Andrew Jackson is senior lecturer in design at the University for the Creative Arts. He has a background in commercial design, running a design studio for ten years before gaining an MA in Design History from Middlesex University. His research interests are centred on theories of consumption, particularly in relation to amateur design and craft practice. Most recently, he was a contributor to the special issue of the Journal of Design History devoted to do-it-yourself, and his contribution to Maria Buszek’s Extra/Ordinary: Craft Culture and Contemporary Art will be published in the USA in 2008.