Born in 1944 in Rzeszów, he went to Krakow to study architecture at the Krakow University of Technology (1962–65), and then the Industrial Design at the Academy of Fine Arts (ASP). He graduated from ASP in 1971. In the 1970s, he was an assistant of professor Boh dan Lisowski at the Post Diploma Studies of Industrial Design at the CUT and a designer at the Institute of Metal Cutting (now the Institute of Advanced Manufacturing Technology). He carried out a designer’s practice of his own and became the member of the board of the Association of Polish Visual Artists (ZPAP) in Krakow. Since 1980 he has worked as an expert of the Ministry of Culture and Art in the field of industrial design.

Since the beginning of the 1980s Konaszewski lives in Switzerland where he has been leading the department of design and ergonomics of the global manufacturer of industrial machinery Sulzer-Ruti AG in Winterthur. In 1988-98 he was a co-owner of one of the major Swiss-German designer agencies Meyer Hayoz Design Engineering in Winterthur and Constanz. Since 1998 he has his own design company, JK DESIGN.

Janusz Konaszewski is an active member of the Polish indepen - dent and freedom-supporting organisations in Switzerland and he is an active member of the Board of the Polish Museum in Rapperswil. Since the 1990s he has been cooperating with Polish firms and is active as an expert for the industrial design promotion. He received his PhD at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, for the dissertation on the designing of means of production.

Since 2003 he has been an academic teacher: as a visiting professor of the ASP in Poznań, head of the Chair of Industrial Design in the School of Art and Design in Łódź, and a lecturer at the Faculty of Industrial Design of the ASP in Krakow.

Janusz Konaszewski is the author of 130 industrial designs which have been implemented in over 50 companies in Poland, Switzerland, Germany and the USA. He is a member of Swiss and Polish associations of the industrial designers.

He has received many prizes in the competitions in industrial design. He was awarded first prize in the competition for the recreationional equipment organized by the Industrial Design Institute in Warsaw, was twice awarded the Design of the Year prize in 1978 and 1979 in Krakow. He also received German and Swiss awards, such as: If Product Design Award 1989, 1993, 1996 in Hannover; Design Innovation 1989, Haus Industrieform, Essen, prize of the Art Museum “Neue Sammlung” in Munich; Design Preis Schweiz 1997 and 1999.

Industrial design belongs to the “architecture of an object”. The starting point of both is the spatial order and domination of the humanistic aspect over the technological one. Designing everyday objects, medical equipment, machines or installations meant for mass production I always bore in mind the ideas imbibed during the studies at the Faculty of Architecture which stressed the need for functionality and formal discipline. These principles and not the overtly artistical approach of the ASP let me design “timeless” products which gained approval of international bodies and have become the standard of European design. The main point I would like to convey to my students is the ability to implement their design ideas – that is practicing the art of effectiveness.

Janusz Konaszewski
Krakow, June 2010

photo by Barbara Bielak