Sometimes you just stumble into things. In a non-Star Wars: The Force Awakens profile on Apple designer Jony Ive, The New Yorker got some flickering tidbits about the new lightsaber that made Star Wars fans explode: a boozy dinner party was involved. Apparently over drinks Ive suggested to J.J. Abrams that the lightsaber would benefit from a design that would make it "more analog and primitive."
"I thought it would be interesting if it were less precise, and just a little bit more spitty... Somehow more ominous," Ive said. Obviously, analog and primitive is not the Apple design. Perhaps it was the booze talking, or perhaps it was a way to keep Apple at the front of the sterile, pristine technology carriage.
Ive did say that he did not suggest the two extra beams at the hilt of the saber, which made it look like a cross being held upside down.
But maybe Ive doesn't remember going that far. Abrams tells the New Yorker that he had "very specific" suggestions. (Just how boozy was this dinner party?)
Ive was part of a design team that worked on the iPhone and the iPad. He needs just a little bit more grit in his life. And we agree. Grit is good. In case you forgot (there's been a few boozy Holiday dinner parties between the trailer debut and now) Stephen Colbert declares that this lightsaber announces that "amateur hour is over." Now, that is what Apple does.
[via The New Yorker]
[via Time]
