Category: Essays

Steven Heller|Essays

Emil Pirchan and the Golden Age of German Posters

A brief look at the life and prodigious career of designer Emil Pirchan

Bruce Willen|Essays

In Defense of Inconvenience

Seductively efficient, easy-to-use products are the gold standard within design and tech. But is this convenient, frictionless user experience actually what we’ve been looking for?

Steven Heller|Essays

Commencement Redux

On the off-chance that a college or university might invite me to take part in their graduation festivities, each spring I write a commencement speech.

Steven Heller|Essays

Watch Out What You Day-Dream For

"I used to day dream a lot about inventing things that were never realized, like an interactive television where you could stick your hand through the top of the set and move the characters around or remove them at will."

Steven Heller|Essays

Hudson Yards Lays an Egg

On Thomas Heatherwick’s much anticipated giant honeycomb, 150 foot-tall “Vessel” structure, the centerpiece of the Hudson Yards outdoor plaza, bathed in reflective copper-steel, comprised of 154 staircases and 80 …

Laura Scherling|Essays

A Tale of Long Island City: Between Industrialization, Innovation, and Gentrification

The multi-faceted aspects of development in Long Island City, with creative and technological development deeply ingrained in it’s rich urban identity and history.

Steven Heller|Essays

A Great Design Staycation: Holiday Magazine

On what defined the incredible art direction of Frank Zachary.

Steven Heller|Essays

HAIR: A Design Problem

According to the Department of Labor Statistics, hair design is big business.

Steven Heller|Essays

Confessions of a Letterhead

I refer to the subset of ephemera collectors who are fanatics about the collection of printed letterhead and billhead design.

Steven Heller|Essays

Devine Intervention

Steven Heller on childhood heros.

Ken Gordon|Essays

In the Future, Life Online Could Be “The Trial”—Unless We Design Something Better

The Trial is seen as prophetic by many.

Steven Heller|Essays

COME IN WE’RE OPEN and Other Signs of the Times

What the old school printers practiced was no-nonsense yet skillful communicative typography, lettering, and illustration, sometimes with a dollop of wit to hold the viewer’s interest.