Susan Weber
Books Every Interior Designer Should Read
All my life, I’ve been “into” interior design in one way or another. It began with looking at the so-called shelter magazines, moved on to watching my mother make decorative choices for our home, to deciding in college that this was an area that went beyond “pretty” and revealed unsuspected facets about my world. To discover, explore, and try to understand the cultural meanings of what would become to be known as material culture would become the governing intellectual passion of my adult life.
From the beginning, I read everything I could discover or that people recommended about what then was simply called interior design. I quickly realized that most people thought of the field as an intellectual sideline at best, a froufrou pursuit of pretty things as a relaxation from more serious pursuits.
That was one of the primary reasons I started the Bard Graduate Center: Decorative Arts, Design History, Material Culture. A mouthful of a name, perhaps, but genuinely representative of the new thinking about interior design as a field broadly representative of culture in any given country or area at a specific moment but—even more—the most significant repository of what people thought and felt about their culture at that time. To me, this is endlessly fascinating and endlessly illuminating and one of the most important areas in understanding any given time or culture.
It is with this background in mind that I have recommended the list of books that follow. All are brilliant, all are illuminating, but I would like to bring attention to some particular favorites and point out an example of what is on the horizon.
The Finest Rooms in America is an especially well-balanced survey of interiors of the past 200 years in this country because it has no bias toward any one period or style and gives the reader a clear and detailed view of this country’s development. On a broader scale, who cannot appreciate, value, and continually refer back to Mario Praz’s An Illustrated History of Interior Design? Another favorite of mine (I’m prejudiced, it’s true) is Women Designers in the USA, 1900–2000, which was published by the Bard Graduate Center in conjunction with an exhibition in 2000–2001.
But there’s so much that is intriguing just over the horizon. For example, a new journal, Interiors: Design, Architecture and Culture, a three-times-per year publication, edited by Anne Massey and John Turpin, whose first issue appeared in July, 2010, is devoted to the analysis of the spaces we occupy, and promises to enliven the field with stimulating and conversation-provoking essays on the world of interiors.
In short, for me, interior design is the newest and certainly among the most exciting of current research in fields in what we call “the arts.” Most excitingly it’s a field open to anyone interested in the broadest sense in civilization, what it is and how it developed – and continues to develop. I am so pleased to be able to introduce you to some of what I consider the best and most thoughtful thinking in the field to date.
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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.
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.
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.
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.
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.”
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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