Patrick Norguet’s Industry Leading Washbasin and Bathtub Design

In this week’s interview with 2021 SBID Awards winner for the Bathroom & Sanitaryware Product category, RAK Ceramics, the designer Patrick Norguet talks about the industry trends’ influence on the designing process and shares his predictions on the future bathroom design direction.

How important is it to enter the SBID Awards & receive industry recognition for your work? What are the benefits?

It is always important to measure the reaction to a product or a collection and the industry recognition that the Award demonstrates is an important indicator of the likely success of the product once it is available commercially. For me as a designer, it is always pleasant to receive congratulations for my work and that of my team.

What do you think made this particular design an award winner?

As with any first collaboration I spent a lot of time trying to understand a brand, its origin, its strategy, its culture, and its production capacity. RAK- Valet is the result of this research. Beyond the design, the success of a product is also about timing. RAK-Valet brings together all the elements, thus making the collection a sweet blend of elegance and modernity.

How do evolving trends in the KBB industry inform the design decisions you make about RAK products/collections? Where do you find inspiration?

The word trend is contradictory to a designer’s work. My job is to understand the evolution that is needed related to a particular company or industrial sector. RAK Ceramics came to me as they were looking to increase the perceived value of their products, with a unique collection that has an international cultural approach. I think we succeeded in this challenge with our first collaboration.

To answer your question, which is often asked of me, my inspiration comes from my work. As a designer as well as an industrialist, I like to offer products that make sense, because there are too many objects already surrounding us. My inspiration therefore comes from a conscious and unconscious set of things that nourish my creativity according to what is needed.

As a leader of innovation within the sector, what recent developments in bathroom design do you think will become commonplace in the coming years?

It is an interesting subject because the bathroom for several years has become much more of a living space and a room in its entirety.

The notion of comfort and well-being is at the heart of the needs of our Western society. Tomorrow may be different. The density of the population has an impact on us and our living spaces, so it is therefore also necessary to think and design spaces that are more compact, but that offer quality. Bathroom design also needs to address societal challenges, like the consumption of energy and water, maintaining comfort while bringing meaning to our actions.

Now that you’ve won an SBID Award, what are the next steps? Is there anything new you are excited to be working on?

It would be terrible for me to settle for one award alone. To design and offer products correctly, it is important for an industrialist to establish a collaboration that lasts over time. I hope that this first collection designed for RAK Ceramics will lead to a continued relationship and to win another SBID Award in the future. In the meantime, I am focused on many projects ahead of the Milan show in April 2022.

What advice can you give to young designers starting out in the design industry?

My advice would be that it is a difficult job, which requires a lot of work and skill, but it is also a job that offers a lot of freedom. So never give up and work hard.

Questions answered by Patrick Norguet, RAK-VALET Collection Designer, RAK Ceramics.