How to use graphic design to sell things, explain things, make things look better, make people laugh, make people cry, and (every once in a while) change the world - Tapa dura

'(An) insight into an illustrious career spanning every aspect of graphic design.' - Creative Review 'Stunning work throughout' - Typetoken

A monograph, manual and manifesto by one of the world’s leading graphic designers. Protégé of design legend Massimo Vignelli and partner in the New York office of the international design firm Pentagram, Michael Bierut has had one of the most varied careers of any living graphic designer. The 35 projects Bierut presents in this book illustrate the breadth of activity that graphic design encompasses today, his goal being to demonstrate not a single ideology, but the enthusiastically eclectic approach that has been a hallmark of his career. Each project is told in Bierut’s own entertaining voice and shown through historic images, preliminary drawings (including full-size reproductions of the notebooks he has maintained for over 30 years), working models and rejected alternatives, as well as the finished work. Along the way, he provides insights into the creative process, his working life, his relationship with clients, and the struggles that any design professional faces in bringing innovative ideas to the world. Inspiring, informative and authoritative, How to...is set to be the bible of graphic design ideas.

Table of Contents

Introduction · 32 projects: 1. How to destroy the world with graphic design · 2. How to be a graphic designer in the middle of nowhere · 3. How to think with your hands · 4. How to put a big sign on a glass building without blocking the view · 5. How to have fun with a brown cardboard box · 6. How to disorient an architect · 7. How to shut up and listen · 8. How to fit eleven pounds of type in a ten pound bag · 9. How to get where you want to be · 10. How to find out who you are · 11. How to write a picture book · 12. How to be fashionably timeless · 13. How to make a museum mad · 14. How to investigate a murder · 15. How to restore an organisation’s soul · 16. How to design two dozen logos at once · 17. How to set a table · 18. How to raise a billion dollars · 19. How to brand a fantasy · 20. How to win a football game · 21. How to cross cultures · 22. How to name the baby · 23. How to run a marathon · 24. How to transcend style · 25. How to make a mark · 26. How to avoid the obvious · 27. How to be grateful · 28. How to contemplate the infinite over scrambled eggs · 29. How to run your very own island · 30. How to officiate a marriage · 31. How to fly · 32. How to save the world with graphic design