Ron Arad's I.P.C.O (Inverted Pinhole Camera Obscura), 2001

Guest post by Victoria Kirk Owal

To make it as a designer in London in the '80s, you had to pretend you knew what you were doing when you really didn't. This was the central message from Thursday's panel discussion at the Barbican Center in London between Ron Arad, Katharine Hamnett and Rolf Fehlbaum, moderated by Deyan Sudjic of London's Design Museum. It accompanies Restless, Arad's first major survey in the UK, showing through May 16.

The conversation focused on the designers' career paths rather than the shift from readymade to industrial production, the suggested topic. The designers recalled their individual journeys to creative and professional success in a time when London's design scene was diffuse and less sophisticated than it is today. Fehlbaum contributed his perspective on the growth of their respective design talents and the expansion of London's pool of designers.

Several memorable themes emerged:

The role of constraints in creativity Ron and Katharine both recalled a strong desire to liberate themselves from norms, practice design without marketing constraints, and answer their own briefs. The real constraints lay in the capabilities of mass production and, in Katharine's case, the need to stay commercially viable to pay the bills without compromising creative vision. Ron was working within the creative and technical constraints that he set for himself, which gave him unprecedented autonomy and room to experiment.The rise of the designer/producer The combination of design skill and the industrial power to produce their own work rendered both designers unstoppable. In the fashion world, Katharine produced bold designs with iconic, politically charged slogans. Ron exploded on the tiny design scene with outlandish ideas, experimental forms and shocking materials. Making the leap from self-produced pieces to industrially manufactured objects was a step change in the type of work he could create as well as the scale and speed at which he could produce it. The entire panel argued, however, that craftsmanship and the skills to make things by hand is the foundation on which to build a successful design practice. Technology is the enabler, not the answer.

Politics and sustainability No conversation about 1980's London would be complete without acknowledging the political and economic tension of the Thatcher years. Katharine made history when she met the Prime Minister wearing a self-made t-shirt that read, "58% DON'T WANT PERSHING," a reference to public opinion polls revealing that the majority of Britons opposed the basing of Pershing missiles in the country.

Sustainability emerged as the current hot topic in both politics and design, requiring designers to consider their choice of materials and production processes more carefully than they did in the when they started. More and more, consumers demand green products and designers have a responsibility deliver, both for their end-users and for the environment.

An audience member asked what Ron and Katharine would do differently, if they had the chance to do it all over again. There wasn't a hint of regret in their responses. Katherine mentioned briefly that she might have taken more vacations with her kids. But as for work, she followed her own path and is happy that she hasn't gotten entirely bored of clothes yet. Ron said he never had a plan to begin with. "It's not a career," he said. "It's just what you do and for as long as they let you do it, carry on!" With that, the evening ended with a resounding call to dig deep and make it happen.

More shots of the show below.