Norman Potter
Norman Arthur Potter was a cabinetmaker, political dissident, poet and author of ''What is a Designer?''
Life
By trade, Potter was a cabinetmaker and designer, a minimalist decades before the term became fashionable. He was a Christian anarchist and was imprisoned several times for his political actions. In 1949, he set up a workshop at Corsham in Wiltshire that produced modern furniture. In the late 1950s, Potter attained a full-time position teaching design at the Royal College of Art. In 1964, Potter, along with several colleagues, established a Construction School at the West of England College of Art and Design in Bristol. Potter sustained his political activism through this period, joining the student revolts of 1968. It was also in 1968 that Potter wrote What is a designer. A little over twenty years later, he followed up with Models & Constructs in 1990. Potter died of a heart attack in 1995 while bicycling in Falmouth.Books by Potter
- What is a designer: things, places, messages. London: Hyphen Press, 2002.
- Models & Constructs: margin notes to a design culture. London: Hyphen Press, 1990.