Two of us started it up after chatting during our final year. We worked well together at college and both fancied being 'design consultants', (whatever that meant) so after graduating from Product Design we decided to become 'product designers'.

We shared some view on the world and enjoyed designing similar types of product so decided we'd plan it and do it after college...SO when we graduated we started by deciding to get some advice: taking up travel bursaries we'd won, and after getting a portfolio or work together between us we travelled to New York for a month. We stayed on friends floors, arranged meetings with designers in New York and Lecturers at colleges there, and just asked them all the same sort of question, something like: "We want to start up a design consultancy in Glasgow, please have a look at our work and tell us if you think anything's lacking in our portfolio, and please give us any other advice you can!"

So they all said you'll need proof that you can design products that sell. Some mentioned doing work for free, some mentioned making and selling our work to manage to get a real, live portfolio of products on the market. We went for the make-and-sell option. So we started by producing a product that was cheap to produce using scrap materials, begging a local factory (who we'd got in touch with through a college project) to make some tooling for free and amortise the cost into future sales (and they did it!!) and going to a heavily subsidised trade fair. All with the help of a Princes Trust loan (and very handy benefits which existed then, to help us live/pay rent while we were starting). We were very excited at getting our first few thousand pounds worth of orders although it never seemed to actually earn us a living. That took years! We then started to tour 'round retailers on our wish list. We visited Habitat and they said they'd not buy from us but offered us consultancy work. Our little dream was coming true...we kept doing a balance of both, showing at fairs and cold calling retailers or manufacturers on our wish list and the business just kept going. I think one of the most useful things was to decide what we wanted to do, who we wanted to work for or with, what sort of work we wanted to do etc. Then that plan could turn into a group of people to get in touch with.

Our first product wash a serving dish made from an old washing machine door. The glass form was beautiful and Will had seen one in his pal's house while they were fixing the machine. We worked on how to make the scratched up forms pristine (sort of) again, and finding out how to manage the practicalities of collecting cleaning, sandblasting etc without a factory to just do it all. That was a good first product because we were keen on recycling and it was a beautiful piece of scrap (that combination isn't that common) but yes, two types of creativity, -noticing the possibility (concept design I suppose) and then the creativity practically was then necessary to make it into a real product, so -finding the oddest ways to produce it using all sorts of people. The next products needed creativity in a more traditional design sense. They needed to be useful and good looking products which were cheap enough and efficient enough to produce. We used aluminium since it's got a high recycled percentage and had a very generous minded contact who owned an aluminium casting factory! I think you need to be creative when you don't have a lot... and creative if you keep strict limitations. They might not be inflicted on you, you might create them yourself by forming a clear brief.

There wasn't a point ever where we said 'this is going to work'. We always just felt that if we kept a check on money and carried on then we wouldn't get into too much trouble! We never paid ourselves more than we dared, and it was never really a wage! Will left the business in 2000 (possibly to do with that!) and I suppose that when he left I decided that I had to start paying myself a real wage - I suppose to test whether it would actually work. It's worked since then, but I do keep a careful reign on money and don't spend it if I can help it!

There was a lot of adapting when Will left,since we were great friends and it was scary to be solely responsible. ON the other hand... I was just taking his portion of the wages so as long as I could keep the money coming in at a similar rate, make decisions twice as fast (including design decisions) NO BOTHER! And that's what happened. We enjoyed working together but did used to discuss things for rather a long time, avoid doing things that we found difficult and wait for the other one to do them (chase payments, make sales calls etc). I still procrastinate about these things, but not much since I'm the only one who'll do them. I do have some other fantastic professionals who work for me on some of this, but I take on specific duties to do each week in order to make sure I'm getting my bits done. Sometimes I actually do them on time.

The Glasgow 1999 Festival of Architecture and Design was incredibly supportive, handy, and exciting for us. For probably a year up to it's launch were were included in a group of designers who were invited to propose or work on projects, listened to, brought together for meetings and also in order to socialise, share contacts and share experiences. It really helped produce interesting jobs for us, interesting press for us and interesting connections with other designers. We won the Peugeot Design Awards for one of our projects for Glasgow 1999, the Chasm chair, and it was also given Millennium status. We really did feel like we were being celebrated and were being given a chance to work on interesting projects.

Don't know. Actual jobs wise it changes from day to day, week to week. Last week I really enjoyed crouching in the barn and putting together a mock up while seeing hens nip into our field from next door. I felt like I was very lucky to be doing a fun thing in a very open and free environment. The week before I hated doing that mock up because I was worried I'd make some bad decisions and it was cold in the barn! In general I like the fact that I have freedom in my daily life to decide how each day goes. I also like the fact that I can challenge myself to work in a way which is in tune with my (quite basic) world view - of not exploiting the world in a destructive way, and no-one can stop me, except myself.

People, plants, animals, views (points of view, not nice view), discussions and materials or bits and bobs I come across. Mostly... all of them.

Developing interesting flat pack long lasting products which don't use up too much energy in production and look fantastic. Been trying for ages and I've not managed to get them manufactured well enough, so next... SIMPLER manufacturing. Also, I love ceramic and would like to bring out some new ceramic lighting. The products are delicate but live a long time if you care for them, it's not a process which uses up too much energy in my opinion, and can be beautiful. Designing some hospital waiting rooms with Timorous Beasties which we do the next stage of in the Autumn so I'm looking forward to that. Waiting rooms should be better.

I used to think I'd be a chauffeur, but I've been getting a bit car sick lately so I don't think so. Maybe a gardener.