The People’s Graphic Design Archive

What do all these people have in common?

• A graphic designer looking for inspiration
• A professor hunting for historical examples of a minor artistic era
• A historian preserving an overlooked element of graphic design history
• A collector memorializing a treasured belonging
• A student searching for a unique topic for a research project
• A pop-culture enthusiast just hoping to find something unique

Answer: You might find any or all of them at the People’s Graphic Design Archive (PGDA), a project intended to make graphic design history accessible to everyone (Figure 1). I sat down with Briar Levit, associate professor of graphic design at Portland State University and co-director of the Archive, to learn more about the history and purpose of this innovative resource and to share some tips for using it effectively.

A Brief History of the PGDA

The People’s Graphic Design Archive is a crowdsourced database of graphic design history. Co-directed by four female graphic designers and educators (Figure 2), the project has several aims: to preserve ephemeral pieces of graphic design history, to expand and diversify the current canon of graphic design, and to make graphic design history accessible to anyone who wants to engage with it. To these ends, the Archive is a place where anyone can upload a piece of graphic design work that they created or discovered. As the Archive announces on

its front page, “it includes finished projects, process, correspondence, oral histories, articles, and other material in the form of images, documents, videos, audio, as well as links to other relevant archives and websites” (Figure 3).

The PGDA was the brainchild of Louise Sandhaus, an award-winning graphic designer and professor at California Institute of the Arts. More than eight years ago, Sandhaus was working on her book Earthquakes, Mudslides, Fires & Riots: California & Graphic Design, 1936–1986, which reflected on the distinctive work of Californian graphic designers and how their location affected their design. “While she was working on Earthquakes,” Levit explained, “she came across so many materials that wouldn’t fit into the book. And she just knew that she wanted to share them in some way. Earlier, she had had a situation where she went to the AIGA [American Institute of Graphic Arts] in Los Angeles and asked to look at some pieces in their archive and they said, ‘Oh, we just threw those away two weeks ago.’ So, she thought, ‘I gotta do something!’”  Sandhaus presented the idea for an online archive to a group of educators and curators of graphic design history, which put her in contact with Briar Levit and Brockett Horne, who immediately got involved. Soon afterwards, they connected with the founders of Fonts in Use, an online independent archive of typography. With their help and some inspiration from the format of the Fonts in Use website, the People’s Graphic Design Archive got up and running. The co-directors of the PGDA were very deliberate when it came to the design of their website. “Our site works like any other archive. You can just get on there and dig around. But we have a more pleasant viewing experience than a lot of archives. There were some off-the-shelf options for wikis and things like that, but we wanted more control and for the experience to be more enjoyable aesthetically. We’re designers!” The PGDA’s website is clean and spacious, with an eye-catching color palette, elegant typography, and a color-coded tagging system (Figure 4).   The People’s Graphic Design Archive is a digital-only archive, a deliberate choice, according to Levit. “It’s a lot harder and more expensive to collect physical objects. You have to have the space and the money. Only a few people can see it—the people that are able to get to your space,” she says. While the PGDA does require server space and funds to pay its staff, it can also grow exponentially, far beyond the confines of a physical archive.  There are a few downsides, of course. Levit points out that at a physical archive, a historian can get up close and personal with the object, experiencing its materials firsthand. She also mentions the issue of scale, which is difficult to represent accurately or viscerally in an online database. (Although, you can add dimensions to your PGDA upload!) But ultimately, the digital nature of the Archive goes hand in hand with its mission: to make graphic design history as accessible as possible for everyone. Beyond accessibility, a major purpose of the Archive is to expand and diversify graphic design history. Levit, who has a background in women’s history, explains that part of what drew her to the project was the opportunity to include people whose work may not have been recognized or categorized as graphic design. As Levit explains, “[There are] groups whose work maybe was archived, but was archived in a different place, not in an art way or a graphic design way. In the case of a person I researched, Ellen Raskin, she designed a lot of book covers. She started as a straight graphic designer, then moved on to doing illustration for kids’ books, then ultimately was just writing her own books and illustrating them and became quite well known for that. And it was sort of like people forgot that she was also an excellent designer, so all her work is archived in children’s libraries’ archives.” In the PGDA, there is no such categorizing: All of Ellen Raskin’s work can be archived in the same way and place (Figure 5).  As another example of an interesting piece of graphic design history that would be considered outside of the traditional canon, Levit showed me an entry she made that she’s particularly fond of. The piece in Figure 6 is a wall decoration commemorating the birth of a child, hand-lettered by an unknown woman in 1893. Although pieces like this are often dismissed as household crafts or frivolous personal items, Levit argues that this hand-lettering is just as much a part of graphic design history as any other piece in the Archive’s collection.  This quality of the PGDA allows for a radically democratic approach to graphic design history. On the Archive, you’ll find the concept art for the Nike logo, a catalogue of French hats, an autobiographical quilt, and train tickets from the 1940s, all presented as equally valuable parts of the graphic design canon. Famous designers, unknown artists, one-of-a-kind works, everyday materials, old things, new things, traditional design, experimental design—it all belongs in the Archive. 

Preservation, Not Perfection

Now you understand the purpose of the People’s Graphic Design Archive, but how do you use it? If you’re coming to the Archive for research or inspiration, the answer is easy: Just dive in and start exploring! The front page offers a random assortment of interesting pieces, which you can sort using the menu in the far-right corner of the screen (Figure 7). Sort by Contribution Date, Item Date, Most Discussed, or Most Viewed if you just want to see what the PGDA has to offer. If you’re looking for something more specific, you can use the search bar or click the Topics button to see a range of clickable tags. 

If you’re interested in uploading content to the PGDA, there are some important steps you have to follow. But Levit says that ease of uploading is one of the Archive’s highest priorities: “The idea is for anyone to feel comfortable uploading. We have a motto: preservation, not perfection. Archives in general have this association with formality and restriction and elitism, and we’re trying to remove those barriers.” Any interesting piece of graphic design is welcome on the Archive, with very few requirements for uploading. As Levit says, “Most designers have stuff in their drawers that they’ve kept for some reason because they liked the typography or design—like a train ticket, for example. And those are the kinds of things that we’re welcoming on here.” There are some basic requirements for all uploads to the Archive. A picture of the item is necessary, but any image size or quality is acceptable. A new upload must have a title, but if the piece doesn’t have one, you can provide a short description instead (such as “Potato Chip Packaging for Interstate Biscuit Company”). Next, you must describe what you know about the item and how it’s related to graphic design history. You must also note where the image came from, even if it’s from your own collection. Any further information, however, is completely optional. You can add related links, the date of creation, custom tags, the format, techniques used, dimensions, and where the piece was created. The credits function is especially detailed (Figure 8), offering the option to add not only the designer—after all, designers rarely work alone—but also a publisher, an illustrator, a lettering artist, an editor, and even a calligrapher, thesis advisor, or cartographer! When it comes to what kinds of content should be uploaded, the People’s Graphic Design Archive prides itself on being as open as possible. That means relatively few restrictions on what is “worth” being archived. Perhaps the only hard-and-fast rule is that all content uploaded must be at least ten years old, which prevents the Archive from becoming a portfolio site. Of course, as with any internet-based, open-source project, there will be some questionable material submitted, so there has to be some oversight. But Levit says that outside of offensive material, the bar for entry is pretty low. One of the most common questions about what belongs on the Archive relates to works that are right on the line between art and design. But Levit says that as long as the person uploading the item is able to add more context to justify its inclusion in graphic design history, it belongs on the site. For the sake of guiding principles, though, she was willing to give a few pointers. For example, she says, works that feature typography and lettering are nearly always within the bounds of design, and even pieces without explicit text may count if they still are a means of communication. Works of fine art are often intended as an inward reflection, while works of design are reaching out to communicate something. As an example, Levit points to quilts used in the Underground Railroad that have patterns and symbols meant to indicate directions to those escaping from slavery. “That would count!” she says. “That’s graphic design.” The Archive allows anyone to not only upload whatever they like, but also discuss it in the comments under each item. This allows users to share their knowledge, and sometimes even their own firsthand accounts of their work or the work of their colleagues. Levit says that she hopes that as time passes, histories of various items will emerge as people conduct further research using these pieces. Allowing users to add their own information to entries also takes the burden of editing the Archive off of its staff. “We don’t edit people’s posts,” Levit explains. “The only thing I edit are tags, if there are tags that are just adding more noise. Sometimes people add tags that are like graphic design—that’s a little vague! But I never edit someone’s text. If someone sees something wrong with it, they can say something in the comments.”

Looking Ahead

What’s next for the People’s Graphic Design Archive? Three out of the four co-directors are educators, and Levit sees the education field as being one of the clearest user bases for the Archive. “Teachers can integrate this into their classrooms as a way to have students engage and participate with history instead of just experiencing history as something to be looked at or read. There can be something really valuable about saying that the materials that you find important are also valuable to share.” But Levit also hopes for more engagement from other academics doing research in history or design, as well as more use from designers looking for inspiration. One advantage of the Archive, as opposed to other more mainstream sources of design inspiration like Pinterest, is the variety it can offer. Levitt says she hopes that using the Archive might allow designers to uncover styles and aesthetics that they might not have otherwise encountered. For example, although most people might have an idea of what kinds of fonts, colors, and other design elements they would associate with the 1970s, a look through the Archive shows works from that era outside of the mainstream, from lesser-known designers. Outside of promoting the site and making improvements in functionality, though, Levit thinks the future of the Archive is up to its users. “It’s not our Archive. We’re just here to facilitate the uploads. We want people to take ownership of the Archive, whether through uploading independently or by hosting an add-a-thon with friends or colleagues. You don’t need permission—the site is there!”