Designers & Books Blog

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856 blog entries

Quote of the Day: Diana Balmori & The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting, 1679–1701

By Diana Balmori February 19, 2015

A priceless observation is: “To be without method is deplorable, but to depend entirely on method is worse. The end of all method is to seem to have no method.”

Quote of the Day: Diana Balmori & Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition

By Diana Balmori March 3, 2014

Gardens are fundamental, Robert Pogue Harrison says, in giving order to our relation to nature, rather than bringing an order to nature.

Quote of the Day: Aldo Bakker & Haptic

By Aldo Bakker January 13, 2014

Kenya Hara gives so much attention to every single element: the photography, the paper, the graphic design. This book is so consistent and convincing that it pulls you into a completely different world.

Daily Features

AGI Open 2013, Report from London

By Zara Arshad October 17, 2013

This year’s AGI Open—easily graphic design’s most high-profile annual international conference—took place in London at the end of September. Organized by Tony Brook (Spin, Unit Editions), Angus Hyland (Pentagram, London), and Adrian Shaughnessy (Unit Editions), and the AGI UK board, sessions covered education, gender, clients with ideas, and the pluses and pitfalls of collaboration. More...

Quote of the Day: Gail Anderson & Make It Bigger

By Gail Anderson November 8, 2013

Design doesn’t get any more smarty-pants than Paula Scher.

Quote of the Day: Jonathan Adler & Alexander Girard

By Jonathan Adler August 20, 2013

Alexander Girard was a genius. Everything he did was beautiful and original and idiosyncratic. I love him. But I don’t love how bloody prolific he was—makes me feel like a total slacker.

Quote of the Day: David Adjaye & Translations from Drawing to Building and Other Essays

By David Adjaye November 10, 2014

Robin Evans had the ability to offer rare insights into architectural history and theory that appeal to my interest in the wider social, cultural, and political discourse.

Quote of the Day: Stanley Abercrombie & The Library

By Stanley Abercrombie April 16, 2014

In his preface the author asks “[W]ill this study serve merely as a memorial to a defunct building type?” The book’s final words answer that “… humankind has created an extraordinary variety of spaces in which to read, to think, to dream and to celebrate knowledge. As long as humankind continues to value these activities, it will continue to build places to house them. Whether they will involve books or will still be called libraries, only time will tell.” If indeed what we now know as the library disappears, this book will be the perfect reminder of all that we will have lost.

The Proust Questionnaire — Book Edition

Stanley Abercrombie Answers The Proust Questionnaire—Book Edition

By Stanley Abercrombie December 3, 2013

Architecture and interior design editor and author Stanley Abercrombie has been been “dipping into Finnegans Wake for half a century,” favors poetry, and admires Rizzoli’s series of Richard Meier monographs and their design by Massimo Vignelli. Stanley gives these and 10 more answers to The Proust Questionnaire—Book Edition. More...

Quote of the Day: Stanley Abercrombie & Problems of Design

By Stanley Abercrombie October 3, 2013

The design problems George Nelson observed in the adolescence of modern design are with us still, though rarely as wittily considered.

Announcements

Now is Better by Stefan Sagmeister

Now is Better

By Stefan Sagmeister
Publisher: Phaidon Press
Published: October 2023

Combining art, design, history, and quantitative analysis, transforms data sets into stunning artworks that underscore his positive view of human progress, inspiring us to think about the future with much-needed hope.

Order the book.

Design Emergency: Building a Better Future by Alice Rawsthorn and Paola Antonelli

Design Emergency: Building a Better Future

By Alice Rawsthorn and Paola Antonelli
Publisher: Phaidon Press
Published: May 2022

Rawsthorn and Antonelli tell the stories of the remarkable designers, architects, engineers, artists, scientists, and activists who are at the forefront of positive change worldwide. Focusing on four themes—Technology, Society, Communication, and Ecology—the authors present a unique portrait of how our great creative minds are developing new design solutions to the major challenges of our time, while helping us to benefit from advances in science and technology.

Order the book.

Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World’s Most Creative People by Debbie Millman

Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World's Most Creative People

By Debbie Millman
Publisher: Harper Design
Published: February 22, 2022

Debbie Millman—author, educator, brand consultant, and host of the widely successful and award-winning podcast “Design Matters”—showcases dozens of her most exciting interviews, bringing together insights and reflections from today’s leading creative minds from across diverse fields.

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Milton Glaser: POP by Steven Heller, Mirko Ilić, and Beth Kleber

Milton Glaser: POP

By Steven Heller, Mirko Ilić, and Beth Kleber
Publisher: The Monacelli Press
Published: March 2023

This collection of work from graphci design legend Milton Glaser’s Pop period features hundreds of examples of the designer’s work that have not been seen since their original publication, demonstrating the graphic revolution that transformed design and popular culture.

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Meet Me by the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall by Alexandra Lange

Meet Me by the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall

By Alexandra Lange
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Published: June 2022

Chronicles postwar architects’ and merchants’ invention of the shopping mall, revealing how the design of these marketplaces played an integral role in their cultural ascent. Publishers Weekly writes, “Contending that malls answer ‘the basic human need’ of bringing people together, influential design critic Lange advocates for retrofitting abandoned shopping centers into college campuses, senior housing, and ‘ethnocentric marketplaces’ catering to immigrant communities. Lucid and well researched, this is an insightful study of an overlooked and undervalued architectural form.”

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Die Fläche: Design and Lettering of the Vienna Secession, 1902–1911 (Facsimile Edition) by Diane V. Silverthorne, Dan Reynolds, and Megan Brandow-Faller

Die Fläche: Design and Lettering of the Vienna Secession, 1902–1911 (Facsimile Edition)

By Diane V. Silverthorne, Dan Reynolds, and Megan Brandow-Faller
Publisher: Letterform Archives Books
Published: October 2023

This facsimile edition of Die Fläche, recreates every page of the formative design periodical in full color and at original size, accompanied by essays that contextualize the work, highlighting contributions by pathbreaking women, innovative lettering artists, and key practitioners of the new “surface art,” including Rudolf von Larisch, Alfred Roller, and Wiener Werkstätte founders Koloman Moser and Josef Hoffmann.

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