Famous app designer returns to Apple in much-needed win for Cupertino

Since Jony Ive left Apple in 2019, the company’s design team has had trouble keeping hold of key personnel. Ive’s successor, Evans Hankey, herself left in 2022, and the team has also lost Marc Newson, design overseer Jeff Williams, rising star Abidur Chowdhury, and a host of lesser-known names. So it’s refreshing to hear this week that a famous designer is arriving at Apple Park rather than leaving it.

Sebastiaan de With announced on his Twitter/X account that he has joined the design team at Apple. “So excited to work with the very best team in the world on my favorite products,” he writes. There’s no indication of what those favorite products might be, but we can assume he’ll be on the software side; on his website, he describes himself as a human interface designer. Perhaps he’ll work on Liquid Glass, although the Camera app is more likely.

De With is, in fact, returning to Apple, having previously worked on Apple’s early iCloud and Find My apps before leaving some 10 years ago to pursue projects of his own. He is mostly known for being the cofounder of the app developer Lux, which makes the pro camera app Halide, among others.

It’s important to note that Halide, let alone Lux itself, is not part of the deal. Lux’s other cofounder, Ben Sandofsky, responded to the news by posting a statement to Reddit, which includes the line “Halide is going nowhere. This has been my full-time job since 2019, and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”

As for de With, I can’t help wondering if Apple’s PR department will have a word about staying scrupulously on-message… or whether they already have. A glance at his online footprint certainly gives an impression of an Apple enthusiast (all of his iPhone reviews I looked at were overwhelmingly positive), but one who isn’t afraid to make the odd snarky comment about the Crush promo or Apple’s Lumon-esque “crazy culture of secrecy.” But I hope not, because he’s funnier than any other Apple employee I know.