Magno is a product brand which is known for its flawless wooden radio. Magno was created in 2004 by Singgih Kartono. Magno logo beauty is in the letter ‘g’. He was interested in letter ‘g’ that has a really complicated and zig zag form. Most logos usually uses its first letter to be its logo, however he thought of it in different way. He took a letter from his brand that has a better and interesting form to make it more recognizable. When he first started the company, he was interested in metal weaving, however it was not success as he was expected. Then he got inspired from one of his friends while he was visiting his friend’s house, and he saw a magnifying glass that was made of wood. He started brainstorming around wood idea and what he can create out of the wood. His first initial was to make stationary series, such as stapler, scissor and scalpel.

In 2005, he won a Gold award and a Good design for his wooden stationery design. After that, he started to create another unique product that made out of wood which is a manual radio that we need to wheel up and down to find specific channel. However, he was struggling with the inside electronic part for 7 years that he had been contacting with different electronic company until he lost his patience and broke a radio just to get the inside just to get his wooden radio worked. Surprisingly, his wooden radio got selected and won a Gold award.

The reason behind his wooden design, he thinks that nature is the only thing that is the closest to human. Since wood is a part of nature, he believes that he could bring his design that are made out of wood make human feel a sense of closeness to the nature itself.

Singgih Kartono is now on a new project to create wooden backpack which is called “Nag-Nad-Nak”. He wants to create his own and local brand for students to use because students nowadays are zoned out with international brands, such as Adidas and Nike. Due to this issue, he wants to educate them to be proud of what they have and not upset about not having those trendy branded products.

One thing that I learnt from interviewing Singgih Kartono is answer that from the question that I said him of what he will see himself in the next 5 years. His answer is so simple and professional. He said that he made the right choice since he has come this far by himself. He also said in the next 5 years, he can himself lose and fail or big successful person, so he is not afraid to fail or lose because people make mistakes so they can grow from it. I found it really inspired.

References:

Magno logo, available at <https://pictures.woont.com/manufacturers/7/magno/magno-103616.XL.jpg&gt;.

Images by S. Thy (2016)

Interview with Singgih Kartono, 2016

Magno, n.d., available at < http://www.magno-design.com/&gt;