History

William Drenttel|Essays

International Polar Year

International Polar Year 2007-2008, logo, designed by Ralph Percival, Mouse in the House Graphic Design, 2006.In what may turn out to be the biggest international scientific project to date, an army of thousands of scientists will spend …

Steven Heller|Slideshows

The Other Monocle

Monocle, cover detail, design by Phil Gips, 1963.A whole lot of blog hoopla has been recently generated about Monocle, the spanking new art, culture and issues magazine from Wallpaper's creator Tyler Brûlé. He's the guy who …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

The Illusion of Certainty

Allan McCollum, Each and Every One of You, 2004. 1200 digital inkjet prints. Photograph courtesy Barbara Krakow Gallery.Last fall, at a small gallery on West 22nd Street in New York, the artist Allan McCollum exhibited his new system for …

Debbie Millman|Audio

Elliott Earls

On this episode, Debbie interviews designer and performance artist Elliott Earls, designer-in residence at Cranbrook Academy of Art.

William Drenttel|Slideshows

The Good Citizen's Alphabet

Cover design, Gaberbocchus Press, illustration by Franciszka Themerson, 1953.In these political times, so polarized with heated rhetoric, I was pleasantly surprised to stumble across a copy of Bertrand Russell's The Good Citizen's …

Lorraine Wild|Slideshows

Sister Corita: The Juiciest Tomato

In Daniel Berrigan’s words, Sister Corita is a "witch of invention." And there is no doubt that at least in those tumultuous years of the 1960s, her powers of invention seemed supernatural, if not divine... Corita’s work stands …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

The Not-So-Golden Age of Zero Tolerance

When I was a student, the assignments and their expected outcomes were intentionally conceived as chore-like, specific and frankly, narrow. This was the age of zero tolerance: deviation from a designated format was neither an approved …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Into the Pink

In Western culture, new baby girls are welcomed into the world with rosy pink layettes. Over time, the pale hues of infancy fade away, giving way to more keenly saturated pastels as a child creeps toward toddlerhood. Later, pink is …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

What Makes A Good Poster?

"Designing Effective Posters," Design by Jeff Radel, PhD., Department of Occupational Therapy Education, University of Kansas Medical Center.At its core, the school science fair of my youth was an excuse to engage in two of my favorite …

William Drenttel|Essays

Silk Road Typography

European Union's 50th anniversary logo, design by Szymon Skrzypczak, 2006Late at night, after seeing a particularly vapid, unlikely or just plain idiotic television commercial, I'll often turn to my wife and say, "Can you imagine being in …

William Drenttel|Essays

Winterhouse Awards for Design Writing

More than a year ago, Jessica Helfand and I agreed to co-sponsor an initiative to increase the appreciation of design — by recognizing new voices in design criticism and commentary. In partnership with AIGA, and supported by the …

Michael Bierut|Essays

Alan Fletcher: Living by Design

Remembering the late British designer Alan Fletcher, who once said, "I treat clients as raw material to do what I want to do, though I would never tell them that." For him, design was not a profession or a craft, but a life.