Category: Essays

Steven Heller|Essays

Paul Rand: The Last Word

Design was Paul Rand’s overwhelming reason for being.

John Maeda|Essays

Thoughts on Paul Rand

Twenty years after the event, John Maeda reflects on inviting Paul Rand to speak at MIT.

Steven Heller|Essays

Ten Design Lessons from the 2016 Presidential Election

Steven Heller reflects on the good and bad.

Lana Rigsby|Essays

Are Taco Trucks Awakening the “Sleeping Giant”?

Since September, Houston taco trucks have been serving up information to help Latinos access the voting process.

Cheryl Heller|Essays

A Definition Five Years in the Making

What we mean when we say “design for social innovation”

Michael Bierut|Essays

My Democracy Was Irretrievably Undermined by Reactionary Idiots and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt

Can a designer t-shirt contest have any effect on the US presidential elections?

Michael Bierut|Essays

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mentor, Or, Why Modernist Designers Are Superior

Does a strict upbringing make you a better designer?

Steven Heller|Essays

Elaine Lustig Cohen, Pioneer

Steven Heller remembers Elaine Lustig Cohen, passionate historian, avid collector, and design practitioner.

Adam Harrison Levy|Essays

The Wood Stacker

All his work, from cutting the wood during the summer, to stacking it in early fall, through to burning it in the winter freed him from a dependency on oil. His heat is local.

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Notes from the Road: Part 2

Over a career that spans more than six decades, David Pease has built a body of work that is anchored by a methodical studio practice.

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Notes from the Road: Part 1

A story of how logic meets chance, how memory engenders narrative, how observation seeds curiosity, cues language, and sparks form.

Michael Bierut|Essays

The Typeface of Truth

What are the implications when Errol Morris declares the typeface most likely to induce credulity is Baskerville?