Dieter Rams. Born 1932 in Wiesbaden. Trained as an architect. Joined Braun in 1955 and became head of design by 1961. Over the next three decades he shaped nearly every product the company made — radios, record players, calculators, shavers, clocks.

In parallel, he designed furniture for Vitsoe. The 606 Universal Shelving System, created in 1960, is still in production.

His Ten Principles of Good Design, written in the late 1970s, became the most referenced framework in industrial design. Jony Ive cited Rams as his primary influence — the T 3 radio echoes in the iPod, the ET 66 calculator in iOS.