Ornes graduated from Art Center and was hired at Ford Motor Company in 1963. Throughout his early career he was rotated every six months moving from interior to exterior studios for various car lines. In 1968, he was promoted to design manager and put in charge of the Ford and Thunderbird studio, later working in the Mercury studio, and in 1972 moved to the advanced studio. In 1976, he was put in charge of the small car studio and in 1979 he was moved to the luxury vehicle studio. Ornes starts his oral history discussing his time at Art Center and his early work at Ford Motor Company working on 1966-1967 model vehicles. He talks about the high-pressure atmosphere at Ford during the 1960s as well as some of the personalities he worked with at the time. He speaks of his time in interiors focusing on the theory and practical design aspects of ergonomics, lighting, and creating a better environment for the driver. In 1966, he was sent to Germany and discusses working on the 20M Taunus and the different approach to design in Germany. He discusses his time as a senior designer, the “design by committee” approach at Ford at the time, and working on the 1969 Mustang. He talks about the Knudsen/Shinoda friction in the design department and the impact of federal regulations on the design process. Ornes talks about his time in the advanced studio, working on the Versailles, Mark V, and other vehicles. He also discusses the 1974 “October Massacre” when the design department laid off 30% of their workforce and he was demoted briefly. At the end of his oral history, he discusses the changing design focus at Ford as Jack Telnack began wielding more influence and Gene Bordinat increasingly focused on more “nostalgic” vehicles which were out of place at the time. The oral history ends rather briefly discussing his time in luxury vehicles.

Collection contains 2 cassettes, 2 WAV files, 2 MP3 files, 1 diskette, 2 loose transcripts, 1 bound transcript, and 1 PDF transcript. Uploaded July 27, 2021 and March 24, 2026.