Media

Mark Lamster|Essays

If the Wire Cast Was a Football Team

The Baltimore Ravens look pretty formidable going into the AFC Championship game, but I wonder if this squad from Charm City could give them a run for their money.

Debbie Millman|Audio

Jessica Helfand

Jessica Helfand discusses growing up in a family of collectors, her love of visual biography and why history should be more important to designers than it seems to be.

Mark Lamster|Essays

How the West Was Lost

My reviews of two new photography books.

The Editors|Miscellaneous

Books Received: Winter 2009

New books keep piling up here at Design Observer. During this winter season, we thought we'd share some of the many recently published titles we have received over the past couple of months. Maybe you'll find a surprise or two...

Steven Heller|Essays

My Dada

Steven Heller, as a student at SVARobert Hughes once described the weekly paste-up night at the East Village Other as "a Dada experience." The year was 1970 and while none of us who were toiling into the wee hours of the morning at one of …

Chris Pullman|Essays

What I've Learned

Chris Pullman is the only person who can be said to have won not one but two of the highest possible honors from AIGA. The first was the Corporate Leadership Award, which the company he shaped, Boston public broadcasting network WGBH, …

Steven Heller|Essays

History of Aggressive Design Magazines

Neue Grafik, September 1958  Graphic design evolved during the late nineteenth century from a sideline of the printing industry into an autonomous field with its own lore, icons and personalities. The missing link in this evolutionary …

Michael Bierut|Essays

The Four Lessons of Lou Dorfsman

For over 40 years, Lou Dorfsman designed everything at CBS from its advertising to the paper cups in its cafeteria. Getting great work done in giant institution is supposed to be hard. How did he make it look easy?

Dmitri Siegel|Essays

Design by Numbers

Business reporter Stephen Baker’s new book The Numerati explores the way that marketers and retailers are leveraging personal data to create customized experiences and targeted messages. The book details the staggering amount of data we …

The Editors|Miscellaneous

Books Received: Holiday List 2008

New books have been piling up again at Design Observer. For the holiday season, we thought we'd share some of the many recently published titles we have received over the past couple of months. Maybe you'll find a surprise or two...

Michael Bierut|Essays

Mad Men: Pitch Perfect

AMC’s ad agency drama Mad Men, from the producer of the Sopranos, is beginning its second season. Like The Sopranos, the show finds human drama in an unexpected setting. And where The Sopranos had whackings, Mad Men has client …

Steven Heller|Slideshows

Go West, Young Art Director

Cover of West, May 1971, art direction by Mike SalisburyWhen veteran magazine art directors get together to drink mojitos and reminisce about the glory years before advertising pages broke up editorial wells and when covers were based …