DC07 Vacuum Cleaner

British industrial designer and inventor, James Dyson, is heralded for his highly functional and robust objects, which range from wheelbarrows to restroom hand dryers. Dyson rose to prominence for the innovative Dual Cyclone (DC) vacuum cleaner technology he invented in the early 1980s. Prior to Dyson’s innovation, vacuum cleaners used bags or filters that often became clogged, reducing suction. Frustrated by a clogged vacuum cleaner during his own home renovation in the late 1970s, and inspired by a cyclonic filter he had seen at a local sawmill, Dyson realized that by making a vacuum cleaner’s airstream spin rapidly, centrifugal force could extract dust and debris and eliminate the need for bags and filters. He set out to replicate the industrial cyclonic filter’s suction technology on a smaller scale for domestic use.
After much trial and error and thousands of prototypes, in 1986 he released his first vacuum cleaner, the G-Force, to the Japanese market. The success of that model gave Dyson the confidence to produce the model DC01 in the UK in 1993, using his own name for his fledgling brand. The DC101’s rapid success was due to the fact that it outperformed other cleaning machines. Despite minimal advertising and a high price—twice that of other vacuum cleaners—the DC01 became the bestselling vacuum cleaner in the UK within five years of its introduction. Dyson subsequently released a canister model and continued to improve upon the technology.
In 2002, Dyson’s technology made its American debut with the DC07 upright, one year after the model was introduced in England. The DC07 typifies Dyson’s design philosophy, with its solid engineering and functional integrity in a structure dominated by a constructivist aesthetic and bold color scheme—with working parts visible through its transparent polycarbonate dust bin. This high performance vacuum cleaner stood out both physically and functionally from anything else on the market and attracted a nontraditional consumer audience in the realm of domestic appliances: men. The DC07 also marked the first implementation of Dyson’s Root Cyclone technology, a system that achieved 45% more suction than the Dual Cyclone. This made the DC07 extremely popular with American consumers and, in turn, influenced other manufacturers to improve their technologies and alter the appearance of their machines.

DC07 Vacuum Cleaner; Designed by James Dyson (English, b. 1947); Manufactured by Dyson Ltd. (United Kingdom); England; molded abs plastic, polycarbonate, rubber, metal, electronic components; H x W x D: 117.5 x 33.7 x 35.6 cm (46 1/4 x 13 1/4 x 14 in.) ; Gift of Paul W. Thompson; 2009-35-1-a/e

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color.