Stanley Tigerman
Stanley Tigerman’s Book List
I stopped buying architecture books in 1980, which coincided with my being the architect in residence at the American Academy in Rome where it became clear to me that ideas were the source of a flame that I wished to be near. Since that time my personal library, both at home and at the office, has grown willy-nilly with tomes on religion, philosophy, critical theory, et al. These ten books are the tip of an iceberg that helps to define who I am in the autumn of my life.
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This brilliant probing of the mind underpinning the work of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is the only book on that outstanding architect that isn’t sycophantic.
I have read all of Karen Armstrong’s books. My citing of The Case for God is at some level arbitrary. Her other books, such as The Battle for God, are equally invigorating. She’s one of the best living writers in theology, with a passionate point of view.
I read The Fountainhead when I was 13 years old in 1943, put it down and decided to become an architect. One may question Rand’s politics, even the ideology of the self, but her gripping tale of an architect unapologetically motivated my prepubescent psyche.
In The Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides lays out a way of thinking, particularly about God that I find useful, especially in the case of my continuing search for ineffability in the context of the Western pantheon of ideality.
The Bible is an invaluable resource for most things that I think and write about.
Hayy Ibn Yaqzan was one of the most well-read books in the Middle Ages and moved me fourscore years down the pike.
Ich und Du represents my belief in the importance of another—any other—human being. Buber’s influence on Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida and thereby the rest of us as well is a not very well-concealed secret.
Iris Murdoch uses metaphysics brilliantly as she ambles through the history of morality.
I have read and reread this book several times. Not many books have been written about architecture with a small “a,” but Rykwert does it brilliantly.
For me, St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine are the yin-yang of theo-philosophy. My fascination with matter bounces back and forth between faith and interpretation—ergo, I read both theologians continuously.
Announcements
If Walls Could Speak: My Life in Architecture by Moshe Safdie
If Walls Could Speak: My Life in Architecture
By Moshe Safdie
Publisher: Grove/Atlantic
Published: September 2022
One of the world’s greatest and most thoughtful architects recounts his extraordinary career and the iconic structures he has built—from Habitat in Montreal to Marina Bay Sands in Singapore—and offers a manifesto for the role architecture should play in society.
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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.
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.”
Women Holding Things by Maira Kalman
Women Holding Things
By Maira Kalman
Publisher: Harper Design
Published: October 2022
In the spring of 2021, Maira and Alex Kalman created a small, limited-edition booklet, “Women Holding Things,” which featured select recent paintings by Maira, accompanied by her insightful and deeply personal commentary. The booklet quickly sold out. Now, the Kalmans have expanded that original publication into an extraordinary visual compendium. We see a woman hold a book, hold shears, hold children, hold a grudge, hold up, hold her own. In visually telling their stories, Kalman lays bare the essence of women’s lives—their tenacity, courage, vulnerability, hope, and pain.
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