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Writing & research for graphic designers
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1 2
3 4
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section 1
the three r’s : reading, writing, and research part one : reading
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23
an old public service TV commercial, “fundamental.” It is not
enough to read only captions in a visual book. The text is there
to be read too.
While it is perfectly allowable to skim or glean information
from a text, actually reading an article or a book from begin-
ning to end is ultimately a more pleasurable and cognitively
valuable experience. Yet whichever way one chooses to read—
front to back, back to front, middle to wherever—the goals are
the same: enjoyment and knowledge.
Yet this is a quid pro quo situation. If an author gives you
those pleasures, as a writer you should be able to return the
favor—or strive to do so—for others. Reading provides models.
Since different writers work in varied styles, it is likely that
reading a variety of authors will add to your skill set: Some of
their approaches will inform your own proclivities. I am not
advocating blatant copying. But if the shoe (or approach) fits . . .
well, borrow techniques that will allow for the most expressive
flexibility. Writing is about finding a voice. Personality is key,
but structure is essential. Reading others’ work can help build
the foundation for that structure.
Reading should not be a chore. But it can be a muscle-toning
exercise. Reading other writers’ work invariably triggers one’s
own writing. Emulating another writer is as valuable (and
flattering) as enjoying his text, and is sometimes unavoidable.
What to Read
In the fictitious twenty-fourth century, as a respite from
seeking out new worlds, Star Trek’s Jean-Luc Picard sits in
his captain’s seat with a rare, leather-bound relic in his hand.
Despite predictions to the contrary, the book in the future is
still viable (at least in science fiction). Yet as boundless as it
may be, the definition of a book may demand revision. Digital
“readers” are making inroads and the iPad is the future. Yet
even in the most futuristic science fiction projections, the book
continues to hold a place of honor.
You are reading this book (and have gotten this far) because
you want to write about design. So, in addition to reading your
favorite fiction and nonfiction, poetry and verse, how-to and
self-help, children’s and young adult, as well as newspapers
and magazines in whichever media you choose—in print or
5
What to read influences how to write.
Here are four of the leading design
magazines known for smart writing
and exciting design.
1 IDEA from Japan serves a regular diet
of international news and features.
2 Eye from the U.K. balances graphic,
motion and dimensional design with
a strong leaning toward history.
3 Communication Arts from the U.S. has
long advocated the interdisciplinary
side of graphic design.
4 Print, the oldest running graphic
design magazine, views popular
culture through the graphic lens.
5 Bibliographic, is a survey of 100 of the
most significant graphic design text
and picture books. Although not the
canon, it comes close to being the
optimum reading list.
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on Kindle, iPad, or Nook—you should also read some design
writing (including the case studies in this volume).
You might, however, want to start with design history as
your grounding in the field. Just three decades ago there was
not a single tome devoted to the history of graphic design.
Then, in 1983, Philip B. Meggs (1942–2002) published the
first edition of A History of Graphic Design. His premier work
chronicled the first image (Lascaux), first printing press
(Guttenberg), and first typefaces (Latins), and provided the
first accepted taxonomies for Western graphic design move-
ments and styles. His book was adopted as the primary history
text and stood alone for more than ten years. In 1994, Richard
Hollis’s Graphic Design: A Concise History appeared, offering
a more digested but no less insightful account of the early,
orthodox and post-modern legacy. A few supplementary
histories were also published, including my own Graphic
Style: From Victorian to Post-Modern (1988), coauthored with
Seymour Chwast, and Nine Pioneers in Graphic Design (1989)
by R. Roger Remington and Barbara J. Hodik. Each cut the
pie a little smaller. Graphic Style (now in its third edition)
looked at the continuum of changing style and Nine Pioneers
analyzed American design through its leading form givers.
That was it for more than a decade.
It never rains, but it pours. Commencing in 2004 a publishing
deluge began. The French poster historian Alain Weill published
Graphic Design: A History, a slim book that summarized much
of the same ground as Meggs and Hollis. Two years later,
in 2006, another accomplished French design historian,
Roxane Jubert, published Typography and Graphic Design:
From Antiquity to the Present in English and in French,
which covered much the same material, but also uncovered
historical ground from a European perspective (like sign
lettering during the German occupation of France). A
year later, in 2007, Stephen J. Eskilson’s Graphic Design:
A New History, a hotly debated book that, while covering
much the same turf as Meggs, Hollis, and Jubert, saw graphic
design through an “art” historical lens (an expanded second
edition was published in 2012). In 2009, Johanna Drucker
and Emily McVarish’s Graphic Design History: A Critical Guide
was released, following a more traditional textbook format and
focusing on how technologies altered design—it is also
whittling away at Meggs’
hold (the fifth edition
published in 2012) on
textbook dominance.
That same year, Graphic
Design, Referenced, by Armin
Vit and Bryony Gomez
Palacio, was released as an
encyclopedic collection of
brief design history facts.
Just when it appeared—at
a time when the graphic
design history publishing
Graphic Design: A New History proves that there are many ways to
write about design history.
Just My Type is a witty romp
through the world of “fonts” for
both the insider and outsider.
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section 1
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(Text)
25
market couldn’t be any more saturated—along comes The
Story of Graphic Design by Patrick Cramsie in 2010.
One telling of history was enough? Despite variations in
voice and perspective, are there not only so many ways of
carving up the pie without redundancy? These omnibus books
have been written and rewritten, so who needs another graphic
design history book? Frankly, we all do. I believe the field is all
the richer for distinct viewpoints and new discoveries.
In addition to these histories, essay anthologies are edited
samplers of design thinking and commentary from various
writers. There are many such books in and out of print, but
single- and multiple-authored books from Allworth Press,
Princeton Architectural Press, and Yale University Press, to
name a few of the leading anthology publishers, will give the
neophyte writer a balanced selection of styles and methods—
and an assortment of different styles and voices.
Illustrated design books are too often designated “eye candy,”
and while a number of them serve as pictorial records, most are
inspiration for other designers, and therefore are essential to
design practice and cultural study. An excellent book on
design books is Jason Godfrey’s Bibliographic: 100 Classic
Graphic Design Books, which collects and comments on many
of the key texts and monographs.
While most graphic design books are usually produced for
a professional or student audience, even this should not be a
stigma; many such books are reliquaries of popular culture—
and appeal to wider audiences (whether they know it or not).
As your reading list grows, let’s not forget vintage (and
antique) books. They are rich repositories of design knowledge
as relevant today as they were when first published. Seven
Designers Look at Trademark Design (1952), edited by Egbert
Jacobson, may survey the work of designers such as the late
A spread on the Dada movement from Graphic Design: A New History.
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Writing & research for graphic designers
(Text)
24
on Kindle, iPad, or Nook—you should also read some design
writing (including the case studies in this volume).
You might, however, want to start with design history as
your grounding in the field. Just three decades ago there was
not a single tome devoted to the history of graphic design.
Then, in 1983, Philip B. Meggs (1942–2002) published the
first edition of A History of Graphic Design. His premier work
chronicled the first image (Lascaux), first printing press
(Guttenberg), and first typefaces (Latins), and provided the
first accepted taxonomies for Western graphic design move-
ments and styles. His book was adopted as the primary history
text and stood alone for more than ten years. In 1994, Richard
Hollis’s Graphic Design: A Concise History appeared, offering
a more digested but no less insightful account of the early,
orthodox and post-modern legacy. A few supplementary
histories were also published, including my own Graphic
Style: From Victorian to Post-Modern (1988), coauthored with
Seymour Chwast, and Nine Pioneers in Graphic Design (1989)
by R. Roger Remington and Barbara J. Hodik. Each cut the
pie a little smaller. Graphic Style (now in its third edition)
looked at the continuum of changing style and Nine Pioneers
analyzed American design through its leading form givers.
That was it for more than a decade.
It never rains, but it pours. Commencing in 2004 a publishing
deluge began. The French poster historian Alain Weill published
Graphic Design: A History, a slim book that summarized much
of the same ground as Meggs and Hollis. Two years later,
in 2006, another accomplished French design historian,
Roxane Jubert, published Typography and Graphic Design:
From Antiquity to the Present in English and in French,
which covered much the same material, but also uncovered
historical ground from a European perspective (like sign
lettering during the German occupation of France). A
year later, in 2007, Stephen J. Eskilson’s Graphic Design:
A New History, a hotly debated book that, while covering
much the same turf as Meggs, Hollis, and Jubert, saw graphic
design through an “art” historical lens (an expanded second
edition was published in 2012). In 2009, Johanna Drucker
and Emily McVarish’s Graphic Design History: A Critical Guide
was released, following a more traditional textbook format and
focusing on how technologies altered design—it is also
whittling away at Meggs’
hold (the fifth edition
published in 2012) on
textbook dominance.
That same year, Graphic
Design, Referenced, by Armin
Vit and Bryony Gomez
Palacio, was released as an
encyclopedic collection of
brief design history facts.
Just when it appeared—at
a time when the graphic
design history publishing
Graphic Design: A New History proves that there are many ways to
write about design history.
Just My Type is a witty romp
through the world of “fonts” for
both the insider and outsider.
(Ray)
(Fogra 29_WF)Job:08-28858 Title:RP-Writing & Research for Graphic Designers
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section 1
the three r’s : reading, writing, and research part one : reading
(Text)
25
market couldn’t be any more saturated—along comes The
Story of Graphic Design by Patrick Cramsie in 2010.
One telling of history was enough? Despite variations in
voice and perspective, are there not only so many ways of
carving up the pie without redundancy? These omnibus books
have been written and rewritten, so who needs another graphic
design history book? Frankly, we all do. I believe the field is all
the richer for distinct viewpoints and new discoveries.
In addition to these histories, essay anthologies are edited
samplers of design thinking and commentary from various
writers. There are many such books in and out of print, but
single- and multiple-authored books from Allworth Press,
Princeton Architectural Press, and Yale University Press, to
name a few of the leading anthology publishers, will give the
neophyte writer a balanced selection of styles and methods—
and an assortment of different styles and voices.
Illustrated design books are too often designated “eye candy,”
and while a number of them serve as pictorial records, most are
inspiration for other designers, and therefore are essential to
design practice and cultural study. An excellent book on
design books is Jason Godfrey’s Bibliographic: 100 Classic
Graphic Design Books, which collects and comments on many
of the key texts and monographs.
While most graphic design books are usually produced for
a professional or student audience, even this should not be a
stigma; many such books are reliquaries of popular culture—
and appeal to wider audiences (whether they know it or not).
As your reading list grows, let’s not forget vintage (and
antique) books. They are rich repositories of design knowledge
as relevant today as they were when first published. Seven
Designers Look at Trademark Design (1952), edited by Egbert
Jacobson, may survey the work of designers such as the late
A spread on the Dada movement from Graphic Design: A New History.
(Ray)
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Writing & research for graphic designers
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26
Paul Rand, Herbert Bayer, Will Burtin, and Alvin Lustig,
but in some cases the logos are still extant and in others they
provide valuable case studies in success and failure. Graphic
Design: Visual Comparisons (1959), written by Alan Fletcher,
Colin Forbes, and Bob Gill during their pre-Pentagram days,
is a collection of disparate yet corresponding images that is as
inspiring for young designers now as it was for the young back
when it was published.
Who doesn’t like to read magazines? Over the past couple
of years, a few important graphic design magazines in the
United States and abroad have folded or severely reduced
their pages. A once bountiful field of design publications is
migrating to digital formats. Although a few old standbys
are still plugging away, the successful magazines cannot
resist digital pressures, and new digital outlets, such as Design
Observer (http://designobserver.com), are wellsprings of writing.
Graphic design magazines, such as Print, Communication Arts,
Eye, Idea, and Baseline, as well as academic journals including
Design Issues and Culture, are evidence of the development of
styles, propagation of standards, and canonization of the profes-
sion. Although current periodicals have come a long way since
The Second edition of Graphic Design: A History,
enabled the author to fix the mistakes and
add material that was subsequently researched.
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the late nineteenth century periodicals, the common editorial
mandate to report, analyze, critique, and showcase contempo-
rary and avant-garde achievement is what makes these journals
integral to the study and practice of graphic design.
How to Read
All of us read sequentially—in the West usually from left
to right. But we also read in spurts, jumping from line to
line, paragraph to paragraph, and page to page. We are torn
between this phrase and that idea. Our media are print and
screen, with more of the latter coming into play. There are,
perhaps, too many options today. Attention is compromised
every time we click on a hotlink, or turn a printed page and
remember something we forgot or need to do. We have to
learn how to read again, especially if we want to write. We
must become reacquainted with the sublime solitude of
spending time absorbing the static page. Letters and words
need not take flight or ring-a-ding to make us take notice.
Reading is receiving information in a contemplative way.
Learning (or relearning) how to read means changing habits.
If you are a skimmer, slow down. If you are a fragmenter,
take in more. If you are a multitasker, focus on one medium
or a single text, if only for a finite time frame. If you read
in a linear, thoughtful, and absorbing way, well, then, good
for you.
Where to read is also part of this equation. Be comfortable,
but not excessively relaxed. Don’t lie in bed or on the couch,
like a slug. Sit up straight, preferably at a desk or in a chair.
Unless you are reading before bed in order to fall asleep, your
mission is to stay awake and be productive. Slow down, but
don’t drift off.
Taking Notes
One way to apply the brakes, to absorb more, and to focus
intently is to take notes. Whether they are detailed or in
shorthand, underlined or highlighted, or on sticky notes
or notepads, jotting down or making extensive notes will be
beneficial over time. (I routinely find marginalia made long
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