Some of Newson’s creations are almost impossibly imaginative, such as a concept jet, a nickel surfboard, a craft for short space flights and a prototype personal flying machine. Others are more down-to-earth and practical, including a toaster and kettle for Sunbeam and a range of bathroom taps for Caroma.

Newson said it was just as satisfying designing an everyday product as a luxury item.

“They’re all problems that need to be solved in different ways,” he said. “The so-called luxury industries ethically maybe get a bit of a bad rap but, in many ways, I enjoy working in those places because you’re able to design things of a very, very high quality.

“You know for a fact you’re not designing landfill. It’s very unlikely that people are going to throw these things away.”

Newson said whatever he designed had to be made more sustainably now.

“Sustainability is really more about designing intelligently,” he said. “You can’t avoid using certain materials, like plastics — albeit recycled — or natural materials like wood.

“Both have their distinct disadvantages. But what you can do is use those materials in a more responsible way and design products that people want to keep and that are repairable.”

While design was a global industry with a product like the iPhone crossing geographical and cultural boundaries, Newson said that growing up in Australia gave him a unique perspective on how to solve problems.

He had benefited from the country’s “can-do attitude, the backyard DIY mentality” and by not growing up with the historical baggage that other designers of his generation would have experienced in Italy and other parts of Europe.

“It was a blank slate in many ways which was liberating,” he said.

Newson was creative director at Qantas from 2005 to 2015, a role that included designing the interior cabins of the A380 fleet. So, what does he think about the airline’s decline?

“When I worked with Qantas ... we tried to introduce products that I felt were exciting for customers,” he said. “Which is not to say they’re not trying to do that now. But I think [where it is] is an indication of the state of the industry in general.”

While he professed to be “a little out of touch” with what had happened at Qantas, he had great faith in new chief executive Vanessa Hudson from working with her in the past. “She, then, was wonderfully capable,” he said.

Toyko’s toilet landmarks

Tourists interested in design are following what’s called the Tokyo Toilet Trail, originally commissioned by the Nippon Foundation in the lead-up to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, in the Shibuya ward.

Australian designer Marc Newson’s contribution is located beneath an overpass and between two roads.

Given the busy location, he wanted the public toilet to “trigger subconscious feelings of comfort, familiarity and peacefulness, and for it to become a useful and welcoming amenity for locals and tourists alike”.

Influenced by Japanese architecture and craft, it has stone walls and a shrine-like copper roof. The luminescent interior in pale blue-green features men’s, women’s and multifunctional areas.

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