Hi friends!
Today, I’d like to share an industry leader that I creatively look up to, and whose work I find inspiring. This industry leader is Michael Bierut.
Michael Bierut is best known for his work at design firm Pentagram, his contributions to the Yale School of Architecture program, and his design of the environmental graphic/signage outside the New York Times building.
Bierut has worked with large clients such as Mastercard, Slack, Disney, Verizon, and even Hillary Clinton. He is the recipient of many art and design awards, is an established author, and is both a lecturer at Yale School of Management and a senior critic in graphic design at the Yale School of Art. His partner at Pentagram said the following about Bierut: “If knowledge is power, then Michael Bierut is the most powerful person in the entire design community.”
Not only do his accomplishments speak for themselves, but I think that his design work does too. My favorite pieces of his are the posters that he began creating for the Yale School of Architecture in 1998. I think that his use of movement, typography, and balance within these posters is something that I could sit and look at for hours. Here are a couple of examples of the posters that he created in 2000 and 2014, respectively:
I would really like to read his book “How to Use Graphic Design to Sell Things, Explain Things, Make Things Look Better, Make People Laugh, Make People Cry, and (Every Once in a While) Change the World.” It covers 36 case studies that “cover the creation of all types of work, from identity, logos and branding to environmental graphics, packaging, books and websites, many times all in one project.”
Sources:
https://www.pentagram.com/about/michael-bierut
famousgraphicdesigners.org/michael-bierut
https://d5media.co.uk/blog/design/most-influential-designers-michael-bierut/