When my father, Alick Smithers, who has died at the age of 87, moved our family from London to Stoke-on-Trent in 1968 to take up a job promotion, he was fascinated and intrigued by what he described as "a very gritty industrial city". An industrial designer, he made the area his home for 40 years, working in senior design management roles for the UK's two biggest pottery manufacturers – Wedgwood and Royal Doulton.
He devoted his retirement to saving the relics of the industrial past of Stoke-on-Trent – and in particular the pot-bellied brick "bottle ovens", which had numbered more than 2,000 in their 19th-century heyday. As chairman of the Potteries Heritage Society and then secretary of the Potteries Preservation Trust, he worked tirelessly to restore the final 10 "at risk" structures. In 1999 he secured nearly £500,000 of grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund for this purpose.
Born in Edgware, north London, Alick shone at art at grammar school and won a place to study at the Royal College of Art, which he deferred while he did second world war service with the Royal Navy. After graduating from the RCA school of graphic design with a silver medal in 1951, Alick worked on the Festival of Britain South Bank exhibition. At the end of the war he married Betty – also an RCA graduate whom he had met at Willesden School of Art – and they went on to have four children.
Early family life was in West Hampstead, where our household was a riot of creativity and fun, and anything but ordinary. We never had a conventional Christmas tree – ours were chicken-wire pyramids stuffed with white tissue paper and lit from inside, or towers of painted cardboard boxes. Homemade Christmas cards featured our parents' distinctive – and often irreverent – sketches.
In 1956 Alick joined the staff of Wedgwood in London and set up its trailblazing exhibition and display department. Over the next 10 years, he led and designed the groundbreaking "Wedgwood Rooms" programme – collaborations with major retailers which after postwar austerity brought Wedgwood's ware to shoppers and set new standards for retail display. Promoted to group design co-ordinator, he presided over one of the most creative periods in Wedgwood's history.
In 1981 he joined the rival Royal Doulton Tableware as design manager, in charge of the group's retail display, exhibition, packaging and corporate design. Even at the end of a stellar career he was modest about his achievements, and after taking early retirement in 1987 he continued to be active in professional and vocational design education.
The Guardian was Alick's newspaper of choice for more than 50 years as it reflected his diverse interests and political views. He was featured in its pages in 2000 when, after agreeing to support the Liberal Democrats in a local election as a "placeholder" candidate, he found his name on the ballot paper when he went to vote. He came a respectable third.
Alick was a king of DIY and single-handedly renovated three family homes – and my own. He was "green" before the term was coined: cereal boxes were flattened and cut up to be used for endless lists, while he perfected the art of packing the dishwasher in the most efficient way. He was a founding subscriber to Which? and would never buy a household gadget without consulting it.
Our parents enjoyed later life in the Potteries village of Penkhull – where Alick is still remembered for his weekly "litter pick" – and moved to Suffolk six years ago where they relished the music, arts and proximity to their grandchildren.
Betty died in 2008. Alick is survived by my three brothers, Christopher, Andrew and Matthew, and myself; and five grandchildren.