Designers & Books News

Day 275: New and Next for Designers and Books

By Steve Kroeter October 31, 2011

Steve Kroeter

On Day 275 after launching Designers & Books this past February 1, we find ourselves with more than 1,050 books, book lists from 82 designers and 15 commentators, and visitors from 175 countries. Sure enough, we do keep focused on the growing numbers. But more important, we are also dedicated to creatively evolving an enlightening and entertaining resource for the world of design books. To do this, during the month of November we will be introducing several new features and expanding some original ones.

Forthcoming:

Guest Bloggers: We are pleased that beginning on November 3, each Thursday will we feature a guest blog post written by a prominent member of the design community. Our regular guest bloggers will include Julie Lasky, Paul Makovsky, Daijiro Mizuno, Phil Patton, Maria Popova, Rick Poynor, Erik Spiekermann, and Alissa Walker. During November and December, they will be writing about their choices for the most noteworthy design books published during 2011. Rick Poynor kicks things off on Thursday of this week. We will also be inviting other special guests to contribute to our list of Notable Books of 2011.

2011 Holiday Book Grid: Not only are design books of great importance culturally, but they also make great gifts! For the holiday gift season, we will present our Notable Books of 2011 in a specially developed grid format designed to make it easy and enjoyable for you to find books by title, author, genre, and price range and also by which of our contributors recommended the book—and why.

Holiday Book Grid

Video: We’re excited about debuting original videos on Designers & Books—directed by Jill Bauerle of Stacked Up TV. Our first video, featuring Michael Bierut in conversation with architect James Biber in his “book cube” talking about his selections for Designers & Books, will be posted in mid-November. Our second video, which will post in late November, showcases Wendy Goodman (design editor) and Justin Davidson (architecture critic) from New York Magazine talking about their Notable Books of 2011.

Booksellers and Publishers: We will now be featuring detailed information in a special section of our site about our affiliated booksellers and publishers, including coverage of forthcoming and recently published books as well as other key book-related information.

Additional expanded features underway in November:

New look for our designers, commentators, and other contributors:

Along with a profile and book list, you can now find detailed information on books written by our contributors (many of whom are noted authors) as well as essays or interviews featuring contributors to Designers & Books.

Complete bibliographic information, content summaries, author profiles, list of editions, and local library availability. The last three categories of information we offer as a result of a special relationship we have developed with WorldCat, the world’s largest online database of library resources. This information can be accessed by clicking on any individual book title.

Search:

Last, but not least, to make everything more accessible on the site, particularly books and authors, we will offer a search function.

As you discover and use these features, we hope you will find that they make Designers & Books a more interesting and useful resource for you. We’d love to hear your comments and reactions. Each change has been implemented to make the books that inspire the world’s esteemed designers more accessible to you.

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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.

Order the book.

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.

Order the book.

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.

Order the book.

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.

Order the book.

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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