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My girlfriend is moving into my apartment in June, and among the myriad things I’m excited about is the opportunity to buy a new vacuum. My current roommate’s vacuum is basically a motorized drinking straw that requires 15 passes over the same piece of string before picking it up and dropping it on the floor again. While we probably can’t afford a Dyson, I marvel at the man who just thinks things should work properly.
1. He conquered Japan
Japan’s market for hi-tech gadgets is, to say the least, saturated. But the constant innovation means the Japanese are less attached to their brands, which allowed Dyson to break into the market in the early 90s when no one in the UK was interested in his bagless vacuum design. Dyson snagged an International Design Fair prize with his G-Force model, and the Japanese began snatching them up at $2,000 a piece.
2. He’s got an awesome house to clean with that fancy vacuum
Sometimes, two houses aren’t enough. So in 2003, Dyson bought his third home, Dodington Park, a country estate in Gloucestershire, England. The estate sits on 300 acres of land, which feature an orangery, several gardens, two lakes, a mile-long “carriage drive,” and the source of the River Fromme.
The house itself, not to be overshadowed by the land around it, has 35,000 square feet of space, 15 bedrooms, 40 bathrooms and 10 reception rooms (a morning room, an ante room, a library and a music room just to name a few). And that’s just the main house; there are also staff quarters, two lodges, a Dower house, a farmhouse and four cottages (which bring the bedroom total to 51). If Dyson wants to admire the view of the property from any of the buildings, he can choose from 150 windows. If he just wants to sit back and relax, he’s got 24 fireplaces to settle down next to.
3. A battle with disease turned him into a philanthropist
Dyson contracted viral meningitis when he was 45, but didn’t realize it until his wife insisted his doctor test for it. After learning how hard the symptoms are to diagnose, Dyson set out to raise awareness of the disease and its symptoms. In 2000, he raised £1.5 million for the Meningitis Research Foundation by auctioning off two of his company’s executives for a sponsored leg wax, playing a charity football match against Malmesbury’s Victoria Football Club (the Dyson team won 5-1), holding Dyson Quiz Nights at 20 different pubs and donating the proceeds from the sales of 40,000 limited-edition purple and magenta vacuums.
4. It’s simply a cool vacuum
People usually don’t throw the word “revolutionary” around when talking about vacuum cleaners, but Dyson’s design is considered just that. The bag-less, filter-less design doesn’t clog or lose suction. It’s a nice piece of eye candy, too, and is included in the collections of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the London Science Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Cologne, the Zurich Design Museum, the Design Museum in Lisbon and the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney
5. Frustration was the mother of his invention
When Dyson was six-years-old, his father grew ill, forcing the boy to help his mother around the house. Vacuuming was his least favorite chore because of the “terrible smell of stale dog and dust” and poor suction on the vacuum. Three decades later, still frustrated by his vacuum cleaner at home, he was visited a sawmill and saw workers cleaning up sawdust with a big cone that used a spinning column of air for suction. He spent the next three years in his workshop developing his dual-cyclone vacuum.
6. He’s an icon of clean
Three years ago, the Dyson became the most popular vacuum cleaners in America—one in five of all floor cleaners bought carried his name. His vacuums have made cameos on Friends and Ellen DeGeneres’ daytime talk show, been given away in goodie bags at both the Emmys and the Oscars, and used to accessorize models at Fashion Week. The man is a real life Mr. Clean, but he’s still ambitious. He told Salon.com that he wants to become a verb, in the same way Google has. If you want to help the guy out, Google a vacuum store near you and Dyson your dirty floors.
7. That’s Sir James Dyson to you
Dyson was honored as a Knight Bachelor in 2006, a move that drew some criticism from union leaders angered by the fact that, just four years earlier, Dyson moved his vacuum production plant from England to Malaysia. Despite the controversy, Dyson can rest easy knowing that he has a fan in the Queen. In his autobiography he says, “I was bowing in front of Her Majesty to receive this great big medal around my neck when she said, ‘And what do you do exactly, Mr. Dyson?’ I told her that I was the manufacturer of the Dyson vacuum cleaner. ‘Oh, really?’ she said. ‘We’ve got dozens of them about the palace.’” A ringing endorsement if there ever was one.
8. He wants you to learn from his mistakes (and yours)
Dyson says it took him four and a half years and 5,127 prototypes to refine the design of his vacuum. There’s a life lesson in determination there, but more important is the knowledge that the road to success is sometimes paved with 5,000+ failures. Dyson embraces the lessons people can learn from mistakes and has said that the “the freedom to fail” is lacking in public education. So in 2006 (a busy year for him), he announced his plan to build the Dyson School of Design Innovation. The goal of the school is to encourage teenagers to explore careers in engineering and design. Twenty-five hundred students will receive a free education with a heavy focus on hands-on projects and close relationships with mentors. The school, funded by the James Dyson Foundation and the British government, will also have weeklong residencies for younger children with interests in engineering.
Dyson’s desire to educate also takes shape at his company, where every new employee, right up to the highest executives, tries their hand a building a vacuum on their first day.
9. His wife and kids aren’t resting on his laurels
Mrs. Deirdre Dyson has her own rug design business, and a few of her rugs have shown up in the Big Brother house. The Dysons’ daughter, Emily, used to work as a designer for Paul Smith. Like her father, she turned her frustration at a lack of appealing products into a business. She now owns Couverture, a boutique in London. Their son Jacob also took up the family trade and has a career in lighting design. The other Dyson son, Sam, is obviously the black sheep of the designing family; he plays guitar in a band called Wax On Wax Off.
10. He’s pretty nifty with other things, too
After he turned the world of household appliances on its head, Dyson started tinkering with other things and grabbed headlines at the 2002 Chelsea Flower Show with the “Wrong Garden.” Dyson built the water sculpture, which features four glass ramps positioned in a square, with the water seemingly flowing uphill and pouring off the top, after finding inspiration in an M.C. Escher drawing. Like Escher’s work, it’s a clever optical illusion; water is pumped in at the bottom of the glass structures and comes out of an opening at the top. At the opening, some of the water falls back down the surface of the ramp, while the rest falls over the edge like a waterfall. Compressed air pumped in along with the water causes bubbles to travel up the ramp towards the opening, creating the illusion of the water’s upward movement.
His latest project is the Dyson Airblade, a super-efficient and enviro-friendly hand dryer. The dryer produces an air stream that flows out of a slit no thicker than an eyelash at 400 mph. In tests, the Airblade dried hands completely in just ten seconds and beat the energy efficiency of conventional dryers by 83%. Insert your own “this blows as hard as the vacuum sucks” joke here.
Matt Soniak is a mental_floss intern. You can read more about Matt on his own blog, Bat Country. He may have to venture into acting, if only to get his hands on one of those pretty yellow vacuums they give to Oscar nominees.
Comments (27)
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I’ve used one of the Dyson “Air Blade” hand dryers – fantantic
posted by partiallyDeflected on 4-7-2008 at 7:34 pm
I’ve dreamed of working for this man for ever! He’s amazingly innovative without seeming cocky about it. I love when people look at an existing product, realize there is a problem with it, and actually try to make it better. Kudos to Dyson!
posted by Amanda on 4-7-2008 at 7:38 pm
Dyson vacuums are AWESOME. If I had $600 lying around, I’d buy one. As it is, I keep eying my boyfriend’s Dyson, threatening to kidnap it and take it back to my house.
posted by nutmeag on 4-7-2008 at 9:42 pm
Yeah, I second that Dyson vacuums are awesome. I am not a big homebody nor a fan of cleaning, but it’s my dream to someday own one. Brilliant machine.
posted by Susanna on 4-7-2008 at 11:23 pm
I’ve got to admit that Dyson vacuums are fantastic.
I’ve had another brand vacuum cleaner for a long time, which finally died and instead of buying a cheap replacement (which seems to be the norm these days) I opted for one of his.
I’m really glad I did.
posted by Mark Lancaster on 4-8-2008 at 3:56 am
Having used a Dyson at work on a basis, I can say that, although looking cool, are not as good as people seem to think. Don’t believe the hype!!! The one I used was only fair in performance, needing a few passes to pick up average crumbs and dirt, and did indeed ‘lose suction’. Meh…
posted by Crispin on 4-8-2008 at 4:55 am
The only place I’ve seen the hand dryers is over here in Europe, but really, they’re freaking amazing. Plus you get to watch the neat skin ripple effect.
posted by Sarah on 4-8-2008 at 7:50 am
Having owned carpet in the past, I can say nothing compares to the cleanliness of a $10 mop on a hardwood or tile floor.
posted by Florida on 4-8-2008 at 8:32 am
i’ve never used the vacuum, but they had the air blades in the bathroooms the last time i visited the space center at the museum of science and industry (chicago.) i was so fascinated that i made my boyfriend go take a leak just so he could experience the awesomeness as well. he made fun of me at first…until he tried it!
posted by ashley on 4-8-2008 at 8:37 am
I’m a fan, but I have a hard time believing that “5,000+” failures number. Even if he tinkered and came up with a new design that “failed” every single day, it would still take over 13.5 years to get to 5,000. (And I’d argue that in order for a new design to be realistically considered another “failure”, it’d have to be significantly modified from the previous model, and not something miniscule like ‘well, what if we move this screw 1/8 of a centimeter to the left?’.)
posted by Ed on 4-8-2008 at 8:50 am
air blades = greatest thing ever
posted by Bill on 4-8-2008 at 9:07 am
I too experienced the Air Blades at Chicago’s Museum of Science & Industry. One person used the loo, and the rest of us had to as well, just to experience the hand drier. I loved watching the skin ripple effect! Made me feel like i was 5 years old again.
posted by Gina on 4-8-2008 at 9:22 am
I will take my 8lb Oreck ANY day over that Dyson monster. I can give my long hair cat a cut in the living room (fur everywhere since I have to follow him around in circles) and my Oreck will pick it all up in a flash. I haven’t used a Dyson, but I HATE heavy vacuum cleaners and I’ve heard that so many people hate their Dysons after a month because their so damn heavy.
posted by Jamie on 4-8-2008 at 9:56 am
Although I often made fun of the commercials, I bought a Dyson two years ago when I moved. It’s a really good vacuum and I probably won’t buy another brand ever.
As for the Airblade, they’re in the bathrooms at Gatwick airport. My husband and I went to the bathroom at the same time and when I came out grinning from ear to ear he knew I had found the best hand dryer in the world!! It dries so fast you’re out in like 5 seconds! They need to be the only hand dryer around.
posted by Tricia on 4-8-2008 at 10:14 am
Splurge for the Dyson. I’ve had one for about 5 years, and it’s absolutely the best vacuum cleaner ever.
I actually enjoy vacuuming now. And the excitement still hasn’t worn off, even though the Dyson is no longer new to me. I love seeing all the dirt and pet hair that I can suck out of my house.
The weight of the Dyson has never bothered me. I’m sure it’s more than 8 pounds, but not at all cumbersome. And the way all the attachments and hoses click into place is such a satisfying sound. You can just tell how well it’s made.
posted by bre on 4-8-2008 at 11:00 am
The Dyson vacuums are very pleasing to the eye, but I’ll take my Kirby over it any day. I just have a hard time spending that kind of money for so much plastic.
posted by Swifty on 4-8-2008 at 11:05 am
I too hope to one day own a Dyson…
Great post!
posted by keri on 4-8-2008 at 11:56 am
Dont know if it is true but I have heard that the air blade thing is a direct copy of what they have had in Japan for years. Then I read #1. Hmmmmm.
will admit the guy is doin something right tho.
posted by Rob on 4-8-2008 at 12:32 pm
I LOVE MY DYSON! My husband got me one for Christmas and it was the greatest gift! I’ve always loved vacuum cleaners and I have a hard time picking one out for myself. But I fell in love with the DC18 and it fascinates me every time i use it. It’s definitely worth the expense. As for being heavy, it’s NOT. I’m pregnant and it’s very easy to use when you can’t easily bend over or move certain ways. The hose comes out of the handle and it makes using attachments SO MUCH easier. Everyone should own one!
posted by stef on 4-8-2008 at 12:57 pm
One of the main reasons I come to mental_floss every day is I always learn something. Today I learned there is a lovely word I’d never heard…
orangery.
posted by Johnny Cat on 4-8-2008 at 1:03 pm
My dad would die happy if he could have a Dyson.
I personally hope he doesn’t get one because his Oreck is already way above me on Dad’s list of the things he loves. lol
posted by Melodye on 4-8-2008 at 1:10 pm
I LOVE my Dyson. It’s the most amazing and well designed vacuum that I have ever owned, and I’ve owned them all. I’ve had cheap ones that don’t work well and I’ve had the mega expensive ones with self-propelled motors that drag YOU around the house. None have been as good as this Dyson.
posted by TW on 4-8-2008 at 2:53 pm
I knew I had finally become A Real Adult when I saw the Dyson vacuum and experienced a brief, yet very intense surge of lust for it. I am not a big gadget-head but I really really really think my life will be better if I possess a Dyson. I borrowed one from a friend when we moved into our new home and it cleaned the carpets so well I didn’t want to put furniture on them. I wept when I had to give it back, and am currently thinking up ways to sabotage my current vacuum so I can justify getting a Dyson.
It could be a religion someday.
posted by Rachel on 4-8-2008 at 3:59 pm
I do housekeeping for a living (for the last 8 years), and have to say most clients have the Oreck and 3 have the Dyson…..I don’t care much for either one and have yet to find one I can honestly say I “LOVE”. Oreck has NO attachments so you gotta lug something else around for couches and under cushions, as well as for stairs and it does not even come close to reaching the edges of walls and furniture. The Dyson is heavy and tall so it cannot get under end tables and is a real pain for stairs.(It They have a hose that is long but they are so stiff that the vacuum comes off the ground when trying to reach stairs.) I also thing the attachments should not be on the sides of machines to be broken off or hit against walls or furniture. The Dyson is wider, but heavier and it also does NOT get against walls/furniture but does have an inconvenient attachment that comes off the top(pet version). I’d like the chance to get with a manufacturer and make a convenient and easy to use vacuum with attachemnts that are EASY to use. Housekeeping is hard enough and so is vacuuming that we should NOT have to fight with a vacuum that is difficult to use…and I REALLY DISLIKE bagless vacuums!
posted by Ann on 4-8-2008 at 7:55 pm
Gotta comment on this one. We have a number of pets and after going through approximately one vacuum per year (from cheapos through expensive name brands) we decided to spend the 700 dollars for a Dyson. This thing is AMAZING! I actually did the “use your old vacuum, then ours” test and after running the one we had I was still able to fill the Dyson TWELVE TIMES! Dyson became one of my heroes that day…WITH A VACUUM!
posted by puptentacle on 4-14-2008 at 1:10 pm
I have to say that I just bought a Dyson from Amazon (remanufactured) for much less than the new prices. The warranty is the same. I understand that the Dyson may not be all it’s cracked up to be – but at the price I paid it’s better than the one we had that broke down after never working well. I really wish that some vacuum would be invented that we could say was the read deal because of all the inventions we use – the vacuum cleaner is the one that has least worked well since being invented.
posted by RuthF on 5-1-2008 at 6:15 am
I like Dyson’s carpets.
posted by Nibbleton the 8th on 5-17-2009 at 8:20 am