San Francisco's 1970 Study for Urban Design

Murray GM August 26, 2018

I love a bit of design history. Whilst in the Mission yesterday I picked up this gem from 1970 at Farnsworth Mercantile on Valencia. It's part of an urban planning study that was carried out by the city in the late 60s and early 70s, eventually being adopted in 1972. There were 8 reports and this is Preliminary Report No. 5 Urban Design Principles for San Francisco (July 1970) by Thomas R. Aidala. When I saw it I couldn't resist it. Square format, that beautiful big 5 on the cover and most of all it's about design principles.

It looks like it belonged to one of the consulting or committee architects; Henrik Bull of BSA Architects as there is a newsletter from 1999 tucked inside address to him containing an article on the study.

Here's a few spreads from the report. I love the spiral binding (although it's a little tight) and the heavier paper section divides.

It's chocked full of these great drawings and diagrams explaining problems and approaches to improving the city, based on the principles.

The design principles are pretty cool too. Even the simple explanation to what 'design principles' are is pretty good. Here's a pic of them (will transcribe when I have more time).

Here's the article about the project from the August 1999 SPUR newsletter (sorry about the low quality).

A lovely little book - 101 things...

Murray GM June 5, 2015

Picked up this lovely little gem, 101 Things I Learned in Architecture School by Matthew Frederick. Each spread is a single idea, technique or concept. Great illustrations and wise words throughout. I really love the board cover and binding. Another nice touch is the numbering and the use of the blackened centre gutter.

It's from the MIT Press - more info here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/index.php?q=books/101-things-i-learned-architecture-school

Semiotext(e) Architecture

Murray GM January 15, 2015

This is Semiotext(e) Architecture from 1992. It's a massive (44x28 cm) landscape orientated collection of essays, experiments and ideas focussed on design, architecture and theory. I included the shot with my feet just to show it's size when opened. Totally unmanageable and doesn't fit on any of my bookshelves - which makes me love it even more.

I have three books from the independent publisher Semiotext(e); Architecture, USA and Radio - but this is visually the richest. It's a black and white production, which emphasises the dark and dirty style of the era and also makes it feel very underground and almost fanzine like. It's full on 'cult of the ugly' stuff and touches on the design for designers trend of the time, but also is very reflective of the DIY culture vibe (more here). For me this isn't the greatest piece graphic design but the variety of the content, the scale and the richness of the textures makes it rather special.