In today's landscape, designers rely on digital templates to implement brand identities—fast, accurate, and easily updatable, these digital manuals are now obligatory. But we have lost something in the transition to digital style guides, and the great printed standards manuals from the predigital era deserve a better fate than to be junked. This comprehensive study of corporate design manuals from the golden era of identity design makes a compelling case for their survival and continued appreciation.
The forty-two manuals featured have been expertly photographed, retaining all essential details, and are presented in a spacious and functional layout, allowing readers to fully appreciate these wonderful examples of sophisticated information design.
The photography is accompanied by a foreword by the late Massimo Vignelli, an afterword by designer Lance Wyman, and texts from Adrian Shaughnessy, Richard Danne (NASA designer), Martha Fleming (daughter of Allan Fleming, designer of the Canadian National Railway logo), Greg D'Onofrio, and Patricia Belen, alongside interviews with Armin Vit, Sean Perkins, John Lloyd, Michael Burke, Sean Wolcott, Liza Enebeis, and John Bateson.
Reviews
Manuals are ephemeral, and many were simply discarded when identities changed or businesses merged or closed. Now, a thick, rich compilation with the deceivingly dreary title Manuals 1: Design and Identity Guidelines digs back up some of these treasured tomes
— Steven Heller The Atlantic
This is a welcome and authoritative review of the subject. It should go some way to reducing the number of insipid examples which one meets every year in student graduation exhibitions. Let us hope also that it will inspire continued efforts by professionals to match the standards of the work included here.
— Ian McLaren Grafik
Contributors
Massimo Vignelli
Foreword By
