Best-Selling Design Books at CCA Bookstore, Montreal

These are the design books that were the best sellers at the CCA Bookstore in Montreal during April 2013.

Building Seagram Add to My Reading List

Phyllis Lambert
Foreword by Barry Bergdoll

Considered one of the greatest icons of 20th-century architecture, the Seagram Building was commissioned by Samuel Bronfman, founder of the Canadian distillery dynasty Seagram. Bronfman’s daughter Phyllis Lambert was 27 years old when she took over the search for an architect and chose Mies van der Rohe to design the elegant 38-story tower along with Philip Johnson. Through her choice, Lambert established her role as a leading architectural patron and singlehandedly changed the face of American urban architecture.

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Thanks for the View, Mr. Mies Add to My Reading List

Danielle Aubert Editor
Lana Cavar Editor
Natasha Chandani Editor

Lafayette Park, an affordable middle-class residential area in downtown Detroit, is home to the largest collection of buildings designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in the world. Today, it is one of Detroit’s most racially integrated and economically stable neighborhoods, although it is surrounded by evidence of a city in financial distress. Through interviews with and essays by residents; reproductions of archival material; and new photographs by Karin Jobst, Vasco Roma, and Corine Vermeulen, and previously unpublished photographs by documentary filmmaker Janine Debanné, this book examines the way that Lafayette Park residents confront and interact with this unique modernist environment.

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The Digital Turn in Architecture Add to My Reading List

Mario Carpo Editor

The digital turn in architecture has gone through several stages and phases, and Architectural Design (AD) has captured them all. This anthology of AD’s most salient articles is chronologically and thematically arranged to provide a complete historical timeline of the rise to pre-eminence of computer-based design and production. A pedagogical and research tool, this synopsis also relates the present state of digitality in architecture to the history and theory of its recent development and trends.

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Architecture in Northern Landscapes Add to My Reading List

Todd Saunders
Jonathan Bell
Ellie Stathaki

Todd Saunders is one of the most important young contemporary Canadian architects working internationally. Saunders (he lives and works in Bergen, Norway) has successfully executed work in both Canada, Norway, and Finland, creating architecture with a strong sense of northern identity, an individual approach that is informed by the strongness of natural landscape.

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Studio Mumbai: Praxis Add to My Reading List

Studio Mumbai

The workshop of Studio Mumbai, headed by Bijoy Jain, consists of open-air spaces in a rustic setting surrounded by trees. There, a variety of skilled craftsmen, architects and engineers collaborate in the same space, engaging in, exercising and practicing architecture in a manner that aspires to transcend its own physicality. An intimate look at the workings, outlook and inspiration of the practice is given, which includes the story of its background and setting, along with an interview with Jain and detailed profiles of significant projects in India: Tara House, Leti 360 Resort, House on Pali Hill and the Copper House, to name a few.

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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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Love Letter to a Garden by Debbie Millman

Love Letter to a Garden

By Debbie Millman
Contributions by Roxane Gay
Publisher: Timber Press
Published: April 15, 2025

From the award-winning artist, designer, and the host of the podcast Design Matters, Debbie Millman, this book tells the visual story of falling in love with gardening—and the philosophies that work conjures. Spread throughout are simple recipes using the garden’s ingredients from Millman’s wife, best-selling author Roxane Gay.

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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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