Author: Mike Colagrossi / Source: Big Think
Design is all around us in a myriad of forms. From the screen interfaces on your phones and devices to the handles on your shower faucets. We often know instinctively what constitutes great design, there’s an almost ephemeral quality to it. Great design offers comfort, ease of use and a feeling of being in the know and in control.
Bad design on the other hand hits us like an ill-shaped rock – hard to navigate websites, Rube Goldberg machines and a general sense of annoyance and confusion. Design is both a science and an art and everybody is affected by it in some way. Whether you’re a designer or just appreciate design and want to know more, here are the 10 best books on design.
The Design of Everyday Things
In a clear and concise matter, Don Norman writes about the flaws that plague the design of everyday objects, which makes our lives more trouble than they need to be, more inconvenient and sometimes downright dangerous. This was a book written in the late 1980s, but is still relevant today, as it has been updated a few times.
The book isn’t just an exposé of horrid design, but also a tale of how designers in all industries can become better apt to customers’ and end-users’ needs. It’s a must read for any type of designer, as Norman goes into great detail about design methodologies, ideals and psychology. He has many thoughts about how if you can’t figure something out, it’s not always your fault but often the designer’s. His philosophy of design is proper communication and usability, Norman states:
“Eliminate the term human error. Instead talk about communication and interaction. When people collaborate with one another the word error is never used to characterize another person’s utterance.”
About Face: The Essentials of Interaction
Let’s face it, the majority of design today is within the digital field: software design, websites, applications and other mediums of online & digital expression. Alan Cooper & Co.’s About Face is the premier book for interaction design. It covers project processes, goal directed design and everything you could ever need to know about user feedback, controls and comprehensive overview of interaction.
The book is sprawling and deep dives into just about any common UI widget in existence. It’s considered a pillar of learning material for UI/UX designers. While some may get turned off by its length and pedantic explanations, it also serves as an excellent reference book for UX designers.
A Designer’s Art
Paul Rand’s book was published in 1985 and was one of the first of its kind. The renowned graphic designer wanted to create a book that would explain the art of a growing discipline, rather than just show it visually. The book is packed with personal views on design, peppered with his expansive portfolio and also cites a number of renowned academics.
Rand was another designer who felt that communication is absolutely key when it comes to design. He states:
“Graphic design which evokes the symmetria of Vitruvius, the dynamic symmetry of Hambidge, the asymmetry of Mondrian; which is a good gestalt, generated by intuition or by computer, by invention or by a system of coordinates is not good design if it does not communicate.”
Beauty and symmetrical supremacy doesn’t mean a whole lot if it can’t communicate its intended message. For students of design, teachers and professionals, this is a book that is great for explaining and expressing the creative communication of ideals.
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