Description
Grossman Publishers, Published 1974. Paperback, 230 pp.; 26 cm; Viking Compass edition (C392); illustrated with black-and-white photographs and diagrams.
Rare, out-of-print & unusual books · Since 1997
111
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Catalog notes
Condition & notes
In Very Good condition. Glossy illustrated covers, glossy red back cover, cover price $3.95 present. Light bumping and creasing to edges and corners, mild shelf wear, light rubbing along bottom edge, some toning to edges and fading to spine. Binding tight, a thin strip of glue leakage from the binding along the inner edge of the front cover and front free endpaper. Pages mildly toned at edges. Otherwise unmarked. The founding text of American industrial design, in the Viking Compass edition of 1974, issued two years after Dreyfuss died and carrying a foreword Buckminster Fuller wrote for it. Dreyfuss gave the century the Western Electric Model 500 and Trimline telephones, the Honeywell Round thermostat, the Big Ben alarm clock, John Deere tractors and the streamlined Hudson locomotive for the Twentieth Century Limited, and this is his account of how that work was done. Chapter two introduces Joe and Josephine, the anthropometric figures behind what is now called human factors. Introduction by his first publisher, Richard L. Simon. Cover design by Dreyfuss. Closes with an E. H. Shepard drawing of Pooh coming down the stairs. Contents: The Early Days; Joe and Josephine; How the Designer Works; The Importance of Testing; Through the Back Door; Rise in the Level of Public Taste; The Telephone; Land, Sea, and Air; The Open Road; Design in Unexpected Places; Working for the Government; The Five-Point Formula; Relationship of Designer to Client; That Sordid Subject, Money; Not By Design; Why Are Barns Painted Red?; Profile of an Organization; Re-Appraisal.