Forever relevant

Open your iPhone calculator and you’re looking at a version of the It’s a modern classic: held in the permanent collection at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The functional, clear and even beautiful design is so difficult to improve on that Apple’s designers were left simply paying homage. What irony, then, that our iPhones will barely last three years while Braun’s calculators are still going strong almost 40 years later. Apple’s designers borrowed Rams’ aesthetic, but not his ethic.