Category Archives: design
Saarinen House and Garden: A Total Work of Art
Certainly one of the most overlooked works of modern architecture, the Saarinen house, which this book documents in splendid detail, is perhaps the crowning work of Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen during his years at Cranbrook. Thanks to the recent restoration of the house and garden, we can now see his vision of TOTAL design; from the flatware to the tapestries to the furniture to the door handle to the landscape.
Posted in architecture, art, Cranbrook, design, history
Cranbrook Design: The New Discourse
A book that documents Cranbrook’s Design Department faculty, student, and alumni work from 1980-1990. Although not defined by a style, the Cranbrook design philosophy has been influential in product, graphic and furniture design. Products have been treated as sensual objects to be interpreted. “We’ve tried to recognize that products carry the mythology of the culture,” said Michael McCoy, chairman of the design department with his wife, Katherine.
Design in America: The Cranbrook Vision, 1925-1950
As Neil Harris explains in one of the book’s most interesting essays, Cranbrook derived from the arts and crafts movement that started in mid- 19th-century England as a reaction against shoddy industrial output and that, spreading speedily through northern Europe, resulted in the foundation of several schools aimed at reforming design by relating it more to art and life.
The Cranbrook complex, consisting of a church, schools for children, residences, studios and workshops, took about nine years to complete, by which time it had become – not an art school, but, in the words of the architect Eliel Saarinen, ”a working place for creative arts.” The emphasis, says Robert Judson Clark in his essay, was more on ”place, people and experience than on curriculum and methods.” Still, during World War II, this shifted to more orthodox concerns – credits, degrees and specific courses in, for instance, industrial design.
The influence of the Saarinens diminishes as the first generation of Cranbrook students comes of age, in the 1940s. The students include Ray and Charles Eames, represented by architecture and furniture; Florence Knoll, with interiors, and Harry Bertoia, with welded-metal sculptures.
Whereishere
What is driving communication and what are the real challenges facing designers today? Whereishere presents a radical new take on both these issues, breaks from the orthodox approach to understanding two dimensional design. Leading graphic design studios are represented including Bruce Mau and Cranbrook Academy of Art.
Posted in art, Cranbrook, design, education, media, photography, typography
Mixing Messages
How do we disseminate information? And what does it look like? Ellen Kupton answers that in her new book, Mixing Messages: Graphic Design in Contemporary Culture. Lupton looks at the mission of design through discussions about publishing, signage, typography, corporate identity and the use of design in public places. Mixing Messages will fascinate fans of design, culture or social history.
20th-Century Type Remix
This book challenges the concept of how typographic communication works today, but in doing so strengthen its ties with the traditions of the past. An introductory essay shows how current creative trends are simply part of the continuum of change that can be plotted from the turn of the last century to the turn of the next. Strong illustrated intersection dividers, specially commissioned from leading designers, set the scene for each chapter, or decade, and the space devoted to the 1990s has been substantially expanded.
Posted in art, design, history, typography
Bauhaus, 1919-28
Over seventy years after its foundation in Weimar, the Bauhaus has become a concept all over the world. The respect which it commands is associated above all with the design it pioneered, one which we now describe as “Bauhaus style”. The teachers at the Bauhaus included the leading artists of the times, among them Wassily Kandinsky, Lyonel Feininger, Paul Klee, and Oscar Schlemmer. The teaching strategies developed were adopted internationally into the curriculum of art and design institutes.
Posted in architecture, art, design, education, exhibition, history
Design Culture Now
This is the first-ever survey of American design that cuts across the four disciplines of architecture, product design, graphic design, and new media. Put together by the National Design Museum surveys the up-to-the-minute trends in American design from architecture to product and graphic design to new media. This comprehensive survey catalogs the best in architecture, interiors, environments, landscapes, products, furniture, fashion, objects, typefaces, posters, publications, film and TV graphics, and interactive media from the last three years.
Posted in architecture, art, culture, design, exhibition, media, technology, typography
The Book of Probes
Until now, no book has explored the full expanse of Marshall McLuhan’s thinking. Here we have assembled alongside his most prescient aphorisms excerpts from the full range of his astounding life’s work. One revolutionary book distills the wisdom and wit of the man who explained to us the “the medium is the message” and that we are “now living in a global village”, that “privacy invasion is now our most important knowledge industry” and that “obsolescence is the moment of superabundance”. Art Director and Designer David Carson presents McLuhan’s images with new insight, and has built a work of art that is reminiscent of those lasting works permanently commissioned and interpreted by new generations.
Posted in culture, design, media, philosophy, technology, theory
Enchanting Modern: Ilonka Karasz (1896-1981)
Ilonka Karasz’s career spanned several decades and media, including textiles, furniture, ceramics, wallpaper, and graphic design. She produced over 150 covers for The New Yorker. Enchanting Modern: Ilonka Karasz (1896-1981) is the first book dedicated to the life and work of the artist.
Posted in art, biography, design, exhibition, history