Kimberly White/Getty Images for Vanity Fair
Apple Senior Vice President of Design Jonathan Ive.
These degrees are often awarded as a way of honouring a distinguished person's contributions to a particular field or to society in general. Other institutions have given honorary degrees to the likes of Jon Bon Jovi, Meryl Street, and Kermit the Frog.
Ive's specific degrees was a "Doctor of Science, honoris causa," according to the University of Oxford's website. He was one of nine people to receive an honorary degree from the prestigious university at the annual "Encaenia" ceremony on Wednesday.
The university listed Ive's previous accolades on its website when making the announcement, writing:
"Sir Jonathan Ive is Chief Design Officer of Apple Inc and designer of the iMac, PowerBook, iBook, iPod, iPhone, iPad, AppleWatch and MacBook. Six of his products appear in the permanent collections of New York's Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). In 2012, he received San Francisco MoMA's Lifetime Achievement Award and in 2013 he was awarded a gold Blue Peter Badge. His others accolades include an Inaugural Medal (1999) and Benjamin Franklin Medal (2004) of the Royal Society of Arts, the Design Museum London's first Designer of the Year award (2003), the Design and Art Direction (D&AD) President's Award and the Royal Academy of Engineering's President's Medal (both 2005), and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum's Product Design Award (2007). In 2012, D&AD named Sir Jonathan's team at Apple the Best Design Studio of the past 50 years. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering."
Here is a photo of Ive on the day:
University of Oxford
Sir Jonathan Ive (second on the left) and the other honorary degree recipients in their full academic dress.
On the day, Ive would have been invited to one of the Oxford University colleges to drink champagne and eat peaches and strawberries with the heads of other Oxford colleges and other the university dignitaries.
He would have then walked in procession to the Sheldonian Theatre on Broad Street, where he would have listened to a speech in Latin before receiving his honorary degree.
After picking up his degree, he and his guests would have been invited to a lunch at All Souls College and a garden party hosted by the university's Vice-Chancellor.