It's Official: Starck Only Designing Yacht For Jobs' Family

Last weekend, it was speculated that French designer Philippe Starck was not working on a product for Apple. It has now been officially confirmed that he is indeed working with the family of late CEO Steve Jobs on this new project — a yacht. And that “private project” is (drumroll, please) a yacht for Jobs’ family. A spokeswoman for Starck confirmed the news to The Wall Street Journal:

“It’s not a project with Apple. It’s a private project that began with Steve Jobs and that has been taken over by his wife.”

Starck caused quite the stir late last week when he told a French radio show that he was designing a “quite revolutionary” product with Apple. He has been lauded for his minimalist take while designing streetlights, hotel lobbies and even products for Target.

“We liked to talk about interesting things. We were working on a big project that will come out in eight months,” he said, adding that he’s going to see Jobs’ widow in California Monday. “It’ll be quite revolutionary, if not very revolutionary,” Mr. Starck said, adding that he couldn’t say more about it because of Apple’s “almost religious cult of secrecy.”

Speculation centered on Apple’s rumored iPanel television set that is believed to be announced sometime this year. Are you disappointed that Starck will not be designing the next, great Apple product? Or are Jonny Ive’s skills all Apple needs?

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