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GRO since 1999
GRO was founded in
1999 by Roland Bird, Graham Hinde and Roger Swales. The studio is situated in
Eindhoven, The Netherlands - Europe’s leading design, technology and innovation
hub. Prior to starting GRO design, the three partners were Senior Design
Consultants at Philips Design.
Having worked extensively in corporate design and as design consultants, they bring an understanding of both worlds to their work and collaborations.
In addition to GRO’s project work, the partners have also been involved in judging the prestigious IF and IDSA design awards, lecturing at design conferences, curating Dutch Design Week, external examiners for the Design Academy Eindhoven and ISD France.
We strive to improve user experiences by delivering beautifully crafted products with ‘personality and soul’ – fresh, distinctive solutions that make an emotional connection with people to give them a meaningful experience.
For us, personality is the outward expression of a product, its identity, it’s what makes it memorable and distinctive. The soul of a product is the values it is built on: authentic, honest and fit for purpose. Both need to be in harmony to deliver a meaningful user experience.
Small team thinking big
“We’ve consciously chosen to remain small – it keeps us agile and responsive to our customers’ needs. We’ve got a great combination of experienced seniors working alongside talented young designers in the same space, with a good mix of personalities, qualities and skills.”
Better together
We believe that sharing & building on each other’s ideas as a team leads to the best possible results. This collaborative culture extends to our relationships with our clients whose depth of knowledge and insights enrich our thinking at every step of the process.
“We start each project with a blank sheet of paper and an open mind. We encourage robust, challenging discussions as they lead to only the strongest ideas surviving. And we continually look further and deeper – sometimes the answer is just over the horizon, perhaps even beyond the original brief”
GRO wall
We bring the creative process alive, making it collaborative and dynamic.
We share thoughts and ideas amongst the team in regular reviews and pin up relevant sketches, notes and inspirational images. We cluster the strongest start points which over time form the themes and scope of our design exploration. We deliver a rich mix and scope of ideas and opportunities for our clients to choose from.
GRO projects
Since the beginning GRO has regularly undertaken internal exploratory projects in new and unfamiliar areas to challenge ourselves and refresh our thinking. These studies apply the same rigor and attention to detail as we would with every project we undertake; making the results as compelling as possible to promote our skills and to share our thinking with a wider audience.
