"Full of information for the future." That was Ettore Sottsass's verdict on Shire's teapots, precarious pastel assemblages of cones, cubes and quarter-spheres, and it led straight to Milan and to Memphis, the collective Sottsass convened in 1980 to puncture modernism's solemnity. Memphis traded sobriety for lurid laminates, lopsided silhouettes and furniture as provocation. Shire was one of only two Americans among the founders, alongside Michael Graves, and the one who contributed to every collection. His Bel Air chair, a shark-fin backrest bolstered by a painted sphere, became the movement's emblem, joined by the Brazil table and the Hollywood coffee table

Commissions multiplied. He served on the design team for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, work MOCA exhibited the following year. Public sculpture rose across California, and his pieces entered the Metropolitan Museum of Art, SFMOMA, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Stedelijk. In 2017 MOCA returned to him with Peter Shire, Working-Class Elegance, a title that names his central paradox with precision. 

Under all the confetti there's a spine of pure conviction: the belief that dish soap and doorknobs deserve a little razzle, and that good taste only wakes up when someone tickles its feet. Shire has bent steel into chairs and turned rooms inside out, but he always wanders back to the cup. We've long carried his mugs, slab-built and hand-painted, each one a small firework you can handle before breakfast.

For anyone who doesn't know your name, how would you explain what it is you do?

I've been traveling on airplanes for the last 40 years. There was a time when people were not preoccupied with their devices and actually talked to each other. I met many people who had no idea of any aspect of what I do, and I found very quickly that the best answer was that I worked in ceramic and metal, and sometimes wood. Oddly enough, this completely satisfied them.

You've had a long career across so many mediums. What would you point to as the work that defines you?

At this point there have been many high points, many defining works. Perhaps the most emblematic is having been a founding member of the Italian design group Memphis. The eponymous name has become synonymous with a complete style and a historic design moment in the late 20th century.

You were one of the few Americans in that Milan circle. What was your role in Memphis?

Michael Graves and I were the only two founding Americans. My natural inclinations ran in tandem with what was going on, and I did projects every year for the eight years the group was together.

Which milestones in your creative life have meant the most to you, and why?

There are certain milestones that people understand, like Memphis, doing the athletes' disco for the 1984 Olympics, and artworks in many museum collections. These are things that society values, and I don't dismiss them. Yet the thing that most impresses me is that not only have I managed to stay married for 49 years, but during that time my wife and I have worked together, supported our family, and continue to like each other. On more than occasional moments, being in love. And at other moments, being the sort of thing that's grist for every comedian's routine.

What does your house look like? What's on the walls, on your bedside table?

Our house is a post-and-beam, mid-century modern house that my parents built, finished in 1950. Being a modernist structure, there is very little room for sentimentality, except for a bunch of absurd furniture scattered around the floor. There are no walls, all windows. On the bedside table: books.

What does a perfect day in Echo Park look like for you? I picture you in a swan boat on the lake.

I think of many years and many memorable moments. Like when I fell into Echo Park Lake when I was four or so. When I fell in, I thought I'd really had it. But the lake was so shallow I could feel my toes touch the bottom, and I knew I was OK. I was so embarrassed I hid from my babysitter in the bushes.

This conversation is the first in what we hope will be a long series of exchanges with artists about color: how they find it, live with it, and can't get enough of it. Naturally, we began with a man who dreams in magenta, because there was no better place to start. Tomorrow, who knows? 

Most photos in this feature were excavated from Peter Shire's magnificently unruly archive. The opening portrait and the exterior of Peter's home, however, were taken by Tim Hirschmann for Architectural Digest.