The Design Observer Twenty





Debbie Millman | Design Matters with Debbie Millman
Jason Reynolds
Adrian Shaughnessy | Books
Hello Human
Cindy Chastain, Jessica Helfand, Ellen McGirt + Lee Moreau | Conversation
Design Observer x Mastercard
Jessica Helfand | Interview
Henry Leutwyler: International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum
| Books
The New Art of Making Books
Augusta Pownall | Books
Rational Simplicity: Rudolph de Harak, Graphic Designer
Steven Heller | Essays
WAR! What’s it Really Good For?
Alexandra Lange | Essays
Standard Operating Procedure
Steven Heller | Essays
The Thrill is Gone: A Collector’s Lament
Jessica Helfand + Ellen McGirt | Audio
S9E3: Astra Taylor
The Editors | Books
Self-Reliance
Laetitia Wolff | Essays
Design is Capital: Five Lessons I Learned from Lille
| Books
Origins of Design Patents
Susan Yelavich | Books
Beings: Unruly Things, Golems, Cyborgs
Jessica Helfand | Essays
Under The Microscope
William Drenttel | Essays
I Was A Mad Man
Francisco Laranjo | Essays
Critical Graphic Design: Critical of What?
Susan Morris | Essays
Design+ at Sundance, Slamdance, and the NYFF
Andrew Shea | Essays
Flies in Urinals: The Value of Design Disruptions
Eugenia Bell | Essays
Eliot Noyes
Adrian Shaughnessy | Essays
Are JPEGs the New Album Covers?
Jessica Helfand + Ellen McGirt | Audio
S9E4: Na Kim
Connect 4 | Audio
Min Lew and Zaiah Sampson: Finding Your Creative Voice
Jason Hill | Books
Artist as Reporter
Jessica Helfand | Audio
S9E01: Ellen Mirojnick
Sean Adams | Books
How Design Makes Us Think
Laura Scherling | Essays
How Micromobility Vehicles are Redesigning Global Transportation Systems
Alexandra Lange | Essays
Kicked A Building Lately?


Observed


Is the future of refugee housing permanence?

It’s Pablo-matic: Picasso According to Hannah Gadsby,” explores Picasso‘s legacy through a feminist lens, asking if, when, and how modern audiences can separate the artist’s work from his infamously misogynistic behavior.

Quite possibly the most fascinating job opportunity in design right now.

Jessica Helfand on using AI as a tool to reverse-engineer a historical narrative.

Rethinking the city.

Rethinking the planet.

The problems of the user interface, one streaming service at a time. More here.

Urban design, with safety in mind. And that includes parks.

Think design thinking is over? Think again.

A museum renames a vegetable still life by Van Gogh that identified the wrong kind of allium.

Graphic design and typography obsessives—look no further!

“The challenge isn’t just that our systems default to keeping the “unlike” out,” notes Jens Martin Skibsted, “but we are, rather, in need of an interconnected worldview that appreciates the existence of other realities and contexts.”

Neville Brody’s new monograph (his THIRD)—covering his work for Nike, Coca-Cola, Tate Modern and Channel 4, as well as various informational graphics and magazine editorials—will be published next month by Thames&Hudson.

Milan Design Week wants to know your most memorable experience. Ours is easily Shaped by Water, an immersive experience exploring water as a source of inspiration for design. Co-created by Ivy Ross and her design team in collaboration with the water, light, and sound artist, Lachlan Turczan. Vote for your favorite here.

Non-profit design advocacy agency Where are the Black Designers? (WATBD?) has announced a year-long partnership with digital product studio Ustwo.

“He was mulling a career in graphic design when, at 17, he saw a searing image that would change the course of his life.” The American photographer Kwame Brathwaite has died. Considered the catalyst fo the “black is beautiful” movement in the 1960s, Braithwaite’s career spanned art, music, and more. He was 85.

The subtley, simplicity, and curious symbolism of the humble serif.

After a career of looking at pictures, she is now making them. George Gendron talks to Kathy Ryan, longtime director of photography at The New York Times Magazine.

COLLINS co-founder and Chief Creative Officer Brian Collins and co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Leland Maschmeyer will speak on branding and creativity at OFFF Barcelona this weekend.

“I can’t imagine any person with a background in graphic design made that thing without a committee of bland politicians sanding away its edges until they felt safe enough to unveil that to the public.” Behold: Logogate!

Black designers, curators, and more.

How do you stop deep-sea trawlers from harming ecosystems? Commission 10-ton marble sculptures and place them on the ocean floor, of course.

For ten years, Matt Needle has reimagined every best picture award nominee by redesigning their posters.

Coca-Cola...and art?



Jobs | June 10