You often mention your insatiable curiosity. How is it reflected in your work?
I'd like to know everything, I'd like to have tried everything, I'd like to have been everywhere, I'd like to have seen everything and I'd like to remember everything. I'd like to design putting everything in my design.
Why do you consistently work with younger designers?
First of all because they are better to be looked at, especially the girls. I also like to smell the intellectual perfume of the youth and to learn through the eyes of the young what is going on around me.
Which other designers do you appreciate?
I was friends with George Nelson, Charles Eames, Frank Gehry and others. All of them curious people, intellectually educated and pleasant.
The Memphis Movement broke down barriers between high and low art, between assumptions of ''good'' and ''bad'' taste, and raised the question of access to art design by people of all economic backgrounds. When you started the movement in 1981, what did you expect would come of it?
In the 80's, during so many cultural and political revolutions, the problem for us was: should we work to make the industry rich or should we work for the people?
We tried to design without thinking of the conditions the industrial culture had imposed and is still imposing with all the possible means, legal or illegal, to define what is "good" and "bad" taste. We tried also wider areas than the ones suggested by industrial conditions.
What do you mean by "wider areas" -- and was the Memphis movement satire or political commentary?
"Wider areas" was meant neither as a radical shift nor as a satirical commentary. We were curious to see what could have been done with more liberal conditions and wider cultural knowledge.
For example tackling the cultural problem of the colors; tackling the problem of how to introduce new combinations of old and new materials in a new project. Not always what was meant as a research can be viewed either as a radical shift movement or a satirical comment.
How do you feel about pieces from that period appearing in museums and commanding prices upward of $10,000?
Also going to the moon was very expensive. To look for something that doesn't exist is always very expensive. Also diamond miners' blood costs a lot. In those years also our blood was expensive.
Speaking of diamonds, you said a few years ago that you don't like diamond jewelry because you think "life is about other things." What do you think life is about?
If I said "life is about other things" that doesn't mean that I know what the "other things" are. I don't like diamond jewelry because I cannot dismiss how much pain, how much sweat and human blood there is behind a diamond.
What is the most satisfying result of the Memphis Movement for you? The most satisfying result of the Memphis Movement is that Memphis existed. With Memphis one can do as one pleases. You, too, are asking questions on Memphis.
What is your design ideology?
I don't have any design ideology. If you really need an answer: "design" is an activity humankind has always pursued since the day a girl of the Pleistocene, one morning, "designed" a small necklace made of seashells to wear around her neck ; "industrial design" is an activity no more than two centuries old.
So: I design and then someone tries to find out my ideology.
You were on the forefront of designing with technology in mind (having designed the calculator and typewriter for Olivetti -- and later, a prototypical laptop for Apple). What do you think of Apple?
The girl of the Pleistocene designed herself. The designers at Apple design tools. It is slightly different, but not so much; if I ask a designer at Apple to dive into the sea and look for seashells to make a necklace for his girlfriend maybe it would be more difficult for him than to design an Apple computer. Do you know that to empty a seashell from its living inhabitant you need to dip it in fresh water?
Describe your design process.
Maybe one day I'll write a big book about my design and then I'll send it to you.
How or for what would you most like to be remembered?
I would like to be remembered mostly as everybody's friend. I would be happy if a little girl picking up one of my objects would slowly smile.
What do you consider to be your signature piece?
I don't have 'signature pieces' I keep working, I keep making mistakes. I keep dreaming.
What is your favorite activity?
To have a pencil in my hands, to have a piece of paper and to design something.
You've done photography, ceramics, machinery, furniture What is your favorite medium to work in? Is there a medium you still want to work with?
I learned from my father to be always very concentrated -- while doing any kind of work you forget about all the rest which does not pertain the work itself and you gather all your intellectual power and all your existential experience to be applied to the task. I have learned from Allen Ginsberg, who told me once: "Ettore, be accurate". Everything I do, I'm trying to be accurate.
What do you hope to achieve with each design you create?
Once I designed a small ceramic and I offered it to my girlfriend. She smiled and kissed me. Top achievement. I like to do things, to design things, then I put things on the table, leave them and go do something else. With my design one can do as he pleases.