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Dyson and Ive among The Drum's top 10 UK designers – you decide who will be number one

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By Sam Scott, former employee

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March 20, 2014 | 10 min read

The Drum's top 100 UK designers – the Designerati – have been ranked following over two thousand votes from readers of The Drum.

The stage is now set to determine whom of the top 10 will take the number one position and be named Designer of the Year at The Drum Design Awards in April.

Please vote for your number one UK designer below.

The top 10 includes exemplars from a range of design backgrounds and disciplines. Of the leading set, Gordon Young, editor of The Drum, said: "This is the cream of the UK's design crop. Each individual here is a pioneering presence in design and thoroughly deserves to be celebrated for their ongoing contribution to this dynamic industry".

The 100 design luminaries will appear in order of their rank in The Drum's inaugural Designerati, published on 30 April. The Designerati book will include profiles on each of the individuals’ careers, with insights into their perspectives on design and the biggest challenges they’ve faced.

The survey closes at midday on 1 April. Multiple votes from the same IP addresses will not be considered.

Es Devlin, stage designer

As a multi-award winning international stage designer, Es Devlin's distinctive creations have made their impact across TV, dance, opera, theatre and pop music.Most recently famed for the design of the London 2012 Olympic Games closing ceremony – a spectacle viewed by approximately 26.3m people – her creative talent is currently booked up until 2018. Devlin has worked as an art director for stadium pop musicians including Jay Z, Miley Cyrus, Rihanna, Pet Shop Boys, Take That and Kanye West – for whom she created the 2013 'Yeezus' tour stage design. The designer's awards to date include the TPi Stage Designer of the Year Award in 2012, 2011 and 2010, an Olivier Award for Best Costume Design in 2006, a TMA Award for best Stage Design in 1998, and a 1996 Linbury Prize for Stage Design.Recent works in theatre include ‘American Psycho’ and ‘Chimerica’ at the Almeida Theatre in London.

Lee Draycott, founder and creative partner, The One Off

Lee Draycott is founder and creative partner at The One Off leading the design teams in both its Midlands and London offices; leading by example with a mix of energy, insight and intuition, with the odd creative grenade.Draycott’s two decades of fashion communications and photography experience has seen him lead the design team re-inventing the face of Primark over the past four years. After studying Graphic Design at Loughborough Art College he began his career at Checkland Kindleysides in Leicestershire. Here he began to learn his craft and passion for sports and fashion brands working with Doc Martens on iconic graphics for their first global flagships; projects for Ray Ban and Harley Davidson followed. He worked on the Levi’s Icon Store projects in the 90s and the landmark Levi’s Flagship Store in San Francisco, creating a multi-sensory brand experience.Over the last 10 years Draycott has built his own studio and love of a ‘broad media’ approach adapting media formats to develop The One Off’s unusual inter-disciplinary collective studio of art directors, photographers, animators, graphic designers and architects.His impact on design can be seen every Saturday as more Primark stores are flooded with adoring consumers feeding on the highly polished collateral, with every detail from window graphics, ticketing, way finding and film, creating a world class, enviable retail experience.

Sir James Dyson, founder, Dyson

Industrial designer Sir James Dyson is perhaps best known for the invention of the Dual Cyclone bag-less vacuum cleaner. After failing to sell the product patent Dyson established his own manufacturing company in 1993, marketing and distributing the first iterations of the product himself.Other Dyson designs to have made waves through innovation include the Airblade hand dryer, launched in 2006, and most recently the Air Multiplier bladeless fan system. Dyson studied furniture and interior design at The Royal College of Art in London from 1966 to 1970, after which he applied himself to engineering.Aside from being appointed a CBE in the 1996 New Year Honours, Dyson's other notable accolades include the 1997 Prince Phillip Designers Prize, and an honorary Doctor of Engineering degree from the University of Bath.

Ben (Flynn) Eine, street artist

Eine's profile as a graphic designer was given an international boost when David Cameron presented one of his works to Barack Obama on his first official state visit. And yet Eine is arguably more famous for ‘Alphabet Street’ – the shutters and murals painted in his trademark colourful typography on London's Middlesex Street. The work was described by The Times as “a street now internationally recognised as a living piece of art with direct links to The White House.”Eine's typographic practice began over 25 years ago on the streets of his home town of London. The then graffiti 'tagger' now specialises in abstract and emotive street art, often involving oversized colourful letters. He has uniquely transformed streets around the world in cities including LA, San Francisco, Mexico City, Miami, Paris, and Tokyo.Eine's 82 metre-long statement ‘To Express Thoughts or Feelings Easily and Effectively’ is painted in The Lowry Museum in Manchester.

Dan Germain, group head of brand and creative, Innocent

In 15 years Dan Germain has helped take Innocent from scratch to a successful and massively loved brand. It’s a brand that is now known right across Europe and one that has been studied and copied around the world. A brand that Coca-Cola loved so much, they got involved.Germain’s work at Innocent has shown that natural, packaged goods can be as desirable as those at the ‘posher’ end of the scale. And the intelligent combination of great design and smart use of the written word has created a brand that has character, style, opinion and a real purpose.Germain runs Innocent's global design and creative teams, overseeing all design, copy and creative tasks, from ads to web, and books to packaging. He also works in the areas of culture, sustainability, innovation and ethics, maintaining the brand's most important values.

Tim Greenhalgh, chairman and chief creative officer, Fitch

Greenhalgh has developed an international reputation as one of the UK's most passionate advocates of design as a business tool.After launching his career at brand consultancy Fitch over twenty years ago, Greenhalgh subsequently joined the Conran Design Group for seven years as overall creative director before returning to Fitch in 1996.As chief creative officer Greenhalgh now steers Fitch's creative output globally. Tim's commitment to locating the drama within brands has meant, among other things, more 'play' space in Lego stores – just one example of his renowned ability to inject a sense of theatre into retail experiences.As well as overseeing the Global Creative Forum he has acted as project lead on a number of large-scale accounts including British Airways, Lego, Jaguar, TAG McLaren, Barclaycard US, Central Foods and Unilever.

Wayne and Gerardine Hemingway, founders, HemingwayDesign

Wayne and Gerardine Hemingway have led the way at multi-disciplinary design agency HemingwayDesign from its inception in 1981. HemingwayDesign delivers affordable and social design with a core philosophy of aiming to “improve things that matter in life”. After selling their first brand, Red or Dead in the 1990s, the Hemingway’s have concentrated on projects that benefit society. From large-scale regeneration projects to some of the largest affordable housing in the UK; low cost large-scale public festivals to sustainable uniforms for McDonalds and bottles for Coca-Cola. The Hemingway’s current projects include creating a new uniform for all of Transport for London’s 20,000 strong team, new homes and a masterplan for Warwick University, and a state of the art centre for the blind and partially sighted in Morecambe.

Maggie Hodgetts, head of graphic design, Waitrose

After graduating from Norwich School of Art, Hodgetts took a job at design agency Larkin, Stratton and May working on retail brands including Guinness, Monsoon and Harvey Nichols. In 1998 she became head of graphic design for Waitrose to help build the fledging marketing department. Supported by an in-house team and agencies, Hodgetts is now responsible for the design direction of Waitrose’s visual identity, own label packaging, customer communications and marketing. She has collected many industry medals including D&AD pencils, IPA Marketing Effectiveness awards, and an unrivalled 11 DBA Design Effectiveness awards, culminating in a gold and grand prix scoop for the essential Waitrose brand identity. In 2013 Hodgetts was voted on to the board of the DBA.

Sir Jonathan Ive, senior vice president of design, Apple

London-born Sir Jonathan Ive is one of the most lauded British designers alive today. During his twelve-year career at Apple he has been instrumental in crafting the look and feel of some of the brand's most innovative and iconic products; including the MacBook, iMac, iPod and iPad.Since 2005 Ive has been senior vice president of design at Apple, providing direction and leadership across product design and human interface software teams. Ive's work has been recognised by several design awards. In 2003 Ive was named The Design Museum's inaugural Designer of the Year and granted the title of Royal Designer for Industry by the Royal Society of Arts. In 2007 he was given The National Design Award for his work on the iPhone.The late chairman and CEO of Apple, Steve Jobs, famously said of Ive, "If I had a spiritual partner at Apple it would be Jony". Ive holds a Bachelor of Arts and an Honorary Doctorate from Newcastle Polytechnic.

Sir Paul Smith, fashion designer, Paul Smith

Sir Paul Smith is one of the UK's foremost fashion designers. He is renowned for a creative output that combines traditional and modern aesthetics. As a label, Paul Smith is famous for its clothing and accessories collections, and specialises in an inventive use of craftsmanship and cutting edge design to create beautifully fashioned, desirable, modern pieces.With an enthusiasm for eclectic cultural references and idiosyncratic combinations applied with understatement, Smith is an exemplar of truly contemporary design.

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