces and mix with potatoes (cca one unit of sauerkraut for 4 units of mashed potatoes) and a little bit of salt. Chop onion on small pieces and fry it on lard in frying pan until it turns golden. Serve mixed potato mash with sauerkraut on the plate and sprinkle with fried onion with hot lard.
Bon Appetite!

I love cooking but thanks to my travelling experience, I realized that only the people from rich part of world have the privilege of different tastes. I travelled around Madagascar and I was desperate for the fact that we had no chance to cook and eat anything else than rice, bananas, few tomatoes, yucca and time to time also coconut. We, people coming from rich part of the world, are spoiled by hundreds of different tastes, flavours, ingredients and spices. On the other hand, local people don’t have any choices at all. Children cannot eat chocolate, ice-cream or cookies like we can. They can afford it perhaps only a few times per life.

I love cooking and eating, I love different cuisines and every time I travel I try some unknown food. However, I would like to take the opportunity to tell everybody, who is happy enough to have good food every day: "The fact that 'we have foods', brings special quality to our life and makes our lives very, very good! Remember this each time you want to complain about over-cooked pasta, too salty soup, or dry meat. Even the chance to eat not well prepared food is rear and most people never get this opportunity!"

Taste is interesting, when you have food every day. If you don't have anything to eat, you don't care about taste. So the food, I like to describe, is traditional food of peasants from Bohemian countryside. It is very simple, but delicious and is called "Kocicak" (pronounce: cotchitcha:c)