Brands should continually evolve their products instead of prioritising new launches, according to Magnus Wästberg, founder and CEO of Swedish lighting brand Wästberg.
Speaking to Dezeen at Stockholm Furniture Fair, Wästberg said it can often make more sense to reengineer an existing design than to develop a new one.
"Just doing new things is not the solution," he said.
"Sometimes we already did the best we could with a product, so there is no use trying to do something new. And just because we did the best we could with a product, it doesn't mean that that product cannot get better."
Wästberg's stand at Stockholm Furniture Fair spotlighted new versions of existing products
Wästberg's stand at Stockholm Furniture Fair championed this approach, with two of its three presentation areas dedicated to new versions of products from previous years. One featured the Raw collection, a series of bestselling Wästberg lights recreated in unfinished aluminium, making them more eco-friendly to produce and easier to recycle.
Another presented the Industrial Facility-designed w162 Dalston, a pendant lamp first launched in 2016, now updated with the latest LED technology.
The Raw collection is a range of existing products, including the w227 Winkel task light, all reworked in raw aluminium
Wästberg said he believes product development is as much about looking back as it is about moving forward.
"We spend a lot of time improving and further developing our prod...