Otto Williams

Otto Williams is an Industrial Designer whose broad creative thinking about how people work is the basis for his design practice. The scope of his work includes user research, product design, brand strategy and art direction.

Williams founded his California-based studio in 2008 where he has been designing furniture, consumer products and environments. During this time, he also served as Senior Lecturer at California College of the Arts leading an interdisciplinary design studio investigating the future of workplace design from interior architecture to furniture and interactive technology. Williams is currently working on creating immersive video collaboration rooms that integrate furniture, lighting and interactive video walls. These telepresence environments represent a next step in the evolution of collaborative spaces, which has been a focus of Williams’ design thinking.

In all of his work, Williams explores the relationship between workstyle and lifestyle, responding to new attitudes about work and taking inspiration from the broadest range of human experience and all that delights us.

Williams has a B.F.A. in Industrial Design from the Rhode Island School of Design. His designs have been published in Abitare, Azure, Contract, Fast Company, ID Magazine, Interior Design and Metropolis. He has received numerous accolades including several Best of NeoCon awards as well as Good Design awards from The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Design.

Otto Williams is from Richmond, Virginia and currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Otto Williams and Jess Sorel (working as WilliamsSorel) collaborated with Coalesse to design the Denizen Collection, the recipient of a Best of NeoCon Gold Award.