Books Received
Atzmon, Leslie and Prasad Boradkar, eds. Encountering
Things: Design and Theories of Things. London: Blooms-
bury Academic, 2017. ISBN: 9780857855640 (pbk). 288
pages. Color illustrations.
This book brings a disciplined and thoughtful
approach to the topic of “things” throughout its fifteen
diverse chapters. It covers “things” such as convenience,
telephones, product service ecologies, copper objects,
and many more. The book is about the relationship and
interplay between “thing theory” and design.
Bookstein, Ezra and Jeremy Workman, eds. One-Track
Mind: Drawing the New York Subway. Drawings by
Philip Ashforth Coppola; Forword by Jonathan Lethem.
Princeton: Princeton Architectural Press, 2018. ISBN-13:
978-1616896744 (hbk). 157 pages. Black and white illus-
trations.
For over 40 years, Phillip Ashforth Coppola has
meticulously observed the details of rapid transit
stations. A cross between an artist and an archeologist,
he has documented the New York City subway with
historical descriptions, specifications, and detailed
black and white line drawings that cover typography,
terracotta mosaics, faience, and tile patterns—all of
which are rarely noticed by the millions of riders passing
by every day—but are well illustrated in this book.
Author website: ttp://bit.ly/2Pjjkq3
Bridle, James, New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the
Future. Brooklyn: Verso, 2018. ISBN: 13:978-1786635471
(hbk). 304 Pages.
This book’s information and sources are gene-
rated much by bots and algorithms. Bridle states that
this is a book about what we know, how we know it, and
what we cannot know. The ten chapters have single
word names such as “Chasm” and “Complexity.” The
author seeks to develop a critical literacy of the digital
world we live in. Author website: http://bit.ly/2NDZohn
Eames, Charles and Ray Eames. An Eames Anthology:
Articles, Film Scripts, Interviews, Letters, Notes, and
Speeches. Edited by Daniel Ostroff. Yale University Press,
2015. ISBN: 9780300203455 (hbk). 420 pages. Color and
black and white illustrations.
This collection of many first-time unpublished
writings illuminates the authors’ marriage and profes-
sional partnership of fifty years. With more than 120
primary-source documents and 200 illustrations that
highlight iconic projects such as the Case Study Houses
and the molded plywood chair, as well as their work for
major corporations as both designers (Herman Miller,
Vitra) and consultants (IBM, Polaroid), this book lends
new insight into their creative process and the advance
of modernity in mid-century America.
Fallan, Kjetil and Grace Lees-Maffei, eds. Designing
Worlds: National Design Histories in an Age of Globalization.
New York: Berghahn Books, 2018. ISBN: 978-1-78533-
832-8 (hbk). 296 pages.
Design, globalization, and national identities take
on new significance where global and local meet. This
comprehensive book covers a wide range of design top-
ics as it explores diversity of national identities and cul-
tures in places such as Africa, New Zealand, India, and
Lebanon. The range of writers is impressive, and the
essays address the qualities that make a certain region
or nation’s design unique or that challenge their identity
in an interconnected world.
Gimeno-Martínez, Javier. Design and National Identity.
London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017. ISBN: 9781472
591036 (pbk). 288 pages. Black and white illustrations.
In the increasingly nation-state geopolitical reality,
this timely book explores the relationship between
national identity and cultural production from produc-
tion and consumption perspectives. Key examples are
from national symbols, government positioning of inter-
ventions, and corporate expressions. It also takes on
traditional formations of the nation-state in relation to
globalization, migration, and cultural diversity as
equally important.
82
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DesignIssues: Volume 35, Number 3 Summer 2019
Gooding, Mel. A2Z+: Alphabets & Signs. Edited by Julian
Rothenstein. Princeton: Princeton Architectural Press,
2018 ISBN: 13: 978-1616897079 (hbk). 314 pages.
Over a decade ago, Julian Rothenstein published
A2Z, a cornucopia of unconventional alphabets,
emblems, letters, and signs to inspire practical and cre-
ative use. A2Z+ is a continuation that contains a newly
discovered wealth of rare graphics and ephemera in-
cluding the statistical charts of black activist W.E.B. Du
Bois. Thoughtfully produced and detailed, this version
is an indispensable source of ideas and inspiration for
adaptive contemporary typographic reinterpretation.
Heller, Steven and Greg D’Onofrio. The Moderns: Mid-
century American Graphic Design. New York: Harry
Abrams, 2017. ISBN: 978-1-4197-2401-5 (HBK). 336 pages.
Color Illustrations.
The postwar world was an era of optimism as well
as development of new materials and forms that rein-
vigorated what design and society could do together.
The book generously illustrates profiles of 60 émigré
and American designers by way of interviews; maga-
zine, book, and record covers; advertisements and pack-
age designs; posters; and other projects. The authors
used typography, primary colors, photography, and
geometric or biomorphic forms that defined the visual
aesthetics of postwar modernity.
Jury, David. Reinventing Print: Technology and Craft in
Typography. London: Bloomsbury 2018. ISBN: 97814742
62699 (pbk). 208 Pages. Color Illustrations.
This book is about digital technology and every-
day typography in a post-digital age. There is a growing
fascination and re-evaluation of pre-digital skills and
processes. This three-part book explores re-appro-
priation, which has irreverently liberated a new gene-
ration of typographers, designers, and artists who have
grown up with digital technology. The result creates
exciting, potent, and culturally subversive typographic
responses.
Kries, Mateo, ed. Hello, Robot. Design Between Human
and Machine. Weil am Rhein, Germany: Vitra Design
Museum, 2017. ISBN: 9783945852101 (ppk). 328 pages.
Color Illustrations.
Robots have been, at the same time, both roman-
ticized and feared for decades, and with AI taking on
more of a role in our lives, the robot is now in our digital
platforms. This engaging book, which was part of a
comprehensive exhibition, is an interdisciplinary look
at robotics revealing the contradictions inherent in this
new technology. This book addresses a plea for a de-
sign concept dedicated to designing interactions and
relationships between humans and machines. It con-
tains a glossary with important robotics terms and
includes an extensive catalog. Exhibition website: http://
bit.ly/2PpvVbr
Lupton, Ellen and Andrea Lipps. The Senses: Design
Beyond Vision. Princeton: Princeton Architectural Press,
2018. ISBN: 9781616897109 (hbk). 224 pages.
Curators Ellen Lupton and Andrea Lipps created
this companion book to the exhibition “The Senses:
Design Beyond Vision.” This book explores the way
space, materials, sound, and light affect the mind and
body. Meticulously designed in nineteen sections with
a rich variety of examples from contemporary design-
ers, the book is a combination of manifestos that pro-
pose concepts for enhancing societal life, particularly
for those with sensory disabilities. Exhibition website:
http://bit.ly/2orlkRA
Offenhuber, Dietmar. Waste is Information. Cambridge:
MIT Press, 2017. ISBN: 9780262036733 (HBK). 280 pages.
Black and white illustrations.
We see waste every day and wonder where it all
goes, but is it worthy of study? According to Offen-
huber—yes. He views waste as information that can
be forensically tagged and tracked in what he calls
“infrastructure legibility.” He then explores how waste
is dealt with in three contexts and how it is defined,
managed, and governed among users, technology, and
cities. The wonder of the book is how the discarded can
return as meaning.
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DesignIssues: Volume 35, Number 3 Summer 2019105
Pink, Sarah; Yoko Akama, and Shanti Sumartojo. Uncer-
tainty and Possibility: New Approaches to Future Making
in Design Anthropology. London: Bloomsbury Academic,
2018. ISBN: 9781350002715 (pbk). 160 pages. Black and
white Illustrations.
We live in a world where uncertainty and possibil-
ity are creating fertile grounds for exploration. Research
methods take advantage of disruptive and experimen-
tal techniques for speculative futures. The book’s seven
chapters build from specific to general methods that
show how individuals and teams can now use very
affordable maker spaces to prototype things that until
now were difficult to achieve.
Resnick, Elizabeth. Developing Citizen Designers. London:
Bloomsbury Academic, 2016. ISBN: 9780857856203 (pbk).
432 pages. Color Illustrations.
Design and its relation to social responsibility is
a continuing theme, and this book looks at the contem-
porary ways to learn and practice design in a socially
responsible manner. This very comprehensive volume
has a diversity of contributors who delve into ethics,
sustainability, entrepreneurship, and activism. The wide
array of case studies, assignment briefs, and interviews
makes tangible how social responsibility is realized.
Steenson, Molly Wright. Architectural Intelligence: How
Designers and Architects Created the Digital Landscape.
Cambridge: MIT Press, 2017. ISBN: 9780262037068 (hbk).
328 pages. Black and white illustrations.
What do Christopher Alexander, Richard Saul
Wurman, Cedric Price, and Nicholas Negroponte have
in common? According to Molly Wright Steenson, all
four architects incorporated elements of interactivity
and technology into their work thus influencing digital
design. They challenged traditional architectural think-
ing by addressing its computational, cybernetic, and
artificial intelligence dimensions. According to Wright
Steenson, they were anti-architects who would influence
new generations of architectural practice.
Webb, Michael, Michael Sorkin, Mark Wigley, Lebbeus
Woods. Two Journeys. Edited by Ashley Simone; Fore-
word by Kenneth Frampton. Baden, Switzerland: Lars
Müller Publishers, 2018. ISBN-10:3037785543 (hbk). 206
pages. Color illustrations.
Michael Webb, an artist and trained architect who
was part of Archigram, has spent his 60-year career
thinking about the relation between the two disciplines.
He addresses themes such as time, space, and speed
expressed through pencil, collage, and oil paint. The
book includes essays by Frampton, Wigley, Sorkin, and
Woods, along with nearly 200 sumptuous drawings/
collages rooted in analytical thinking and structured
around architectural elements and notational systems.
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DesignIssues: Volume 35, Number 3 Summer 2019
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