The Good Design Book

Design Revolution Roadshow

I had the chance to visit with Emily Pilloton today. Her Design Revolution Roadshow Airstream trailer was parked outside of CCA, offering students and any other passers by a glimpse into the world of industrial design for the greater good. Emily’s passion and conviction are enviable — rivaled only by her deftly eloquent advocacy (for proof see her easily handle Stephen Colbert’s Q&A on last week’s Colbert Report).

Without question, Emily is her generation’s ambassador for good design, hands-on problem solving, and just plain giving a damn. I think she came along just in time, too.

We’re doing a little Q&A with Emily for the book, and I snapped her portrait while I was at it. The one above is an outtake, but she looked good in all of them. If you’re in the Bay Area and want to see the exhibit and meet Emily in person, head out to the roadshow kickoff Thursday night.

I’ll see you there.

Layout Sneak Peek

So, design-wise, here’s how the book is shaping up. I’ve picked five random spreads (below) to give you a sense of how we’re handling the work. Some spreads are dedicated to a single project, such as Office’s wonderful work for 826 Valencia (top) or the collaborative effort between Volume, Inc and Mende Design for Southern Exposure Gallery.

Most projects don’t actually receive their own spread, but almost all occupy their own page. A few spreads — like the very bottom one shown here with work by Stefan Sagmeister — are given over to a single image.

Sometime next week I’ll drop in a peek at some of the text pages, interviews and case studies.

Purely by coincidence, much of the text on these spreads is out of frame but trust me, we’re writing about everything.

Good Friday: Michael Osborne

There’s quite a bit to report with the book today. The last few outstanding files came in today from Mende Design, Margo Chase, Adam Larson and others.

After a quick chat with my editor, I headed over to Michael Osborne’s studio for an inspiring and thoughtful interview. Michael runs MOD, teaches at the Academy of Art* in San Francisco and is the founder of Joey’s Corner. Named for his son — Joseph Michael Osborne, who tragically passed at the age of 14 — Joey’s Corner is a nonprofit design studio that provides pro bono services to other nonprofit organizations. Michael’s is an uplifting story and one I’m touched and humbled to be able to share with you in the book.

The photo above is from our visit. We’re doing as much of our own photography as possible for the book (this is one of the outtakes). Here Michael is holding a photo of Joey and a sheet of stamps featuring the Joey’s Corner logo.

While I was there, I also had a chance to catch up with Joey’s Corner designer Katy McCauley. I know Katy from Project M (small world) and she was also the winner of our “guess how many entries” contest back in August. Speaking of Project M, I got a first look at Tim Belonax’s writeup of that inspiring program today as well.

Returning to the office, I reviewed divider page designs with Tim and our intern Reena. As you may remember from an earlier post, the chapter dividers feature a collage of represented projects. After a little exploration, we decided to stick to that plan, but we’re including alternate shots and details of the featured projects. It’s a subtle shift, but I think it will really help augment the book with both depth and intimacy. In addition to simply including additional shots of the projects, we’re often including images that reveal part of the process behind them.

Next I hopped on the phone for a chat with Mike Fretto of Rosa Loves to get a little more background for his case study. Mike’s just about the nicest guy you’ll ever talk to.

My 18-year old cousin popped in shortly afterward, putting an end to the day’s work. He’s visiting from the UK and planning a road trip from Atlanta back to San Francisco. I think I convinced him to volunteer at Pie Lab along the way.

I got in a little more writing this evening. It’s 10:22 now and I’m calling it a day. It was a jam-packed day capping a jam-packed week for the soon-to-be-retitled “Good Design Book.” Things are pretty exciting over here…

*Those of you in the Bay Area, Emily Pilloton kicks off her Design Revolution Roadshow with a street party at the Academy of Art on February 4. Everyone else can find a nearby stop by checking out the roadshow itinerary here.

Good Friday: Essayists

So, I’m finally able to share with you who our contributing essayists are for the book. I’m really excited about their diverse perspectives and what they will mean to the book and the work.

As I’ve already reported, John Bielenberg is writing the foreword. You can always count on John for an oblique perspective.

Each of the six sections is also anchored by an essay:

• Teaching (How are critical causes being addressed in design education?) Essay by Allan Chochinov
• Seeking (How can design thinking pro actively identify and address social, cultural and political issues?) Essay by Brian Collins
• Organizing (How does design help spread the word, make people care, and motivate them toward action?) Aaris Sherin
• Supporting (Work that supports an existing cause/non-profit) Essay by Kate Andrews
• Reacting (What is the designer’s creative response to the human condition?) This one I still need to confirm, hang tight…
• Celebrating (Work that celebrates the arts or achievement, contribution or service to a cause. Sometimes good design is, itself, good design.) Essay by Alice Bybee

In addition we have interviews with Emily Pilloton, Michael Osborne, Randy J. Hunt, Brian Dougherty and others.

We also just confirmed to day that Ric Grefe will be contributing some written perspective, along with a few others that still need to be locked down, so I shouldn’t jinx anything by mentioning them here.

I’m very excited and extremely pleased to have the support and contribution of these remarkable leaders and thinkers. Their thoughts and perspective will certainly be a critical force in elevating the relevance and thoughtfulness of the book.

Of Mice and Men

Wow. Was it really October when I last posted?

For any of you still following this infrequent chronicle of our writing and design process, here’s what’s going on:

First of all, I missed some deadlines. I was supposed to get a chunk of the writing into my editor back in October. Honestly I lost site of that deadline and unfortunately she did too. Consumed with the design of the book, and the selection and further curating of the content (more on that in a moment) and of course our regular studio work, teaching, the holidays, etc. etc. I was content to let sleeping dogs lie. The result? We’re behind. Not dangerously behind (my editor wisely set out an aggressive initial schedule) but there’s some catch up to do.

So, what have we been spending our time on? Well, first of all we had to cut about 100 pages form the book. Yep 100. If you’re wondering why we haven’t published a final list of contributors (aside from the fact that we never promised or intended to) that’s part of the reason. There’s a whole lot of good work that just isn’t going to fit. In editing the excess its been a delicate balance of maintaining a diverse body of work from an equally diverse selection of designers. In some cases this has meant having to cut really outstanding projects from firms who are already well represented in the book. Add to this that everyday we see or hear or think of something that really ought to be included, but wasn’t submitted or which we sought out but never secured. Charity Water. Amy Franceschini. The Girl Effect — awesome people and projects which you’ll just have to appreciate elsewhere.

We’re back down to 212 pages (a signature over our target) and HOW is looking into whether we can afford to run the extra pages. Fingers crossed.

Assuming that’s a go, we’ve got the page order locked down, about 95% of the final art in place, and all the credits set. There’s still a lot of writing to do and I’m currently corralling our essayists to complete their assignments as well.

I should mention also that we have been shooting most of the work here in the studio in order to have ore control over the look and feel of the book.

The last and most exciting development this week was the title meeting on Monday. Rockport recently published a book titled Good Design, so it looks like our title is going to be changing. There are a number of options on the table, including one that I’m pretty excited about. Hopefully that will be nailed down next week in time for the soon-to-be-regular-again Good Friday update. If so, you’ll all have some cover art to look at soon as well.

So that’s the latest. Sorry for the prolonged silence. This has been a long, boring part of the process— fraught with a lot of uncertainty and handwringing. I’ll try to keep you all more in the loop going forward, and post some snippets of content in the coming weeks as well.

Thanks for hanging in there.

Now, please do this.

Good Friday: Good Company

We spent a couple of afternoons this week sorting all the work into their respective chapters, identifying some holes, and sending out requests for a few additional projects. While by no means a complete list (we’ll release a final list once the content has been approved by our editor), here are some of the designers and projects you can expect to find in the book.

In no particular order:

• The Decoder Ring Design Concern
• Rise & Shine Studio
• TED
• Fabrica
• Hybrid Design
• Project H
• Project M
• David Garcia
• Tomorrow Partners
• Another Limited Rebellion
• Volume, Inc.
• Student projects from MICA, CCA, Academy of Art University, Emily Carr, Art Center, and others
• The California Academy of Sciences
• Pentagram
• Stefan Sagmeister
• Adams Morioka
• UnderConsideration
• Winterhouse Institute
• Adam Larson
• Laurie Rosenwald
• Geoff Wagner
• Drew Marshall
• Modern Dog
• Borja Martinez
• Stefan Sagmeister
• Mike Fretto
• Paprika
• Randy J. Hunt
• Jon Sueda
• Jason Munn
• Ann Willoughby
• Bob Aufuldish
• Karlssonwilker
• Celery
• Nessim Higson
• Lance Armstrong Foundation
• Samata Mason
• NOON
• Firebelly Design
• Little Jacket, Inc.
• and more…

September Update

Sorry for the longer-than-usual period(s) of silence. The Good Friday updates have ended up being more bi-weekly than weekly of late, for a number of reasons. The last few Fridays I’ve been out of town or at least out of the office, but in general the book has taken a bit of a back seat to some of the other projects going on in the studio.

BUT

Today we reviewed the twenty or so entries and tomorrow we’ll finish organizing everything into their respective categories. Look for a breakdown of the entries and selected work this Friday. It’s not going to be a comprehensive list of all the included designers but it should give you some idea of the makeup of the book. We’ll be contacting some of you for additional information early next week.

Thanks for your patience. More to come (soon).

Good Friday: Good things come to those who wait

Okay. Clearly I missed posting anything last Friday, and if you follow the site at all you’ll have noticed that I haven’t tweeted a damn thing in over a week either. Sorry about that.

Here’s where things stand:

First: We have just about the right amount of good (no pun intended) content. Honestly, I was hoping for and expecting more submissions, but what we did receive were largely top-notch. Early next week we’ll be laying it all out one more time, making some final cuts (sorry!) and filling in some holes. While individually all the work we’ve picked is great, collectively we want to make sure its sufficient to tell all the right stories.

Second: We have design feedback and it looks like we’ll be going with Direction B. Our Art Director at HOW, Grace, had some very helpful and insightful feedback. I’m going to post it all here for you to see (once I have her permission to do so).

Third: I’m trying to lock down one more essayist and then we’ll announce the lot of them. I’m really excited about the lineup.

Fourth: School is back in session, so over the next few weeks we’ll be soliciting content from instructors and students for the teaching section of the book. If you have any suggestions, send them my way please.

I’ll try to be more on top of the postings going forward. Last week I was prepping my syllabus, finishing up a few key jobs in the studio and pitching a couple of very exciting new clients (I also wrote a Good Design related article for Core 77 which will launch next week. Be sure to check it out).

Balancing school and work and the book (not to mention family) is a tricky business, and the book took a bit of a back seat for a week. Expect more regular and substantive postings in the weeks ahead.

Good Friday: Judging

It’s not really fair to call the process of evaluating work “judging.” Yes, we are discerning, but it’s not a contest and we’re not weighing the merits of one submission against another. Rather, we are seeking a diverse collection of projects that help describe a greater narrative. This is how we went about it:

Continue reading…

And the winner is…

We received 428 entries prior to the August 14 midnight deadline, meaning Katy McCauley was closest with her guess of 432. Katy, send us your address and six months or so from now you’ll get an advance copy of the book.

Everyone else, thanks for your participation. Anyone who posts on the blog will be entered in a random drawing for some other goodies associated with the book — and we’ll have another contest soon.