Invited designers and commentators have chosen these as the books that inspire them and that have shaped their worldview or their ideas about design.
covers
272 books
Ada, or Ardor
Vladimir Nabokov
On Tom Coward’s Book List
On Daisy Froud’s Book List
On Vincent Lacovara’s Book List
On Geoff Shearcroft’s Book List
On David Weeks’s Book List
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The Afterlife of Emerson Tang
Paula Champa
On Phil Patton’s Notable Books of 2013 list
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Against Nature (A Rebours)
Joris-Karl Huysmans
On Dominique Browning’s Book List
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The Age of Innocence
Edith Wharton
On Paul Goldberger’s Book List
On Dominique Browning’s Book List
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Akhenaten
Naguib Mahfouz
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
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The Aleph
Jorge Luis Borges
On Jean-Marie Massaud’s Book List
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All the King’s Men
Robert Penn Warren
On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List
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American Pastoral
Philip Roth
On Steven Heller’s Book List
On Tom Geismar’s Book List
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Angle of Repose
Wallace Stegner
On Margie Ruddick’s Book List
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Anna Karenina
Leo Tolstoy
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List
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Answered Prayers
Truman Capote
On Ralph Rucci’s Book List
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As I Lay Dying
William Faulkner
On Shashi Caan’s Book List
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Atonement
Ian McEwan
On Peter Eisenman’s Book List
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The Atrocity Exhibition
J. G. Ballard
On Jonathan Barnbrook’s Book List
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Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter
Mario Vargas Llosa
On Alexander Cooper’s Book List
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Austerlitz
W. G. Sebald
On Barry Bergdoll’s Book List
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The Aviator (L’Aviateur)
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
On Norman Foster’s Book List
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Bartleby, the Scrivener
Herman Melville
On Peter Eisenman’s Book List
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A Beggar in Jerusalem
Elie Wiesel
On Richard Meier’s Book List
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The Bell Jar
Sylvia Plath
On Deborah Sussman’s Book List
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The Belly of Paris
Emile Zola
On Norman Foster’s Book List
On Tod Williams’s Current Reading list
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Beloved
Toni Morrison
On Carin Goldberg’s Book List
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Billy Budd
Herman Melville
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
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The Black Book
Orhan Pamuk
On Prem Krishnamurthy’s Book List
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Bleak House
Charles Dickens
On Dominique Browning’s Book List
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Blindness
José Saramago
On Paul Marantz’s Book List
On Cleto Munari’s Book List
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The Bluest Eye
Toni Morrison
On Nancye Green’s Book List
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The Book of Daniel
E. L. Doctorow
On Nancye Green’s Book List
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The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Milan Kundera
On Jonathan Barnbrook’s Book List
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The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Junot Díaz
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
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The Brothers Karamazov
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
On Norman Foster’s Book List
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
On Peter Mendelsund’s Book List
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Buddenbrooks
Thomas Mann
On Massimo Vignelli’s Book List
On Dominique Browning’s Book List
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The Canterbury Tales
Geoffrey Chaucer
On Norman Foster’s Book List
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Carrie
Stephen King
On Ellen Lupton’s Book List
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The Castle
Franz Kafka
On Florian Idenburg’s Book List
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Cathedral
Raymond Carver
On Mikko Heikkinen’s Book List
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The Charterhouse of Parma
Stendhal
On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List
On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List
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Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules
David Sedaris
On Todd Oldham’s Book List
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China Court
Rumer Godden
On Margaret McCurry’s Book List
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China Lover
Ian Buruma
On Florian Idenburg’s Book List
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Best-Selling Design Books at Van Alen Books, New York

1
Building Seagram
Phyllis Lambert
2
Clog 6: Brutalism
Kyle May et al., eds.
3
Project Journal Issue 1
Project
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Newest Designers and Commentators

Matteo Thun
Architect, Interior Designer, Product/Industrial Designer, Lighting Designer; Italy
Michael Maharam
Writer; Executive; United States
Fritz Frenkler
Product/Industrial Designer; Germany
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20 Books on Textile Design

British Textiles: 1700 to the Present
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Katsuji Wakisaka
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Recent Books by Our Contributors

Diller, Scofidio + Renfro: Lincoln Center Inside Out
Elizabeth Diller, Ricardo Scofidio, and Charles Renfro
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Stephen Burrows
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Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec
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Contributors Who Chose...

Delirious New York
Rem Koolhaas
On 8 lists
Jeanne Gang
Architect; United States
Mohsen Mostafavi
Designer; Educator; United States
Galia Solomonoff
Architect; United States
Adam Tihany
Architect, Interior Designer, Product/Industrial Designer; United States
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