Weekly Wrap-Up & Preview: October 18
October 18, 2013
Interviews with graphic design’s Stefan Sagmeister (author of the updated Things I have learned in my life so far) and Donald Norman (expert on the user experience and product design, as well as the author of a new edition of The Design of Everyday Things) were highlights of this week. We also showcased the work of some “designing women,” including Eva Zeisel, Charlotte Perriand, and Bonnie Maclean, in a recently opened MoMA exhibition. Next week we focus on things digital, and bring you an interview with architect Greg Lynn, who introduced terms like “blob” and “shred” to computer-aided design, and take a look at digitally fabricated furniture, fashion, and more.
Weekly Wrap-Up
The award-winning graphic designer updates his monograph, Things I have learned in my life so far, with diary entries artfully rendered in everything from bananas to neon lights.
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From psychedelic concert posters to silver-plated teapots, the museum's current exhibition shows the vast influence of modern female designers.
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This year’s AGI Open—easily graphic design’s most high-profile annual international conference—took place in London at the end of September. Organized by Tony Brook (Spin, Unit Editions), Angus Hyland (Pentagram, London), and Adrian Shaughnessy (Unit Editions), and the AGI UK board, sessions covered education, gender, clients with ideas, and the pluses and pitfalls of collaboration.
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Design and architecture organizations like Manhattan’s Van Alen Institute are upping efforts to lure in an increasingly design-curious public.
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Design thinker and writer Donald Norman—known for his work that attempts to bridge the gap between the products users want and the products designers create—talks to Designers & Books on the occasion of the newly revised and expanded edition of his book The Design of Everyday Things.
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From gowns to prosthetic limbs, a new exhibition illustrates how computer-assisted production techniques are changing the way we think about design.
Named by Forbes magazine as one of the ten most influential living architects, Greg Lynn has shaped the way in which architects and other designers use computers as a medium. Lynn talks to Designers & Books about the exhibition he curated, “Archaeology of the Digital,” and about how his reading has informed his architecture, a short story he wrote, and his collection of vintage Godzilla figures.
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.
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.”
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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