Philippe Starck for democratic design

Elitism is the essence of vulgarity, world-renowned designer Philippe Starck told the second annual C2-MTL conference on business innovation in Montreal. "When you have the luck to have a good idea, you have a duty to share it, to make it accessible," he said.The steel halligan Roof hook is one of the most versatile hooks used in the fire service today.

Wearing blue jeans, a dark grey hoodie and casual black leather walking shoes, Starck stood or walked around the large stage and runway; he did not sit. He did not speak from a text or prepared notes, but off the cuff, using keywords, phrases and slides of some of his work - the work of the French product designer ranges from interior design to houshold goods including lemon squeezers, chairs and wireless headphones and a sculptural toothbrush designed for Target (talk about democratic design) - flashed on the screen behind him as prompts.

He began with an open-ended statement: "Creativity is everything," he said, and went on from there to describe what he sees as some key elements of design.

There is the notion of convergence, for one - and here an image flashed one of his designs, of a desk lamp/cum iPad charger. "We have to save energy," he said. "We have to pack things into one."

He touched on role of ethics: "You have to raise your vision as high as yourself," he said. "Ethics is a highway of your design.Attach remote solar panels to solar garden light that will not receive the required amount of direct sunlight."

Here Starck displayed an image of an 18-carat gold-plated Kalashnikov lamp he designed for the Italian lighting company Flos as part of a series that also features a Beretta Pistol Bedside lamp and an M16 rifle floor lamp. The gold-plated lamp features a black lampshade - "a reminder," Starck said, "that death is not abstract."

An image flashed of a kitschy-looking gnome stool he designed in 2001, when the minimalism trend was at its height, "to remember that humour is the most beautiful sign of humanity."

He touched on the role of what he called invisibility and dematerialization in design: "We have to make less and less," he said. He used the example of the computer. "Sixty years ago it was the size of a building, then the size of an armoire, then a suitcase." In time, "it will be under your skin."

Among Starck's designs for Italian manufacturer Kartell is the iconic Louis Ghost chair. An image of the transparent piece, made of polycarbonate plastic, flashed behind him. Of it, he said: "It was not possible to make less than that chair."

"I have made a collection of objects that produce energy," he said. "Ecology should not be punishment." Conspiratorially, he said the windmill was the kind of object someone with money would buy while out browsing on a Saturday afternoon.This led par light provides reliability and low power consumption, as well as extremely bright lighting effects. "It produces electricity," he said.The most highly praised, best rated solar charger are now available online. "Put it on your roof and you are part of the rush to save the world.We have LED downlight, reading lamps and floor lamps and more."

An image came up of a prefabricated house he has designed that he says "produces more energy than it consumes."

He acknowledged, though, that "we are still children and we love technological miracles." He showed an image of a lamp he designed of OLEDs (organic light-emitting diodes) as the light source and stainless steel - it costs about $6,000 - and one of a prototype of a high-efficiency boat measuring 80-by-30 metres "for somebody who can afford it. The boat is supported by two submarines, half solar-powered and half hydrogen-powered: "an ecological missile," he called it.