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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Nonfiction, Art and Cultural History

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240 books

The World of M. C. Escher M. C. Escher et al. On Kit Hinrichs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction Walter Benjamin On Elizabeth Diller’s Book List On Ricardo Scofidio’s Book List On Cino Zucchi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Word and Image: Posters from the Collection of The Museum of Modern Art Alan M. Fern On Paula Scher’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Word and Image Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen (MuHKA) On Carin Goldberg’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Wolfgang Tillmans Sophie O'Brien et al. On Christian Wassmann’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Wiener Werkstätte: Kunst und Handwerk, 1903–1932 Werner Schweiger On Carin Goldberg’s Book List Add to My Reading List	What Are You Looking At? Will Gompertz On Craig Dykers’s Current Reading list Add to My Reading List	Ways of Seeing John Berger On Milton Glaser’s Book List On Mark Fox’s Book List On Jennifer Morla’s Book List On Véronique Vienne’s Book List On Angus Hyland’s Book List On Alexa Hampton’s Book List On Ian Ritchie’s Book List Add to My Reading List
Walton Ford: Pancha Tantra Walton Ford et al. On George Yabu’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Walter Pichler: Zwei Troge, Wasserrinnen Galerie Elisabeth & Klaus Thoman Add to My Reading List	Walter Pichler Walter Pichler et al. On Kent Kleinman’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Visual Thinking Rudolf Arnheim On Milton Glaser’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Vision and Difference: Femininity, Feminism and Histories of Art Griselda Pollock On Akiko Fukai’s Book List Add to My Reading List	View Marcel Duchamp On Thomas Girst’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Verf Hans den Hartog Jager On Aldo Bakker’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Venice for Pleasure J. G. Links On Paul Goldberger’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Unknown Craftsman Soetsu Yanagi On Harry Pearce’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Unfashionable Human Body Bernard Rudofsky On Akiko Fukai’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Tom Sachs: Lever House “Bronze Collection” Tom Sachs On Reed Krakoff’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Tom Sachs Germano Celant On Richard Sachs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Tim Hawkinson Lawrence Rinder On Todd Oldham’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Théorie du nuage Hubert Damisch On Terence Riley’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Making of Classical Edinburgh 1750–1840 Alexander John Brown Youngson On Alan Balfour’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Techniques of the Observer Jonathan Crary On Véronique Vienne’s Book List Add to My Reading List
Système de la Mode (The Fashion System) Roland Barthes On Christian Lacroix’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Suspensions of Perception Jonathan Crary On Véronique Vienne’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Super Constellation Christoph Asendorf On Christian Wassmann’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Sun King Nancy Mitford On Alexa Hampton’s Book List On André Leon Talley’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Studio and Cube Brian O’Doherty On Deborah Berke’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Studies in Iconology Erwin Panofsky On Calvin Tsao’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Structure of the Visual Book Keith Smith On Warren Lehrer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Storia dell’Arte Italiana (3 vols.) Giulio Carlo Argan On Massimo Vignelli’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Stamp of Fantasy Ute Eskildsen et al. On Seymour Chwast’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Spirit of Folk Art Henry Glassie On Kit Hinrichs’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Social Radicalism and the Arts Donald Drew Egbert On Denise Scott Brown’s Book List On Robert Venturi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Silence: Lectures and Writings John Cage On Antoine Predock’s Book List On Craig Hodgetts’s Book List On Victoria Meyers’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Shock of the New Robert Hughes On Jeffrey Bilhuber’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Sheherezade Janet Zweig et al. On Warren Lehrer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Shape of Content Ben Shahn On Steven Heller’s Book List On Seymour Chwast’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Shape of a Pocket John Berger On Milton Glaser’s Book List Add to My Reading List

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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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