Dialog with Paulette Pascarella

This week a new website launched,

designed by Pentagram;

Designers & Books,

which allows us to peek inside 50 esteemed members of the design communities libraries, virtually.

Like any collection, these choices are deemed personally relevant, meaningful, and formative to the designer.

Design decisions will always be essentially subjective and these lists of book choices

mapping out the personalities and preferences are intriguing. 

There are the chosen classics,

Jun’ichirō Tanizaki: In Praise of Shadows and Paul Rand: Thoughts on Design,

as well as literary novels such as, Julian Barnes: Flaubert’s Parrot.

Today I have picked my favorite lists: 

Billie Tsien, Jennifer Morla, Milton Glaser and Richard Saul Wurman.  

Founder and Editor Steven Kroeter, of Archetype says, “We read somewhere that any book list is an invitation to begin a conversation.”

This is a premise I love to endorse.

All photographs used by permission, copyright © Designers & Books.

To thank our readers, dialog headquarters is offering a Give-Away!

One of the two books is The Hedonist’s Guide to Art, edited by Laura K Jones, a writer living in London and Berlin.

Hg2 Art is a new handbook that gives readers an insight into both the darker reaches of the art world and some of its more enchanting pockets.

This book published by HG2 and Artica.com, comprises of more than 90 essays by mostly British critics, artists, curators and dealers.

Along with the Hg2 Art, a second book you will receive is Álvaro Siza: Recent Works, published by Phaidon Press.

Álvaro Siza is considered Portugal’s greatest living architect and Mr. Siza is my current obsession.

See my July guest post at designer Brad Ford’s über popular Design Therapy for photographs taken by Zel Nunes of Ibere Camargo Foundation.

Two excellent books I think you will appreciate. 

A winner will be chosen among the subscribers, so if you have not signed up to receive dialog by email, please do so by Sunday, October 31 at midnight (EST).  

The winner will be chosen by random.org and contacted via email requesting a mailing address, for the two books.

What are you waiting for, sign up.

Good Luck.

Update: We have a winner! Thanks to everyone who has signed up as a Dialog subscriber.

The New York City Architecture and Design community is getting its’

first annual A & D Film Festival, and I could not be more thrilled.

Beginning October 14^th through 17^th at the Tribeca Cinemas at 54 Varick,

this Filmfest will feature 40 documentaries and shorts. 

Organized into 13 themed and curated programs, selected by an esteemed A & D industry panel. 

This design-packed event will bring films, filmmakers,

and leaders together in the world of architecture and design and I would not wait to purchase tickets. 

My favorites would be

Program 2: Legacy Bronfman, watch architect Peter Rose talk about the NYC Bronfman Residence, and

Program 3: Two to Tango, includes Contemporary Days: The Designs of Lucien and Robin Day.

Program 13: Design Matters, trailer from The Visual Language of Herbert Matter below.

A recent trip to Chicago gave me a chance to re-explore the city. 

One of the brilliant aspects of Chicago is the absolute modernity and expanse of the buildings, which reach and create a magnificent skyline and city fabric. 

The Modern Wing of the Art Institute of Chicago by Italian architect,

Renzo Piano,

recipient of the 1998 Pritzker Architecture Prize shows the art of making buildings and the art of making cities. 

This is a building about light, modernity, invention as well as convention.  

A series of monographs, edited and published by the Renzo Piano Foundation can be found at the 

Stamp Arte Bookstore.

 Photographs used by permission, copyright © Michelle Litvin.

Check out Michelle’s website for great architecture photography as well as her series called Mindscrims.