At the end of the first year of the Royal College I was fed up with the school, it seemed to be too slow, too academic. I went to Milan as usual for the fair and then I made trips to studios taking a thin portfolio of work and looking for a job. I went and saw Ettore Sottsass, Andrea Branzi and George Sowden, just these three. Branzi’s was the last studio I visited. I was a big fan of his work for Memphis which seemed more rational than others. He was by far the kindest and the most interested and he said: ‘If you’re in Milan I will give you work’. Somehow his offer was a bit too early, perhaps I was even quite shocked by it. I wasn’t ready for that kind of proposal. But his offer was very encouraging, maybe it was enough to hear that someone might give me work. I had the offer of a year in Berlin which I took.
I think I was not the right ‘material’ to be a design studio employee. I could think well enough, and have plenty of ideas but carrying them out was not my strongest card. I could work well enough, but only on projects which enthused me.
My travels to Milan in this period were made on a very low budget, and I quickly discovered that a press pass would get me into the fair for free and even give me lunch and access to the fiera press telephones. I had an agreement with an English architectural magazine to write a brief report about what was new and interesting which made it more or less legitimate.