Typophile

Critique my list of designers and practice areas

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I am requiring all of my introduction to graphic design students to research a designer and his/her work within a specific practice area of design, write a 1,000-word essay about the designer, and develop the essay into a presentation. The designers I chose were picked primarily because it would be easy for students to research in a library as opposed to online. I ended up with a list that is mostly white Americans and I would like to add some diversity.

Also, I still have not come up with a great interface designer for my list. Suggestions there would be especially helpful.

Following is my list of designers and practice ares. Please suggest alternate designers and any practice areas that I have neglected. The most important criteria is that the designer has been written about in commonly-available, English language, books and magazines. This is not a research and writing class, so I do not have time to guide
students through interviews, translations, locating limited edition books, etc..

Kenya Hara, art direction
Roger Black, publication design
Alejandro Paul, type design
Kyle Cooper, film title design
Jason Santa Maria, web design
Debbie Millman, identity and branding
Matteo Bologna, packaging
Jessica Hische, lettering
Jonathan Ives, product design
Paula Scher, environmental design
?, interface design
Nicholas Feltron, information design

Craig Eliason

Looks like it's "Ive" not "Ives," for the product designer (but why a product designer in a graphic design course?)

Sevag B. Martouni

How about Louie Mantia for interface design. He has worked for Apple. No newspaper design candidates?

SB

aluminum

" it would be easy for students to research in a library as opposed to online"

They still make libraries?

I notice the list is (mostly) contemporary folks. Intentional? If not, there's probably some historical figures that could be added: Tufte, Rand, Carson, Glaser, Sagmeister, etc.

And other areas to explore:
motion graphics
user experience designers
illustrators
editorial design
signage/wayfinding

For UI, Susan Kare is a fun one given her creating the early Mac OS icons. John Maeda could be another one (less UI and more experimental, but still fun).

danmalarkey

I had to do this in school. A few names I have to suggest are…

1. El Lissitzky
2. Willi Kunz
3. Saul Bass
4. April Greiman
5. Paul Renner

We also had to write about a time period in design. Luckily for me I was given the Psychedelic era.

Best of luck!
-Dan
http://www.danmalarkey.com

Nick Shinn

You might get some ideas from Jan Middendorp's Dutch Type.

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Sorry, I should have already mentioned this, but the list is supposed to focus on living, working, contemporary designers. Some (and sometimes all) of my students are not design majors and will never work in design, so the goal is as much to teach non-designers about the design field as it exists as it is to teach design students about their own field.

Fabiouser

There are some computer engeniers that work like interface designers, one of them its Donald Knuth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Knuth), who developed systems like teX and MetaFont.

I dont know if this could help you, but there are some live books about them.

There are some names who dont have this about them, but have some great projects:

Ricardo Lafuente (pt) (Lightwriter its great)
Rui Pereira (pt)
Ralph Ammer
Frederik Berlaen

Dan Gayle

Where are you going to find in a library any information about Jonathan Ive? There are only a few books available that concern him, and I have my doubts about them being in regular circulation.

Contemporary doesn't equate well with library.

begsini

I would suggest Dieter Rams instead of Jonathan Ive, for a variety of reasons. Also, "product design" is a somewhat muddy term. I think even software developers use it. I would use the term "industrial design" to be more specific about that practice area.

Maybe Michael Beirut for identity and branding.

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