Chosen Books

Invited designers and commentators have chosen these as the books that inspire them and that have shaped their worldview or their ideas about design.

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2000 books

Antonio de Torres: Guitar Maker—His Life & Work Jose L. Romanillos On Richard Sachs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Antonio Lopez: Fashion, Art, Sex and Disco Roger Padiha et al. On Anna Sui’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Antonio Stradivari William Henry Hill On Richard Sachs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Apartments for the Affluent Alpern Andrew On Alexa Hampton’s Book List On Peter Pennoyer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Applied Grammatology Gregory Ulmer On Abbott Miller’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen Jacques Pépin On Zuzana Licko’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Arcades Project Walter Benjamin On Akiko Fukai’s Book List On David Piscuskas’s Book List On Farshid Moussavi’s Book List On Ian Ritchie’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architectonic Space Dom Hans van der Laan On Craig Dykers’s Book List Add to My Reading List
An Architectural Guidebook to Los Angeles David Gebhard et al. On Paul Goldberger’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architectural Ornament Brent C. Brolin On Chris Bangle’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture in the Age of Divided Representation Dalibor Vesely On Mohsen Mostafavi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture and Politics in Germany: 1918-1945 Barbara Miller Lane On Abbott Miller’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture: Choice or Fate Léon Krier On Witold Rybczynski’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of the City Aldo Rossi On Michael Graves’s Book List On Mohsen Mostafavi’s Book List On David Adjaye’s Book List On Jorge Silvetti’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture: From Prehistory to Postmodernity Marvin Trachtenberg et al. On Alexa Hampton’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture in Britain 1530–1830 John Summerson On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Architecture of Michelangelo James S. Ackerman On Mohsen Mostafavi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of Community Léon Krier On Andrés Duany’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of H. H. Richardson and His Times Henry-Russell Hitchcock On Denise Scott Brown’s Book List On Robert Venturi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of Happiness Alain de Botton On Paul Goldberger’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of Humanism: A Study in the History of Taste Geoffrey Scott On Witold Rybczynski’s Book List On Paul Goldberger’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of Sir Edwin Lutyens A.S.G. Butler On Peter Pennoyer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture of Truth François Cali On Michael Maharam’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture on the Edge of Postmodernism Robert A. M. Stern et al. On Peter Pennoyer’s Book List Add to My Reading List
Architecture: The Natural and the Manmade Vincent Scully On Norman Foster’s Book List On Witold Rybczynski’s Book List On Gijs Bakker’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture and Utopia Manfredo Tafuri On Mohsen Mostafavi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of the Well-Tempered Environment Reyner Banham On Mohsen Mostafavi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture Without Architects Bernard Rudofsky On Niels Diffrient’s Book List On Norman Foster’s Book List On Zack McKown’s Book List On Mikko Heikkinen’s Book List On Aric Chen’s Book List On Cino Zucchi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architecture: Form, Space, and Order Francis D. K. Ching On Philip Freelon’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Architecture of Ludwig Wittgenstein Bernhard Leitner On James Biber’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architettura addio Alessandro Mendini On Alberto Alessi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Architetture nel Segno dei Maestri Claudio Buttafava et al. On Daniel Libeskind’s Book List Add to My Reading List
Archizoom Associati, 1966–1974 Roberto Gargiani On Paolo Deganello’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Archtop Guitars Rudy On Richard Sachs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Are Clothes Modern? Bernard Rudofsky On George Tscherny’s Book List On Stanley Abercrombie’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Armada Garrett Mattingly On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Arranging Things: A Rhetoric of Object Placement Leonard Koren et al. On Zuzana Licko’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Art & Fear David Bayles et al. On Ken Carbone’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Art and Politics in the Weimar Period John Willett On Abbott Miller’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Art and Visual Perception Rudolf Arnheim On Milton Glaser’s Book List Add to My Reading List

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.

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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.

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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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