DeTnk's Must Read Book of the Month

8th July '09

For anyone itching for a great design read, we highly suggest picking up a copy of David Pye’s ‘The Nature and Aesthetics of Design’.

Although written over 30 years ago the book is as relevant today as it was then. It presents a wisdom and understanding of design that deeply resonates with our current situation.

“The cumulative effect of design on the human spirit is really important in a simple
utilitarian sense. The alien, daunting, inhuman character of modern cities every-
where is communicated to us through the eye. This character may yet prove a more
insidious danger to man than any of the poisons he sprays and leaches out on the
world so freely. It is a cumulative effect, this character. It results from the combined
impact of the design of a great many separate things, none of which is so atrocious,
too many of which are flatly negative. The design of each single thing in
the environment, however small it may be, is really important. What is designed and
made will outlast the people for whose profit and whose use it was made. It follows
that all designers have a responsibility to the people of the future and to far more
people in the present than those whose profit or use their seeking to provide for...
We may think we are designing furniture or motorcars, but we are not. In designing
a motorcar for one man, we design the scenery for 50,000 others.” (David Pye, 1964)

Visit DeTnk’s Bookstore to pick up your copy now.