Born in Yamanashi Prefecture in 1956, Naoto Fukasawa graduated from Tama Art University in 1980. After having acted as the head of the American company IDEO's Tokyo office, he established Naoto Fukasawa Design in 2003.

Representative works include MUJI'S CD player (part of the permanent collection, MoMA New York), the mobile phones Infobar and Neon, and the ±0 brand of household electrical appliances and sundries. In recent years, he has released a host of new works with Italian companies B&B Italia, Driade, Magis, Artemide, Danese and Boffi, as well as in Germany and Northern Europe, and they have garnered a great deal of attention.

He has won over 50 awards, including the American IDEA Gold Award, the German if Gold Award, the British D&AD Gold Award, the Mainichi Design Award and the Fifth Oribe Award.

He is a professor at Musashino Art University and a visiting lecturer at Tama Art University. He has authored such books as An Outline of Design (TOTO) and co-authored others such as The Ecological Approach to Design (Tokyo Shoseki).