ROB FORBES
2003 HONOREE
Modern Design Impresario
Rob Forbes founded Design Within Reach in July 1999. In just four short years, he has helped bring good design into an ever-growing marketplace. Forbes is an artist and a merchant—a potter with an MFA from Alfred University and an MBA from Stanford University, a rare combination. As an artist, he has exhibited in both solo and group exhibitions, and was a recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Grant in 1981. He has also taught ceramics at the Cleveland Institute of Art and the Philadelphia College of Art.
It was in the 1980s that Forbes began to lay the groundwork for Design Within Reach, or DWR as it is called, as Director of Marketing and Inventory Management for Williams-Sonoma. He was Director of Business Development for Smith & Hawken, developed a catalogue business for the London-based Selfridges, and was instrumental in reinvigorating The Nature Company. During this time, he established strong relationships with designers, suppliers and manufacturers.
That, in turn, led to the launch of DWR as a catalogue and internet retailer and studio (with its headquarters in Oakland, California and retail showrooms in numerous cities including New York and Miami Beach) for both classic and new modern furniture, lighting, and accessories; his specific mission was to improve the quality of design in public spaces. The catalogue alone reaches 500,000 readers every month.
"DWR's belief is that good design should be accessible to anyone, not just to card-carrying members of the design establishment. I thought we could make the whole process easier. For me, personally, it was an extension of my passion for design. I love the discovery of new products and the designers behind them, and felt that this was an area that I could devote myself to without compromise," Forbes said in a recent interview.
He promotes good design, not just as a retailer but as a missionary in lectures around the world and in his intelligent and eloquent DWR internet newsletter. Rob's particularly insightful story on Manitoga in the August 27th 2003 newsletter, is a perfect case in point.
Forbes has been a juror for the Cooper-Hewitt Museum's National Design Awards. He is currently a member of the SFMoMA (San Francisco Museum of Modern Art) Architecture & Design Forum, CCAC Interior Design Advisory Board, the 2002 International Design Conference at Aspen, and the Board of Directors for SFJazz. He rows around Alcatraz Island nearly every morning in an 18-foot Maaxs rowing shell, his favorite piece of mobile furniture.
Beth Dunlop