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.

title a–z

Nonfiction, General

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480 books

Less Than One Joseph Brodsky On Juhani Pallasmaa’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Letters of Mozart & His Family (3 vols.) Emily Anderson, ed. On Massimo Vignelli’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Letters to a Young Poet Rainer Maria Rilke On Juhani Pallasmaa’s Book List Add to My Reading List	L’Ideologia del Traditore (The Ideology of the Traitor: Art, Manner and Mannerism) Achille Bonito Oliva On Stefano Giovannoni’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Life with Picasso Françoise Gilot On Tod Williams’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Lincoln at Gettysburg Garry Wills On Alexander Cooper’s Book List On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List Add to My Reading List	L’intraitable beauté du monde Edouard Glissant et al. On Pierre Bernard’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Lives of the Great Composers Harold C. Schonberg On Alexander Cooper’s Book List Add to My Reading List
London Orbital Iain Sinclair On Jonathan Barnbrook’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Londongrad Mark Hollingsworth et al. On Carl Magnusson’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Long Ago in France M. F. K. Fisher On Billie Tsien’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Long Walk to Freedom Nelson Mandela On Richard Meier’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Long Slow March Clifton Meador On Warren Lehrer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Longing for Darkness: Kamante’s Tales from Out of Africa Kamante et al. On Warren Lehrer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Longitude Dava Sobel On Bruce Hannah’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Look at the Land Alex MacLean et al. On Denise Scott Brown’s Book List On Robert Venturi’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Lotus and the Robot Arthur Koestler On Craig Hodgetts’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Love and War in the Apennines Eric Newby On Jasper Morrison’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Lunar Men: Five Friends Whose Curiosity Changed the World Jenny Uglow On David Easton’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Machine in the Garden Leo Marx On Jeanne Gang’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Made to Stick Chip Heath et al. On Tom Kelley’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Making of the English Working Class E. P. Thompson On Ian Ritchie’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Making Things Public: Atmospheres of Democracy Bruno Latour On David Adjaye’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Man Who Planted Trees Jean Giono On Ian Ritchie’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Marsh Arabs Wilfred Thesiger On Jasper Morrison’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Masks of God Joseph Campbell On Calvin Tsao’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Mastering My Mistakes in the Kitchen Dana Cowin et al. On David Rockwell’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Materials for the Study of Variation Treated with Especial Regard to Discontinuity in the Origin of Species William Bateson On Greg Lynn’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Maxims François de la Rochefoucauld On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Meaning of Anxiety Rollo May On Eric Owen Moss’s Book List Add to My Reading List	The Measurement of Meaning Charles E. Osgood On Dan Formosa’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Meditations Marcus Aurelius On Jaquelin Robertson’s Book List On Hartmut Esslinger’s Book List Add to My Reading List
The Medium is the Massage Marshall McLuhan et al. On Abbott Miller’s Book List On Carola Zwick’s Book List On Warren Lehrer’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Meerlust: 300 Years of Hospitality Phillida Brooke Simons On David Easton’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Memoirs Elie Wiesel On Richard Meier’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Memories, Dreams, Reflections C.G. Jung On Harry Pearce’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Metamagical Themas Douglas Hofstadter On Cino Zucchi’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals Iris Murdoch On Stanley Tigerman’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Metropolitan Life Fran Lebowitz On Carin Goldberg’s Book List On Jonathan Adler’s Book List Add to My Reading List	Micrographia Robert Hooke On Tom Coward’s Book List On Daisy Froud’s Book List On Vincent Lacovara’s Book List On Geoff Shearcroft’s Book List Add to My Reading List

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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