Top 35 Dieter Rams Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Question everything generally thought to be obvious.”

— Dieter Rams

2. “Less, but better.”

— Dieter Rams

3. “Good design means as little design as possible.”

— Dieter Rams

4. “Good design is as little design as possible. Less, but better – because it concentrates on the essential aspects, and the products are not burdened with non-essentials. Back to purity, back to simplicity.”

— Dieter Rams

5. “Good design makes a product understandable.”

— Dieter Rams

6. “You cannot understand good design if you do not understand people; design is made for people.”

— Dieter Rams

7. “The design should make the product speak to you.”

— Dieter Rams

8. “One of the most significant design principles is to omit the unimportant in order to emphasize the important.”

— Dieter Rams

9. “Good design is thorough, down to the last detail.”

— Dieter Rams

10. “An honest design communicates solely the functions and values it offers. It does not attempt to manipulate buyers and users with promises it cannot keep.”

— Dieter Rams

11. “Good design is thorough down to the last detail – Nothing must be arbitrary or left to chance. Care and accuracy in the design process show respect towards the consumer.”

— Dieter Rams

12. “Good design is making something intelligible and memorable. Great design is making something memorable and meaningful.”

— Dieter Rams

13. “My goal is to omit everything superfluous so that the essential is shown to best possible advantage.”

— Dieter Rams

14. “People react positively when things are clear and understandable.”

— Dieter Rams

15. “Having small touches of colour makes it more colourful than having the whole thing in colour.”

— Dieter Rams

16. “A product is bought to be used. It has to satisfy certain criteria, not only functional, but also psychological and aesthetic. Good design emphasizes the usefulness of a product whilst disregarding anything that could possibly detract from it.”

— Dieter Rams

17. “Good design is long-lasting! It avoids being fashionable and therefore never appears antiquated...”

— Dieter Rams

18. “As designers, we have a great responsibility.”

— Dieter Rams

19. “Indifference towards people and the reality in which they live is actually the one and only cardinal sin in design.”

— Dieter Rams

20. “I hate everything that is driven by fashion.”

— Dieter Rams

21. “I don’t like computers. I still like to do my drawings by hand.”

— Dieter Rams

22. “Good design is innovative Gives a product utility Is aesthetic Makes a product easy to understand Is unobtrusive Is honest Is long-lived Is consistent down to the smallest detail Protects the environment Good design is as little design as possible.”

— Dieter Rams

23. “Nothing works without details. They are everything, the baseline of quality.”

— Dieter Rams

24. “Products have to be designed in a way that they are comprehensible.”

— Dieter Rams

25. “Things which are different in order simply to be different are seldom better, but that which is made to be better is almost always different.”

— Dieter Rams

26. “My heart belongs to the details. I actually always found them to be more important than the big picture. Nothing works without details. They are everything, the baseline of quality.”

— Dieter Rams

27. “We designers, we don’t work in a vacuum. We need business people. We are not the fine artists we are often confused with.”

— Dieter Rams

28. “Design should not dominate things, should not dominate people. It should help people. That’s its role.”

— Dieter Rams

29. “There is a lot of bad architecture. What we need more is to look at how our landscape should look in the next decades.”

— Dieter Rams

30. “I am not an early bird. I go to bed normally between midnight and 1 oclock, so it is understandable that I cannot be an early bird. I wake up around 9 oclock.”

— Dieter Rams

31. “I sit, I think, I make some drawings. As a designer, you cannot retire totally.”

— Dieter Rams

32. “As designers we have a great responsibility. I believe designers should eliminate the unnecessary. That means eliminating everything that is modish because this kind of thing is only short-lived.”

— Dieter Rams

33. “All too much of the man-made is ugly, inefficient, depressing chaos.”

— Dieter Rams

34. “Good design is innovative. Good design must be useful. Good design is aesthetic design. Good design makes a product understandable. Good design is honest. Good design is unobtrusive. Good design is long-lasting. Good design is consistent in every detail. Good design is environmentally friendly. And last but not least, good design is as little design as possible.”

— Dieter Rams

35. “The composition of these rooms represents the basic intention behind my design: simplicity, essentiality and openness.”

— Dieter Rams