I (Anthony) have lived in south-west London
for six years with my wife and kids. It's residential and peaceful but also quite close to the centre of town and there are great shops close by.
Richard and I live on the same street, on opposite sides. We were both looking for bigger houses. I saw his house first and went to visit it with my wife, but it was too big a project for us.
I told Rich about it and he loved it. In the meantime, another came on the market on the other side of the road, which we took.
So when we collect our milk
in the mornings, we can wave to each other. I (Richard) have spent a long time doing up my house. It was a real project.
It's now a cool, contemporary space. I've kept the original exterior of the house traditional, but behind the front door I've taken out every floor and wall and created a huge open space.
My favourite feature is at the back. I've got these huge glass six-metre-high sliding glass doors. The whole of the back of the house opens up, which is really useful in this hot British climate. I open it about twice a year. It's spectacular, though.
It's quite a place.
I'm a bit jealous actually. We've got toys everywhere these days and we spend most of our time in the basement family room. We hardly use the other rooms in our house.
Rich has a really stylish place but one of the staircases doesn't have any banisters, so it's a bit of a death trap.
I never had any intention of working with my brother. It just sort of happened.
Our grandfather and father
had a glass manufacturing business in Birmingham, making industrial glass components - for fridges, cars and hobs.
Both Richard and I
studied product design, but he has always been better at the business side of things, while my strength is the creative stuff.
My father asked me if I'd like to come and work with him, and I designed and made a glass chopping board. Rich had just finished a master's at Cambridge in design and manufacturing, and he started to sell the products. We showed them at a trade exhibition and they sold really well.
We realised we had a business
and things grew from there.
Our father didn't give us
any money but we were fortunate that he could let us work within his factory at the beginning. The step from being a design student to having a successful design business is usually much more difficult.
I've also been very lucky to have a brother who is so good at the business side of things. There's not a huge amount of support for people when they leave college and want to set up a manufacturing business. Even if you've got good ideas, it's difficult to get started.
We get on very well.
We play to each others' strengths. Anthony has a better artistic eye than I do and he manages the design team, then I run the business side of things. We leave each other to do our separate roles but we do have crossover.
I think we can be too honest sometimes, because we know each other so well. There are no airs and graces. We don't worry about what the other one thinks because blood is thicker than water. If we do have disagreements, we get over them very quickly.
We love each other
dearly but when we first started, we argued a lot more because we didn't really know which direction we were going in. These days, we each have clearly defined roles. We make all the big decisions together.
We're both inspired
by entrepreneurs, people like Paul Smith, Steve Jobs at Apple - guys who have great products and are good at selling them, too.
James Dyson is fantastic
- an industrial designer who's very good at sales and marketing. We really respect Richard Branson, too.
If we had to choose
between form or function, we'd choose function, every time.
We offer products
that improve the way people live. They're colourful products, but that's secondary. Form naturally follows function.
My favourite product
is the Chop2Pot, our folding chopping board. It was an immediate success. It highlighted the fact that good, honest, functional design is what consumers want and every product we've created since then is based around that principle.
I'm certainly not
a specialist chef. Our products are all designed for everyday use. We're constantly coming up with new ideas through our own experiences in the kitchen.
We'll be launching
some game-changing products later this year. We're branching out into the kitchen organisation area. We feel that the space around sinks is ugly and impractical so we've come up with some really exciting ideas to improve it.
We've recently opened a concession in Selfridges, London, and we've had shop-fits in Chile, the US and France.
The US is now our biggest market. In the future we're planning to explore other areas of the home and grow our business worldwide.
When I'm not working,
my ideal evening out would be to have a nice meal in town somewhere.
We share a holiday cottage
on the south coast, so I love to head down there, either with Anthony or independently. It's right on the water - the perfect place to de-urbanise.
Joseph Joseph products are available at Bloomingdale's Home and Lakeland stores in Mushrif Mall, Mirdif City Centre and Mall of the Emirates, or online at www.josephjoseph.com
