Tom Seymour is inspired by how we interact with products throughout everyday life. Whether that is taking down a number from a phone call or scratching a scratch-card to reveal something hidden, these simple actions inspire and contribute to his way of designing.
Since graduating in Art and Design from London's Central St Martins in 2002, Tom won the 2002 OXO Peugeot Design Furniture Award with the Note Table. His ability was confirmed in 2003 when his Scratch Light was named runner up in the Lighting Award of the same competition. Tom has just been nominated for Arena Magazine's Man of the Year, against designer Sam Buxton.
One of the OXO/Peugeot Award's prestigious judges is design sage Wayne Hemingway, who liked the Note Table so much he bought a version for himself. "It sits in his daughter's bedroom", says Tom proudly. "It's like a massive jotter pad on wheels. And no matter how many pages she manages to colour in, it'll still last forever because it's made from over 5000 sheets of paper." At a rate of 3 sheets a week, that'll last 5 year-old tykes everywhere until they reach 40. Even for the grown-up customers Tom has mainly in his sight, that's a lifetime.
If the Note Table looks familiar it's because you have probably seen a tinier version in WH Smith. It is a scaled up version of a Post-It note block, its different layers of coloured paper bound on one side. Tom recently exhibited it to widespread acclaim with DESIGN LONDON, Hidden Art's show in Milan, along with the Scratch Light, a futuristic light with the surprising properties of a giant scratchcard.
When Tom Seymour designed the Scratch Light, he road-tested its silver scratchable surface on five people: a creative director, a design group and a five year-old. The results were certainly interesting, he says. "When the lights were switched on, the five year-old's pattern looked the best. What it proved was that it really doesn't matter how good the design is. It all depends on how the design feeds the light through."
Perhaps relying on your customers to create interesting surroundings for themselves is not as hazardous as it may seem. More products like this could bring out the creative skills in everyone. But in any case, Tom is developing a new version where the owner can reapply the ink, so that for more careless or cautious engravers there's less worry about going wrong.
After being named runner up in the Oxo/Peugeot Awards in 2003, the Scratch Light was taken on by Artomatic and sold in their Selfridges concession. Tom was also commissioned by the OXO Tower and Totally London to design and make an interactive piece for the public using the same material.
The Scratch Light has been recently been put into production by 2pm Ltd, a manufacturer that Tom was put in contact with by the Hidden Art Bureau.
One last thing: how does he do it? "There's a booklet included with lots of guidance about how you go about applying a design, but my preferred method is to copy my graphic designs onto acetate, then project them onto the surface. Then I can scratch out the light sections to leave the darker bits concealed." Simple.
Fiona Sibley, May 2004