Summer Reading Resources for Creatives
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Although you never need an excuse to buy more books, summer makes a particularly good one. With longer and lazier days, a stack of good new reads is one way to stay inspired, keep informed, and escape without leaving the comfort of your beach towel. This round-up includes recently published and forthcoming titles that will appeal to creatives of all (tan) stripes.
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How Design Makes Us Think: And Feel And Do Things
With chapters on Seduction, Efficiency, Love, Humor, Intelligence, and more, Sean Adams’ newest book examines how design brings meaning, evokes emotion, and influences the way we are as people and as a society. From historical artifacts and paintings to recent posters and product packaging, this book offers a brilliantly organized collection of examples to trace the impact of design on our culture and psychology. As tempting as it may be to glance through the visuals, don’t miss the words. Adams’ characteristic intelligent wit shines through in his commentary and provides illuminating details and stories that make the examples even more memorable. What will this book make you think and feel and do?
The Big Leap
If you’ve just started freelancing full-time, you need this book. If you’ve been freelancing but are looking to grow your business, you need this book. If you’re even thinking about freelancing or starting your own business, you need this book. Basically, all new or restless freelancers should get this book! Martina Flor has packed years of practical advice on how to launch and build your own flourishing creative business in the modern world—this is the kind of advice that will save you untold hours, dollars, and headaches. While this book is particularly relevant to graphic designers, typographers, and illustrators, its advice can easily be applied to other creative professions. Flor covers the full spectrum of what it takes to start and scale a freelance business, with lots of examples for context and real talk on the challenges and advantages for various decision points you may face.
Extra Bold: A Feminist, Inclusive, Anti-racist, Nonbinary Field Guide for Graphic Designers
In the right hands, this book will be a catalyst. Extra Bold isn’t just for feminists or LGBTQ+ designers or those in ethnic minorities. It is a must-read for any human working in the design field. With honesty and humor, interviews and infographics, history and future-forward advice, this “field guide” is a timely resource for navigating and leading a career in design today. Eye-opening, empowering, and, at times, laugh-out-loud funny (especially the “Emotional Labor Invoice”).
Identity Designed
David Airey’s latest book on branding is packed with gems of advice for any visual identity designers. This collection of case stories shows how different design studios approach branding projects. The interview texts are refreshingly honest and transparent, detailing everything from pricing to research and how the design studio presented its ideas to their clients. The text describes the process from start to finish, while the (many) images feature the final results. Gray boxes at the end of each interview highlight the “key takeaway” advice given from each studio, helping to make this book an accessible, practical resource for students and professionals newer to the branding scene.
Sketch & Finish
“I’d rather consider a sketch as the mind’s introduction to a creative journey. It is, by many standards, ambiguous. Its primary purpose may be to create an opportunity for a path to emerge,” writes Milton Glaser in Sketch & Finish, one of his last publishing projects before his death in 2020. If you like “before and after” reveals (and who doesn’t), Sketch & Finish is an absolute treat. Side-by-side images of Glaser’s early sketches and final art show not only the transformation of each work but also hint at the thinking and decisions Glaser might have had along the way. It’s like getting a behind-the-scenes studio tour from one of the greatest illustrator-designers of our time.
Two Worlds: Above and Below the Sea
Great photographs tell stories and reveal worlds unseen. National Geographic photographer David Doubilet’s book of stunning photographs does just that—it shows you our beautiful planet from an angle most of us rarely take: half above water and half underwater. Doubilet’s rich and immersive photos take you from ice floes to coral reefs and are accompanied by short descriptions of the subject matter. As Doubilet writes in the preface, “These photographs invite you to look through the surface, imagine, dream, and come to know the sea.”
Own It
Own It is a collection of inspirational reflections on everything from awareness to zigzags by the notable fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg. With its dictionary-like A to Z format, this brightly colored little book is perfect for dipping into when you could use a fresh perspective or some wise insights. Diane von Furstenberg’s “definitions” and commentary are at least as elegant, versatile, and timeless as the clothing she has designed.
Inspiration and Process in Design
Volumes:
The value of an excellent monograph isn’t simply that you can enjoy an overview of someone’s life works—an excellent monograph also tells a story of professional progress and personal philosophy. Inspiration and Process in Design is a growing series of monographs conveniently sized for reading and reference (not your typical coffee table behemoth). Each volume is full of colorful exhibits, spanning a wide diversity of work produced by each featured creative professional. Some contain more written insights and commentary (Louise Fili and Herbert Bayer) while others let you immerse in the visuals (Seymour Chwast and Milton Glaser). Either way, close study of the masters is always rewarded, and these slim, tastefully curated monographs are a perfect way to get started and get inspired.
Patented
A humongous delight of a book, Patented presents one thousand objects over a century of design…all through their patents (with illustrations). See a cream whipper from 1901. Or a portable reading light from the 1920s. An Oscar Mayer “automotive vehicle” shaped like a hotdog. Or the original designs of things you use today, like tape dispensers. But this book is much more than just a gathering of patent documentation for random things—it’s like a museum of social artifacts, shown in their original form. Patented is a treat for historians, product designers, and inventors…or aspiring inventors.
Introduction to Three-Dimensional Design
Kimberly Elam’s newest instructional is the first-ever book to teach graphic designers the essentials of 3D design with drawing and model projects. With photographs, illustrations, and computer-simulated models, Elam shows how the principles of 3D design work to achieve various effects and manifest as tactile objects and art. This is a highly relevant and recommended resource for anyone interested in 3D illustration, 3D printing, 3D animation, collage, carving, pottery, and sculpture.
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