Home decorating, interior design ideas, garden design - Homes and Gardens

The product designer Robin Levien is best known for his consistently innovative work in ceramics. His eminently affordable, understated style is a careful balance between form and function and sums up the highest ideals of the modern movement. Robin's success can be measured by how long his designs stay on the market. His award-winning Studio range of baths, basins and WCs for Ideal Standard has been available for over 20 years. Trend porcelain tableware, another Levien long-distance runner, has been selling here and abroad since 1983. Designed for Rosenthal Thomas, with simple shapes and a finely textured surface, it is one of the most successful modern tableware ranges ever. UK homeowners, with an average bathroom little larger than a double bed, love Levien's ground-breaking and much-copied Space range, also for Ideal Standard, a strong seller since 1996. The name says it all: Space's slimmed-down fittings feature triangular basins, cisterns and shower cabinets and a WC seat at a 45° angle. Other clients of Studio Levien, founded in 1999, include Villeroy & Boch (Germany) and Guzzini (Italy).

Attention to detail is a Levien hallmark. A garlic press he designed has a hinged metal grate that swings out for cleaning; a Parmesan grater, also easily cleaned, sits in its own porcelain serving dish. Elected by his peers, Robin Levien has been a Royal Designer for Industry (RDI) since 1995. He is on the Council of the Royal College of Art and since 2003 has been a non-executive design director of Ideal Standard (UK). His awards include the coveted international Red Dot, which he won in 2002 for Dibbern Fine Bone China, and a special commendation for The Prince Philip Designers Prize 2007.