My new memoir is available Now.
You can purchase it now from bookshop.org or At amazon.co.uk
TOYMAKER
My Journey from War to Wonder
Tom Karen From Blink Publishing, an imprint of Bonnier Books UK
12th November 2020
Hardback | 9781788700863 | £20
“Tom Karen, the greatest designer you've never heard of” Top Gear Magazine
In this incredible memoir, inventor and designer Tom Karen OBE recounts his colourful and creative life through the inventions and objects that have come to define it. He also looks to a future with floating cities, smarter transport and a greatly reduced need for travel.
This is a story about life, imagination, being in the present and looking to the future. A story about painting, drawing, chopping and changing; about thinking, discussing, arguing and listening. This is a tale of a century of creativity and how 'things' come to define who we are and help us look ahead to where we’re going.
Tom Karen has had an illustrious career, though many would argue deserves far greater recognition of his contribution to British design in the last century. A designer for the Aircraft industry, Ford motorcars, whitegoods leaders Hotpoint and Phillips he later became Chief Designer and MD at Ogle Design where his client list included Airbus, Renault, Raleigh, Electrolux, BR, BAe, London Transport, Kiddicraft and Reliant. He conceived smarter designs for everything from trucks to toys, including a double-decker bus and a 45ft aircraft fuselage.
Tom created the Bond Bug, a two-seat, three wheeled automobile loved by many and currently celebrating its 50th anniversary year. A lover of children, games and toys he also invented the famous Marble Run game and the iconic Raleigh Chopper bike. Visit his home and you will see papier-mache birds, a life-sized cardboard tiger, model cars; his work bench is a vibrant collage of creativity, from hand-drawn maps and postcards to newly devised toys for his beloved grandchildren and their friends.
Described as the 'man that designed the 1970s' he's every one of his thousands of sketches contained in London's Victoria & Albert Museum. From his early life in the former Czechoslovakia, his journey fleeing Nazi Germany across continental Europe, and his formative years in the UK as an immigrant landing on these shores with little-to-no money, through to his ascent to the top of the design tree, and his later years as a creative polymath and design mentor.
In Toymaker Tom Karen presents some of the most cherished items that tell a story of not just an extraordinary life but show the importance of nurturing one's own imagination. Written with award-winning novelist and journalist Richard Askwith, Toymaker spans a century of art, wonder and incredible invention.
'This man designed the 1970s' Top Gear Magazine
'If you are over 30, it's likely that part of your soul is Tom Karen-shaped' Sam Jacob, Architects' Journal
Author Biography
Tom Karen was born in Vienna in 1926. His home, however, was in Brno, a prosperous industrial city, 120 miles from Prague in what was then Czechoslovakia.
His Czech great-grandfather owned a brick factory, to which his grandfather added a cement works, the source of their considerable wealth which allowed them a staff of 17 to care for the house and gardens.
HIs mother's father, Arthur von Ferraris, was a very successful Viennese portrait painter and sitters included Kaiser Franz Joseph, Wilhelm II, Roosevelt and Rockefeller. For many years Tom’s father ran the business while his mother ran the home but also established herself as a keen pilot, flying competitively and owning her own aeroplane.
Following the rise of Nazi Germany, his family had to flee their home country and all their wealth, settling in the UK via Belgium, France and Spain. A creative at heart, Tom trained in product design at Central St Martins and survived on very little. He went on to work at Ford and Hotpoint before taking over Ogle Design, when its founder, David Ogle was killed in a car accident. It was at Ogle where Tom reached the top of the design game. Tom Karen is responsible for some of our most cherished inventions such as the Raleigh Chopper bike, the Marble Run, the Scimitar GTE (featured in The Crown series 2) and the Bond Bug, amongst many other cult transport vehicles, toys and games loved by kids the world over.
When he retired after nearly four decades, he was able to indulge in art and craft activities, run workshops for children and make toys for his grandchild. Tom has given many talks on design, has his work featured in The RA Summer Exhibition and tutored at the Royal College of Art. He has honorary degrees from Loughborough and Hertfordshire Universities. Although retired, he still sees opportunities for improving many designs. Tom lives and designs in Cambridge. He has four children and seven grandchildren.