Writing Design: Words and Objects

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

How do we learn about the objects that surround us? As well as gathering sensory information by viewing and using objects, we also learn about objects through the written and spoken word - from shop labels to friends' recommendations and from magazines to patents. But, even as design commentators have become increasingly preoccupied with issues of mediation, the intersection of design and language remains under-explored. Writing Design provides a unique examination of what is at stake when we convert the material properties of designed goods into verbal or textual description. Issues discussed include the role of text in informing design consumption, designing with and through language, and the challenges and opportunities raised by design without language. Bringing together a wide range of scholars and practitioners, Writing Design reveals the difficulties, ethics and politics of writing about design.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• List of Illustrations (p. vii)
• Contributors (p. xi)
• Acknowledgements (p. xv)
• Introduction: Writing Design (p. 1)
• Part 1 Righting Design-on the Reforming Role of Design Criticism
• Introduction (p. 19)
• 1 Writing about Stuff: The Peril and Promise of Design History and Criticism (p. 23)
• 2 Design Criticism and Social Responsibility: The Flemish Design Critic K.-N.Elno (1920-1993) (p. 33)
• 3 The Metamorphosis of a Norwegian Design Magazine: nyebonytt, 1968-1971 (p. 47)
• 4 Writing Contemporary Design into History (p. 63)
• Part 2 Mediations-Between Design and Consumption
• Introduction (p. 77)
• 5 Thinking in Metaphor: Figurative Conceptualizing in John Evelyns Diary and John Ruskin's Stones of Venice (p. 81)
• 6 Regulating the Body in Army Manuals and Trade Guides: The Design of the First World War Khaki Service Dress (p. 93)
• 7 'Vita Glass and the Discourse of Modern Culture (p. 103)
• 8 Lewis Mumford's Lever House: Writing a 'House of Glass' (p. 119)
• Part 3 Designing Vim and Through Language
• Introduction (p. 133)
• 9 Judging a Book by its Cover: Or Does Modernist Form Follow Function? (p. 135)
• 10 Reading Details: Caruso St John and the Poetic Intent of Construction Documents (p. 149)
• 11 Applying Oral Sources: Design Historian, Practitioner and Participant (p. 163)
• 12 Fluid Typography: Construction, Metamorphosis and Revelation (p. 175)
• Part 4 Showing as Telling-On Design Beyond Text
• Introduction (p. 189)
• 13 Showing Architecture through Exhibitions: A Taxonomical Analysis of the First Venice Architecture Biennale (1980) (p. 191)
• 14 Design as a Language without "Words: A G Fronzoni (p. 205)
• 15 On the Legal Protection of Design: Things and Words about Them (p. 219)
• 16 Text-led and Object-led Research Paradigms: Doing without Words (p. 231)
• Select Bibliography (p. 243)
• Index (p. 253)