Weekly Wrap-Up & Preview: October 31

Architect Daniel Libeskind, one of our original book list contributors, was the keynote speaker Thursday, October 9, at the first-ever Dwell on Design New York, a “festival of modern design” organized by Dwell magazine October 9–11.

In partnership with Knoll, we’re offering you the chance to win three newly published books featuring the work of three designers who have collaborated with the noted design company. Through November 11, 11:59 PM (EST), enter to win a copy of Abbott Miller: Design and Content (Princeton Architectural Press); the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale catalogue, Fundamentals (Marsilio, distributed by Rizzoli) by Rem Koolhaas, the Biennale’s curator; and Lella and Massimo Vignelli: Two Lives, One Vision (RIT Press). Five winners will each receive a copy of all three books.

British architect-educator-author Ian Ritchie talks to U.S. architect-educator-author Witold Rybczynski about Ritchie’s career, including the making of his latest book, a two-volume opus; the favorite project he didn’t get to build; and why he writes poetry.

British architect Ian Ritchie lists 35 books that have inspired him in the course of a career that extends over 40 years. His celebrated work includes sharing the creation of the Louvre Pyramid and Sculpture Courts with I. M. Pei in Paris, the Leipzig International Exhibition Center Glass Hall in Germany, and The Spire in Dublin.

As part of last month’s London Design Festival, British product designer Jasper Morrison’s Shop—which sells a variety of products from around the world in “a modern interpretation of the classic hardware store”—featured an exhibition of Morrison’s photographs along with his reflections on the seemingly ordinary situations contained in them. Designers & Books caught up with Morrison to talk about the book, what he reads (at last year’s London Design Festival he turned the Shop into a Library of Design), and why and what he photographs.

We highlight five designers from Finland and Scandinavia this week. These are: architect Craig Dykers of the Norwegian-U.S. firm Snøhetta, Finnish architect Mikko Heikkinen (Heikkinen + Komonen), architect Jens Holm (HAO, Demanrk/U.S.), Juhani Pallasmaa (former dean of the School of Architecture at Helsinki University of Technology), and Danish product designer Jens Martin Skibsted (KiBiSi/Biomega).

Fifteen books on Art Deco—the predominately European and American decorative arts style of the 1920s and ’30s that took its name from the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes held in Paris.

This year’s DesignThinkers conference, Canada’s largest conference for visual communicators, hosted by the Canadian Association of Registered Graphic Designers (RGD) conference on November 6 and 7, 2014, features five graphic designers who have sent us book lists: Ellen Lupton, Abbott Miller, Debbie Millman, Paula Scher, and Erik Spiekermann.

As founder and director of MIT’s SENSEable City Laboratory, Carlo Ratti investigates how digital technologies are changing urban living. Trained as an architect (he runs an architecture firm in Turin, Italy) and engineer, he also has several patents to his name. His Digital Water Pavilion, exhibited at the 2008 World Expo in Barcelona, was hailed by Time magazine as one of the Best Inventions of the Year.

Inspired by our post earlier this month on the Books That Inspire Five Designers from Finland and Scandinavia, here are 25 books on Scandinavian design from our contributors.

Designers & Books is curating a pop-up design book fair, featuring books from more than a dozen publishers and rare and out of print book dealers, at the first-ever Dwell on Design NY, October 9–11, taking place at 82 Mercer Street in New York’s SoHo. Visitors who stop by the book fair have a chance to win any of over 10 different design books in a special drawing.

Halloween reading—from Gothic fiction to horror in architecture—chosen by designers Jonathan Barnbrook, Jeanne Gang, Angus Hyland, and other contributors.

Through November 14 only, you can buy selected design and architecture books from 8 different publishers at 80% off their original prices (many $10 and under) at our Online Book Fair special sale.

A look at recent highlights in books for children about architecture and design from AMMO Books, Gestalten, Paintbox Press, Princeton Architectural Press, and Schiffer Publishing.