News: Jonathan Ive Knighted

Although we’re “away” for the next couple of days, we had to share this story—according to BBC News, Jonathan Ive, Apple’s head of design, has been knighted. What this means is that he’ll have “Sir” before his name, because now he’s officially a Knight Commander of the British Empire (KBE).

The man behind a number of hits from Apple, including the iMac, iPhone, iPad, and most notebooks since the PowerBook G4 was given the award due to his contributions and passion:

Raised in Chingford, Mr Ive began working for Apple in 1992 and since then has been the brains behind many of its products.

He described the honour as “absolutely thrilling” and said he was “both humbled and sincerely grateful”. Mr Ive added: “I am keenly aware that I benefit from a wonderful tradition in the UK of designing and making. “I discovered at an early age that all I’ve ever wanted to do is design.”

He got his start at Apple during some of the worst times:

One of the clients for the agency was Apple which was so impressed with the work he did on a prototype notebook that it offered him a full-time job. Mr Ive was apparently frustrated during his early years at Apple as the company was then suffering a decline. Everything changed, however, in 1996 when Apple bought Next and Steve Jobs returned to the company he helped found.

“What’s made him so outstandingly successful is the relationship he’s had with Steve Jobs and Apple,” said Deyan Sudjic, director of The Design Museum. “He’s been working there for 19 years and has built up the kind of relationship that’s very rare.”

Mr Jobs described Mr Ive as his “spiritual partner” in the recent biography of the Apple co-founder written by Walter Isaacson. However, it also said that Mr Ive was “hurt” by Mr Jobs taking credit for innovations that came from the design team.

Ive was honored in 2005 when he was made a Commander of the British Empire.