DESIGN AT STANFORD

Design at Stanford: A Visual History of Thinking and Doing is a book that was researched, written, edited, illustrated and designed by me over a three year span.

Design at Stanford reveals the fascinating story of how, in 1958, Stanford University’s departments of art and mechanical engineering collaborated on a joint graduate degree in design. Since 2005, Stanford’s “d.school” (the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design) has become legendary for propagating “design thinking” as a methodology, enabled in large part by alumnus and professor David Kelley.

Apple Computer’s early product designs, the founding of global design company IDEO, the design of the Google and Twitter logos, numerous typefaces for Adobe, the patented Koosh ball toy – Stanford-educated designers have influenced the world around us. As an alum of the joint program (David Kelley was on my thesis committee), I couldn’t help but to apply what I learned to the design of the book!

Glimpse a few sections as PDF files:

• title page and table of contents
• preface
• professor Rolf Faste
• alumnus Steven Skov Holt

A program chronology from 1949 to present is the book's backbone. Faculty and alumni profiles, side stories and numerous collages also populate its 256 full-color pages.

A custom display typeface, titled Manwhole, was designed based on the letters SU found on Stanford campus manhole covers. Its name is a nod to Prof. Bob McKim’s 1959 lecture at the Creative Engineering conference “Designing for the Whole Man.”

A “boutique edition” of 65 books has been printed and hardbound by Smart Set in Minneapolis. The inside of the book jacket has a bonus poster that caricatures the graduate design faculty from 1984.

It is also available as a paperback from Blurb. Buy it here: https://www.blurb.com/b/12015291-design-at-stanford-a-visual-history-of-thinking-a

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DISSEMINATION

Looking Good nationally juried exhibit. Florida Atlantic University. Davie, Florida.