Nicholas Dodziuk

Nicholas Dodziuk is the son of an artist and a mathematician, so it’s no wonder he is able to combine creativity and precision in his work. Dodziuk got his first taste of good design at an early age from an Alvar Aalto table among his family’s furnishings. “I was always enchanted,” he says of the table, “with its relationships of parts to the whole, and how it seemed to work differently than other pieces of furniture.” Then one day he got his hands on a Sony Walkman (“the first product that just blew me away,” he recalls), and his aspirations as a designer were set.

Raised in New York, Dodziuk graduated in 1998 from the Rhode Island School of Design with a degree in industrial design. From there, a Fulbright fellowship took him to Germany, and upon his return in 2000, he worked as a freelance designer for companies such as Unilever and Sony (in the post-Walkman era).

In 2003, Dodziuk joined forces with Jeffrey Bernett at Consultants for Design Strategy in New York, and they have since collaborated on projects for B&B Italia, Bernhardt, Boeing, Herman Miller®, Knoll®, Teknion and, of course, Design Within Reach. Their awards include the Best of Neocon Silver in 2007 for the Dividends Horizon collection from Knoll, Best of the Year award in 2010 from Interior Design for DWR’s own Raleigh Sofa and Best of Neocon Gold in 2013 for Teknion’s Fractals.

Dodziuk names “real-life observed behavior” as an inspiration for his creative process. “Once you dig deep enough into both stated and unstated needs,” he says, “rarely are there any bad ideas to work from.” He believes good design improves quality of life. “Design has to solve problems and capture the human spirit at the same time. It has to accomplish both if it is going to contribute to the common good.”