D-Crit: In the Field by SVA MA Design Research

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Reports of Working Life from Graduates of the SVA MFA in Design Criticism SVA MFA Design Criticism Design writing, research, curation, and criticism, through printed and online media, radio, video, exhibitions, and events. www.dcrit.sva.edu @DCrit www.dcrit.sva.edu

School of Visual Arts MFA in Design Criticism The SVA MFA in Design Criticism is devoted to the study of design, architecture, and urban infrastructure. The innovative two-year graduate program, co-founded in 2008 by Alice Twemlow and Steven Heller, trains students to interrogate and evaluate design and its social and environmental implications, and to experiment with ways to engage design criticism’s publics. Working alongside New York’s bestrespected editors, authors, critics, curators, and historians, D-Crit students learn how to build an argument, develop a critical stance, and hone a writerly voice. Instructed by such faculty members as MoMA’s senior curator of Design and Architecture Paola Antonelli, urban design critic Karrie Jacobs, and online media maven Elizabeth Spiers, students communicate their unique perspectives through a range of media, including radio podcasts, exhibitions, video essays, events, syllabi, online media, and books. The program seeks to cultivate design criticism as a discipline and contribute to design discourse with new writing and thinking that challenges and inspires. Applicants come to the program with experience in design, architecture, journalism, and from academic backgrounds in art history, English literature, philosophy, and critical studies; alumni of the program go on to work as editors, writers, curators, researchers, bloggers, managers, entrepreneurs, and educators.

School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York City is an established leader and innovator in the education of artists. From its inception in 1947, the faculty has been comprised of professionals working in the arts and art-related fields. SVA provides an environment that nurtures creativity, inventiveness and experimentation, enabling students to develop a strong sense of identity and a clear direction of purpose.

Apply Admission to the program is by online application and the submission of one essay written specifically for the application, up to 2,000 words of writing samples, and three letters of recommendation. If you have any questions about your application please contact us. We are happy to arrange for prospective students to tour the department or meet with the department chair, and to attend a class or a Tuesday evening lecture. Detailed application procedures can be found on the Apply page of our Web site, www.dcrit.sva.edu/apply. Contact Web: www.dcrit.sva.edu Email: dcrit@sva.edu Follow: @DCrit Telephone: 212.592.2228 Visit: Design Criticism Department School of Visual Arts 136 West 21st Street, 2nd Floor New York, NY 10011 Thank you to everyone who has contributed to the success of the D-Crit program during its first four years, including: Steven Heller, D-Crit program co-founder; David Rhodes, SVA president; Anthony Rhodes, SVA Executive Vice-President; Jeff Nesin, SVA Provost; the D-Crit faculty; D-Crit students—past and present, and their families; D-Crit program coordinator Emily Weiner and systems administrator Victor de la Cruz and his predecessor Mary Foti; visiting critics, lecturers, thesis advisors, conference speakers and moderators; the design team at the Walker Art Center and Matthew Rezac; sponsors, partners, and scholarship and internship providers; mentors; employers; and members of the public who attend our lectures and conferences. This brochure Design: Matthew Rezac Editing: Alice Twemlow and Emily Weiner (Thanks to Pamela Williams and Adam Harrison Levy) Printing: Modern Press, Minneapolis, MN All images are courtesy of the contributors to this publication and the SVA MFA Design Criticism department, unless otherwise noted. If proper copyright acknowledgment has not been made, or for clarifications or corrections, please contact the Design Criticism department and we will correct the information on the website and in any future re-printings. Photos: page 9, E: Rama; page 9, F: mrkathika; page 19, C: Phil Patton; page 20, C: xenmate; page 27, C: Wladyslaw. Illustrations: pages 6, 11, and 13 by Jeanne Verdoux.

What does design criticism look like today? In the following pages you’ll find the stories of eleven graduates of the SVA MFA in Design Criticism who have used the program as a catalyst for launching multi-faceted careers in the intersecting realms of design research, curation, and writing. When I launched D-Crit four years ago, I imagined graduates deploying their critical thinking about the built environment in all manner of media, calling out what is harmful as well as what enriches, and guiding the design conversation toward issues of import, with wit, conviction, and poise. As real, breathing critics began to emerge from the program—and to launch careers as researchers, educators, publishers, writers, curators, and managers— the quality of their work and the breadth of their interests surpassed even my biased expectations. With the release of each year’s flock of graduates, I not only see well-argued, historically informed, and imaginative work being realized, but I also see the priorities and the very definition of design criticism being both expanded and refocused. This brochure charts the paths of just some of our graduates. For the fuller versions of the Q&As, plus those by other graduates, please visit our website, www.dcrit.sva.edu. I hope you will be as inspired as I am by what you see. At D-Crit we’re working hard to hone the practice of design criticism as an academic discipline, but these efforts are only relevant in connection to what emerging design critics, like the ones you are about to meet, are actually doing— in the field . . . —Alice Twemlow, Chair SVA MFA Design Criticism

www.dcrit.sva.edu

John Cantwell

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2010 Writer and teacher

Date of birth: 1983 Hometown: Dumont, NJ Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, English and Philosophy, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA

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D-Crit in 10 words or less: Totally unique. A faculty and curriculum unlike any other.

Your biggest surprise? The richness of thought and literature surrounding design. There are these incredible writers—people like Reyner Banham,C Stephen Bayley,D John Ruskin,E and Ada Louise Huxtable F spring immediately to mind —who have so much to say not just about design, but about how we live our lives.

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? All of the work I now do came to me through people I met at D-Crit. All of it. What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I was looking to change my career. I was working as an editor for a consulting firm but I wanted to focus more on writing. I saw D-Crit mentioned in an article in The New York Times.1 The faculty and curriculum seemed amazing. It was the only grad program I applied to.

What are your fondest/funniest memories? There were a lot of late nights at D-Crit, and most of my favorite moments surround those evenings. Especially during thesis crunch time, we would routinely work well into the early mornings. There was a bond that developed out of those nights, the kind of esprit de corps that only comes from working well past your bedtime. And of course, there were all the field trips. Visiting MoMA’s design and architecture storage facility out in Queens felt like being in an Indiana Jones movie, when he finds himself in one of those endless warehouses with all the boxed-up treasures. Visiting Philip Johnson’s Glass House G on a really nice fall afternoon…3

What is your first memory of D-Crit? The first time I knew D-Crit was something special was when our instructor Karrie Jacobs made us read John Ruskin and then took us on a walk through Times Square B—a place I’d been a million times before, and mostly despised.2 After that walk, I had an entirely different perspective on the place, and I realized one of D-Crit’s chief values: it would help me see the world with new eyes.

How did your research process change or evolve? The D-Crit curriculum exposes you to a terrific range of writers and subjects. Whatever I’m working on now, I almost always know a book or article that can serve as a starting point.

What was your biggest challenge? I was an English major in college, and came into D-Crit lacking significant knowledge of design history. However, early classes with Russell Flinchum and Alexandra Lange gave me a really great background in the histories of industrial design and architecture, respectively. SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Research editor at Corporate Insight, a market research and consulting firm Career after D-Crit: Contributes articles and essays to The Atlantic, The Awl, Design Observer, Observer and Autoweek;A copywriter and content strategist at experience design company Hot Studio; writing instructor at D-Crit; adjunct professor in design history at Rutgers University

Students in Karrie Jacobs’ “Urban Curation” class read “The Lamp of Truth” from The Seven Lamps of Architecture by 19th-century design reformist John Ruskin and discuss the layers of architectural and urban planning history visible from the bleachers of the TKTS booth at the center of New York’s Times Square. Then, they write a brief essay on the meaning of truth in the twenty-first century urban environment.

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Alice Twemlow, chair of SVA MFA Design Criticism, compared Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign website to that of the experience of using a Macintosh computer in “Is Obama a Mac and Clinton a PC?” by Noam Cohen, The New York Times, February 4, 2008.

He took a background in English and philosophy, mixed with some hardheaded financial website analysis (and a dash of long-form improv comedy bravado) and brought it to his study of the built environment. The result is well-reported, witty missives from design’s front lines.

Each year new students visit the Philip Johnson Glass House in Connecticut. Two D-Crit students were awarded fellowships at the Philip Johnson Glass House and helped to develop the online discussion salon, Glass House Conversations, http://glasshouseconversations.org

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How did your thesis help define your territory as a writer and a thinker? In researching my thesis, “Cars, Car Sharing,H and the Future Pragmatic,” I learned a tremendous amount about the automotive industry and the role of cars in the urban fabric, all of which has served me well in several freelance assignments.

What are the priorities for design critics now? The design critic’s challenge is the same as it’s always been: to find ways of engaging the public in meaningful discussions about design. What are different are the opportunities and challenges presented by this particular moment in our culture’s history. The opportunities being the way in which welldesigned objects like the iPhone have greatly raised general awareness of design and the amount of platforms and media through which to work. The challenge of our time is that traditional publishing venues like magazines and newspapersI are still struggling.

Do you stay in touch with your fellow classmates both personally and professionally? We have a shared interest in one another’s success. My classmates and the D-Crit faculty have become the backbone of my professional network.

Would you do D-Crit again? Absolutely.

How have you deployed skills learned at D-Crit in your professional life? D-Crit gave me a range of skills that allow me to simultaneously function in editorial, academic, and professional environments. A heightened sense of visual perception. Vastly improved writing. The ability to work, and communicate with, designers, curators, and other creative professionals.

www.dcrit.sva.edu

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@juancantwell www.johncantwell.net

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Date of birth: 1979 Current location: Lisbon, Portugal Education prior to D-Crit: Licenciatura, Communication Design, Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon Career prior to D-Crit: Designer at Leo Burnett Kuala Lumpur, Fabrica, ExperimentaDesign

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Since D-Crit launched in 2008, it has hosted more than 300 design critics, educators, theorists, curators, historians, and editors. Students receive a spreadsheet at the end of each semester with the contact details of each of the guests to help them build on relationships they forged in the department.

2 Alice recalls Fred’s email reaching her and thinking, “this guy is perfect for D-Crit!”

D-Crit in 10 words or less: Crafting and creatively broadcasting informed opinions on design.

What initially attracted you to D-Crit? During the Summer of 2007 I read in Metropolis about SVA’s forthcoming design criticism program. At the time I was writing about design on a freelance basis for Público, Portugal’s main daily newspaper and I was working with two friends on a book project, Fabrico Próprio: The Design of Semi-industrial Portuguese Confectionery. Confectionery I immediately thought to myself “this is exactly what I need to do right now.”

What kinds of projects are you involved in post-D-Crit? In the summer of 2011 I had a weekly column in Público’s Sunday magazine, where I wrote about everyday stuff (ID cards, the ATM interface, or custard tart packaging).A I’ve also contributed to the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation’s Next Future program, which deals with contemporary culture from Africa, South America, Asia and Oceania; I’ve given talks and curated a one-day symposium on design in North Africa. With Becky Quintal (Class of 2010) I started an architectural criticism workshop that had its first edition in Montreal in 2010 and its second edition in Lisbon in 2012, and we’re planning to take it to other cities in 2013. I collaborated with Laura Forde (Class of 2010) on a feature about New York for TAP Portugal’s inflight magazine, and with Vera Sacchetti (Class of 2011) on an essay about social design for a book dedicated to cooperation and development in Africa. I included Hala Abdelmalak’s (Class of 2010) KafLab Foundation B in the symposium I curated for the Next Future program, and I am about to collaborate with student Zachary Sachs (Class of 2011) on an exhibition dedicated to Pan Am’s 1970–1972 redesign.C

What is your first memory of D-Crit? I immediately sent an email to SVA, enquiring about the program. I got an email response from Alice Twemlow herself and she encouraged me to apply. That was a big deal for me. I’d say this is my first D-Crit memory, even if it precedes my arrival to New York.2 What were the most important skills that you learned? One of Alexandra Lange’s sharpest comments—and boy, were they ever sharp— on my very first essay in her “Architecture Criticism” class was, “make us care.” I would say that finding, owning, and crafting my own opinions about design was one of the major skills I learned in this program. D-Crit is not about learning the theory of criticism, it’s about making people care, as much as you do, about design and how it affects society.

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? D-Crit gave me great insight into the context and possibilities of design criticism, but also great exposure to such a wide variety of professionals in the design field (the so-called Filofax effect).1 Also, and perhaps more importantly, if it wasn’t for D-Crit I would not have been able to explore Brazilian design as an ongoing research topic. SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career after D-Crit: Teaches part-time at ESAD in Caldas da Rainha, and at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon; contributes to both Portuguese and international publications with reviews of design projects, events, books and exhibitions (many of which are related to Brazil)

What was your biggest challenge? Writing “for the ear,” instead of “for the eye” in Kurt Andersen and Leital Molad’s “Radio and Podcast” workshop. And constantly failing to accomplish any decent recording of my own voice. Your biggest surprise? My thesis grade.3

Ralph Caplan, recipient of the 2010 National Design Award for “Design Mind,” and a sort of god-father of design criticism, was editor-in-chief of Industrial Design magazine in the early 1960s, and the author of several books including By Design: Why There Are No Locks on the Bathroom Doors in the Hotel Louis XIV and Other Object Lessons. Lessons For the final session in his “The Critical Imperative” class, he and his wife Judith Ramquist invited students to his Upper West Side apartment for the afternoon. As they sat in his book-lined apartment sipping wine and listening to Ralph read aloud the Dylan Thomas poem “In My Craft or Sullen Art,” outside the window the first snowflakes of winter began to fall.

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A born connector, he is now running events, curating exhibitions, writing for international publications, and generally helping to re-shape the global design conversation.

Fred received one of the highest grades for his thesis, “Alvorada: How Social Change is Shaping Brazilian Design and Creating Brazil’s Own Design Model,” which challenged stereotypes about Brazilian design, in reward for the ambition and scope of his primary research and the sophistication of his analysis.

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2010 Design journalist, curator, and educator

Frederico Duarte

Your most embarrassing mistake? Not having ironed my shirt D when our class visited the designer and collector Elaine Lustig-Cohen’s apartment—what was I thinking?4

Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit Too much of the global design discourse revolves around New York. Most New Yorkers are too self-obsessed to properly understand the complexity of the world beyond their city’s limits, which allows for the creation of simplifications, stereotypes, and misinterpretations about “the rest of the world.” I found this frustrating—disconcerting even. I sincerely believe D-Crit can help to change this situation, particularly through its increasingly international student body, and create a truly multi-polar design discourse that embraces complexity and challenges the notions of center and periphery.

Your greatest triumph? Managing to uncover a hitherto-untold design story about a series of 1970s Pan Am posters from the collection of the Museum of Modern Art. And getting from Steven Heller not just an “A+,” but also a “Bravo” written on a Post-it note.5

Do you stay in touch with your fellow classmates both personally and professionally? I’ve made coming back to New York for the D-Crit graduating conference an annual routine.8 Also, I’m happy to say quite a few D-Crit alumni have visited Lisbon since I graduated, making Lisbon (apart from the fact both I and Class of 2011 student Vera Sacchetti were born here) the world’s second D-Crit city.

How did your thesis help define your territory as a writer and a thinker? My thesis addressed the impact of social changes on Brazilian design.E As a native Portuguese speaker I was able to record the stories of many Brazilian designers and other related professionals at a very interesting period of their country’s history. I’ve become a bit of an expert on the subject: I have written articles and essays and given talks at places like the Royal College of Art in London and Parsons The New School for Design in New York.

Anything else you would like to add? Long live D-Crit! Ω Ω

@freduarte www.05031979.net

8 Each year D-Crit students organize, host, and star in a graduating conference. With only 10 minutes in which to distill the findings of their thesis research, they undergo a strict regimen of public speaking training. Alumni of the program return each year to support their program mates, and to keep in touch with the new issues and themes at the heart of design criticism.

7 Elaine Louie, writer for The New York Times, taught a course on reviewing restaurant design and took the Class of 2010 for a special soiree at the newly opened Maialino restaurant with Danny Meyer, its owner and David Rockwell, its designer.

What are your fondest/funniest memories? Russell Flinchum’s adrenalin-fuelled double slide projector classes; watching snow flakes falling for the first time in New York from Ralph Caplan’s living room;6 standing with the class, Elaine Louie, David Rockwell and Danny Meyer all crammed inside Maialino’s tiny wine cellar;7 staying late after many of D-Crit’s Tuesday lectures, chatting with colleagues and guests, finishing up the beers and eating the last pretzels in the bowl.

www.dcrit.sva.edu

C 5 Fred published his research, begun in Steven Heller’s “Researching Design” class, as an article in Eye Magazine (Frederico Duarte, “Flight of the Imagination,” Eye 73, Autumn 2009) and is currently developing it into an exhibition, working with Zachary Sachs, (Class of 2011) and coordinator at SVA’s Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives.

4 As part of Steven Heller’s “Researching Design” class, students visit private archives such as Elaine Lustig Cohen’s collection of avant-garde graphic design housed in her elegant Upper East Side apartment.

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2012 Intern in R&D department, Museum of Modern Art

The off-Broadway lighting designer who got to work with Paola Antonelli at The Museum of Modern Art via a shooting range in northwestern Wyoming. Ω Ω

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Date of birth: 1986 Hometowns: Michigan, Arizona, Virginia, Texas, New Mexico, Washington State, and Ohio Current location: New York, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA (summa cum laude), Philosophy and Theater, Ohio Wesleyan University

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D-Crit in 10 words or less: Intellectually gratifying.

subject’s darker implications. In the end, my ambivalence proved to be an advantage because it let me access multiple viewpoints on the issue and kept me open to changing my emotional and intellectual reactions.

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? If I hadn’t gone to D-Crit I would still be hanging lights and writing cues in some dusty downtown theater. I wouldn’t be a published writer.2 I wouldn’t be working at MoMA with one of my design heroes.3

Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit? Now I realize that objects shape our thoughts and interactions on a fundamental and inescapable level. I don’t see the human mind as closed off from the external world but rather integrated with its environment. We think through objects.

What is your first memory of D-Crit? I attended one of the public Tuesday night lectures soon after I’d leaned about the program but before I’d decided to apply. Design writer Peter HallC gave a talk and it absolutely blew my mind.4 After that night I knew that I had to try and become one of these people.

How have you deployed skills learned at D-Crit in your professional life? Every day I draw off of the research methods and writing styles I picked up at D-Crit. I use historical or theoretical references when trying to frame the impact of a certain designer or design concept.

What were the most important skills that you learned? Interview skills! It is amazing to think how shy I was going into the program, even after several years working in the theater world. Through D-Crit I had to go out and talk to so many people that I now know I can just call someone up and get their perspective on an issue without the world exploding. It turns out that people love to be consulted.5

6 “Missing the Modern Gun: Object Ethics in Collections of Design”

What advice would you give to prospective students? Don’t be afraid if you have a background that isn’t in design.7 I was afraid that I wouldn’t have the same reference points and design vocabulary as other students and that my work would suffer. But it didn’t! Some of my best projects were ones in which I pulled knowledge from my predesign days into D-Crit assignments.8 Also, use D-Crit as an excuse to interview the people you most admire. Almost anyone will consent to be interviewed by an informed and enthusiastic student.

What was your biggest challenge? I wrote my thesis on firearms,D a topic that I was initially reluctant to choose.6 I’d done an assignment in our “Radio and Podcasting” workshop on the reasons firearms are absent from the Museum of Modern Art’s design collection and I knew that there was a wealth of unexplored territory relating to the material culture of guns. But I hesitated to select it as my thesis topic because I didn’t know if I could properly handle the SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Theater lighting Career after D-Crit: 12-month Intern working with Senior Curator of Design Paola Antonelli A in newly formed R&D department at Museum of Modern Art,B New York. Research is focused on museum innovation and identifying new partnerships, initiatives, and potential revenue streams1

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@barbaraeldredge www.museummonger.com

5 Award-winning writer and BBC documentary filmmaker Adam Harrison Levy teaches students the nuts and bolts of the Q&A in his specially-designed course “The Art of the Interview.” Class guests have included New Journalism legend Gay Talese, famed writer and former Harper’s editor Lewis Lapham, and literary nonfiction guru Lawrence Weschler.

1 In many respects this is a dream job for Barbara, since, with a museum director as a father, she grew up in and around museums. The blog she launched in Elizabeth Spiers’ “Online Media Workshop,” museummonger. com, covers museological issues, and her thesis looked at the role of ethics in the museum design collection. 3 Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator in the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art, is a D-Crit faculty member. Barbara was Paola’s Teaching Assistant for her “Curating Design” class and further developed a relationship with her through thesis research.

2 Barbara has published her writing on Core77 and in Dress, the second in the series of D-Crit chapbooks, amongst other publications.

Barbara Eldredge

8 For an assignment in “Researching Design,” for example, Barbara researched the props used as skulls in Hamlet.E

4 On December 8, 2009, design critic and educator Peter Hall, D-Crit’s visiting critic and external thesis reader, gave a lecture titled “Writing Design History: Problems and Provocations.” His lecture, and more than 150 others, can be viewed on the D-Crit Vimeo web page, http://vimeo.com/dcrit.

www.dcrit.sva.edu

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The SVA MFA Design Criticism program welcomes students from a range of academic backgrounds whose diverse perspectives and experiences enrich the debate. The program is equally well suited to designers, who want to hone their skills in writing and critical thinking, as it is to journalists and writers, who wish to deepen their understanding of design. Particularly appropriate undergraduate backgrounds include: design, architecture, journalism, art history, English and literary studies, film studies, urban studies, philosophy and anthropology. Some students have significant work experience under their belts, while a few will be accepted straight from school.

Chappell Ellison

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2010 Blogger and columnist

She took a running leap away from design practice and northeastern Texas, landed in the middle of the NYC design criticism community, and found her true voice as a writer and editor. Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1984 Hometown: Texarkana, TX Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BFA, Design, University of Texas at Austin

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Career prior to D-Crit: Web design Career after D-Crit: Lead contributor for The Etsy Blog; Blog design columnist for GOOD; instructor at D-Crit; brand strategist for companies and individuals within the design realm. Contributor of articles to Design Observer, Observer AIGA Voice, Ready Made, Made and Cabinet; former assistant editor at Design Observer

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SVA MFA Design Criticism

What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I got lucky in my last semester at UT when I accidentally signed up for a class taught by Jeffrey Meikle, a design historian. Within a few weeks, I knew I was meant to be a design writer. When I found the Design Criticism program at SVA, it sounded perfect.

What advice would you give to prospective students? Once you enter the D-Crit program, it’s yours to make of it what you will. Bring your own interests and fascinations to the table. Be curious. Stay late. The connections you make with the students and faculty will be enduring and essential.3

What were the most important skills that you learned? D-Crit taught me how to find my voice. I’m still working on it, but the program guided me to establish myself as the person I want to be in this discipline. By practicing our communication skills on the page and at events, we put ourselves out there. I also learned how to crank out writing like a machine. I used to fear a 1,500-word essay, and would agonize over it for a week. Now, a 1,500-word essay is what I do before breakfast.1 A

What are the priorities for design critics now? What kind of design interests you today? We’ve reached a critical mass with the amount of manufactured objects on this planet.G Now is a great opportunity for design critics and writers to help stem that tide and make sense of our designed environment so that we can cut a better path to the future. Designers will eventually be valued more for how they think than for what they make. We need more writers and designers who can operate critically in the field and make decisions that create meaningful, positive change.

The written D-Crit thesis is 10,000 words in length. Chappell’s, titled “Design in the Dark: Finding Meaning in the Multiplex,” traced the historical origins of symbols commonly used in movie theater design.

example, are desperate for people who can craft strong, creative communication for a company. Non-profit organizations always need help getting their message out to their audiences. There are hundreds of avenues us D-Crit grads can take.

2 Chappell won the student category of the 2009 Winterhouse Award for Design Writing & Criticism for “Compulsion: Where Object Meets Anxiety,” her personal essay about the role of objects in her brother’s obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Your greatest triumph? Nothing beat the feeling of getting a phone call from Bill Drenttel,B who informed me that I’d won the Winterhouse Award for Design Writing and Criticism.2 C I think from the moment I won that award, my career in design writing truly began to open up.

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What are your fondest/funniest memories? Some people might say their favorite memories were the field trips or events, but for me it was the small moments in class. D-Crit has some of the most animated, wonderful, faculty members. I still laugh when I thinking about Russell Flinchum’s rant on Postmodern coffee tables D and Ralph Caplan’s lecture about how the “problem with design is your mother.”

Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit? I’m more aware of the issues within design that aren’t discussed as much as they should be. Politics, the environment, and health are all directly affected by the decisions of designers. I also learned that the study of design can be exactly what you want it to be. A chair E is no more or less designed than the experience of waiting in line F at Disney World. How have you deployed skills learned at D-Crit in your professional life? Some might assume that the rise of new media and the questionable future of newspapers leave writers out in the cold, but that’s hardly the case. Fortunately, there is still a huge demand for writers, especially those with the kinds of flexible skills that D-Crit provides. Start-up companies, for www.dcrit.sva.edu

@ChappellTracker www.chappellellison.com

3 D-Crit’s core curriculum, which trains students to interrogate and evaluate design, architecture, and urban infrastructure, is augmented by the specialist knowledge of more than 40 visiting critics and lecturers each semester. Recent guests in the Tuesday night lecture series include Cmmnwlth design studio founder Zoe Coombes, fashion philosopher Lucy Collins, design studio Project Projects, food-design strategist Emilie Baltz, public radio producer and reporter Roman Mars, author Steve Almond, MoMA curator Pedro Gadanho, and Moss design store founder Murray Moss, among others. After the lectures, students stay for a wine and cheese reception—a chance each week to hob nob with speakers, faculty, and friends of the program, and to forge connections that lead to internships, mentorships, and jobs.

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? If I hadn’t gone to D-Crit, I’d be stuck in a desk job, designing brochures—poorly. I wasn’t a very good designer, but I think I might be able to be a great design writer.

A design time-traveler, she left her pre-D-Crit study of antiquities; now she is defining the future of design and architecture. Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1972 Hometown: Raleigh, NC Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, Classics and Art History, Duke University; MA, History of Art and Architecture, Harvard University (ABD PhD)

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D-Crit in 10 words or less: Everything comes together at D-Crit.

What were the most important skills that you learned? From a practical standpoint, it was really useful learn how to create podcasts E with instructor Leital Molad1 or learn the ins and outs of online media with Elizabeth Spiers. Justin Davidson’s course was tough but invaluable, both for writing and editing skills. Even today when I’m writing, I often think “WWJS?” or, “What would Justin say?”

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? D-Crit gave me the extra push I needed to design my own career. There’s a real “just do it” attitude at D-Crit and the course itself is a great place to experiment and test ideas. When I finished the program I didn’t just have a lot of ideas, I also had the tools and network to be able to follow through on them.

What was your biggest challenge? Through D-Crit, I was offered a great editor job at The Architect’s Newspaper, the semester before the thesis was due. It was full-time, so getting the thesis written on time required foregoing any leisure pursuits for a few months. But the upside was that I had a job when I graduated!

What initially attracted you to D-Crit? The interdisciplinary curriculum with its expansive definition of design, a group of faculty whose bylines I had followed for years, and the program’s focus on critical writing. I was hooked. My previous educational background is in art history, and I had professional experience in publishing as well as communications for architecture firms—the D-Crit program seemed as if it would tie my interests together under the common heading of “design” and open new avenues for my career. What is your first memory of D-Crit? I remember the preparatory reading list that was mailed to first-year students at the beginning of the summer before the start of the first fall semester. It was long, challenging, and fantastic—ranging from Reyner Banham to Ralph Caplan. It underscored for me that I had made the right decision to return to grad school, and that it was going to be intense! Plus, it was a great excuse to buy boxes of wonderful books about design,C like William Whyte’s The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces D and Charles Moore’s You Have to Pay for the Public Life. Life SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Communications at Gensler and Rockwell Group Career after D-Crit: Contributing editor and former managing editor at Architect’s Newspaper; A managing director of Superscript B editorial collective; contributor to publications such as Fast Company, Company The Art Newspaper, Newspaper AIGA Voice, and the Journal of Decorative Arts; member of the communications committee of desigNYC.

What are your fondest/funniest memories? I remember most of my class cramming as a group for the “Design History” final at the end of first semester; we were all frantically thumbing through flashcards of the design icons we had to learn—from Le Corbusier’s Pavilion de l’Esprit Nouveau to George Nelson’s Sling Sofa F—we were exhausted yet high on adrenaline. In the end, I think we were surprised at how much information we processed and retained. Don’t knock the value of memorization. What did the experience of writing and presenting your thesis teach you? I came to better understand the idea of audience when both writing and presenting. You might think you have something profound to say, but no one is going to pay attention if it isn’t presented in a compelling and engaging way.2

In this course, WNYC’s “Studio 360” senior producer Leital Molad instructs students in the principles of radio and podcasting: How to interview and gather sound; write for the ear; create narrative arcs and effective pacing; set scenes and tell a story; ask good questions and pick good tape; and enrich pieces with music, ambient sound, and archival clips. With “Studio 360” host Kurt Andersen as their guest critic, in the fall semester the red light outside the D-Crit recording booth is seldom off.

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2011 Contributing editor and editorial consultant

Molly Heintz

“Present Tense: The 2011 D-Crit Conference,” moderated by documentary film producer Adam Harrison Levy, and featuring The New York Times Magazine contributor Rob Walker as keynote speaker, presented 2011’s eleven graduating MFA Design Criticism students (who each made a sharply honed ten-minute presentation on their thesis topic) and concluded with a panel of prominent critics (MoMA’s Paola Antonelli, BIG’s founder and architect Bjarke Ingels, Van Alen Institute’s executive director Olympia Kazi, The New Yorker’s John Seabrook and Fast Company’s Company Linda Tischler), on the future of design criticism. The students’ topics ranged from the design of playgrounds to the use of sound as a communicative tool in design and architecture and from a consideration of decay and impermanence in design to an analysis of the Afro as visual archetype. D-Crit conferences attract audiences of up to 600 members of the design and media communities.

How did that post-thesis-submission shot of Tequila taste? I’m from the South, so I requested a bourbon shot, which tasted excellent (it was actually Jack Daniels G whiskey, but close enough!).

What advice would you give to prospective students? Come to D-Crit and take full advantage of all the design minds and support you’ll have for two years—great things will happen! Reflect on what ideas and subjects you’re passionate about and weave it into your coursework.

How important are D-Crit friendships/ working relationships to you now? It’s an impressive and highly effective network. After serving for a year and a half as managing editor of The Architect’s Newspaper, where I often matched up Newspaper talented D-Crit colleagues with writing assignments, I’m now spending the majority of my time as the managing director of Superscript, an editorial collective founded with three other Class of 2011 D-Crit grads (Avinash Rajagopal, Aileen Kwun, Vera Sacchetti). Superscript works on designrelated research, writing and editing projects for a variety of firms and institutions, from Pentagram to Rockwell Group, among others. In some cases, we serve as a kind of in-house critic, helping our collaborators think through what they’re saying to the world and how they’re saying it. Our tagline is “multiplying conversations about design,” and we hope that all our projects speak to the idea of expanding and improving those dialogues. www.dcrit.sva.edu

What are the priorities for design critics now? What kind of design interests you now? I think design critics need to start by being critical of themselves. There are few formal editorial roles with the title of “critic” so it’s up to the writer to establish that position with his/her approach. There is so much uncritical, unreported design writing happening, particularly online, that the critic really must serve as a guidepost. Ω Ω

@heintzmm www.superscript.co

Aileen Kwun

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2011 Design writer, editor, and design studio manager

With an ear for language, and a nose for a good story, she used D-Crit to sharpen her design savvy. Now she applies her expertise as manager of a design studio, and writes for top magazines. Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1985 Hometown: New Orleans, LA Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, English Literature & Composition, UC Berkeley; Certificate in Publishing, Columbia University’s School of Journalism

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Career prior to D-Crit: Publicist at Princeton Architectural Press Career after D-Crit: Manager at design firm Project Projects;A contributes articles to Icon, Grafik,B Disegno Disegno, The Huffington Post, Design Bureau, Bureau The New City Reader, Metropolis Metropolis, and The Architect’s Newspaper; edits books for Princeton Newspaper Architectural Press; founding member of Superscript editorial collective

SVA MFA Design Criticism

What did the experience of writing and presenting your thesis teach you? I’m prone to hole up and silently stew on my own when it comes to writing and research, so I really appreciated being forced out there to interview people, observe things first hand, and ultimately present my thesis to an auditorium packed with hundreds of people. Working on my thesis definitely made me realize that writing is only one small part of the act of criticism. Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-DCrit? It’s all about being aware of your environment: what surrounds you, how it works, what it’s made of, how it’s being built and planned for the future; small scale to big scale, visible and intangible, from a practical point of view, and from an emotional point of view. Design, and design criticism, is about voicing and sharing those observations—for the user, the consumer, the community member...for all the different roles we play in our daily lives. Ω Ω

What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I found the course description completely refreshing, ambitious, and unabashedly optimistic in its scope and approach. I was working as a publicist at Princeton Architectural Press at the time, awash in the range of existing design journalism outlets and honestly a bit disappointed with their content. Many of the articles were merely remixed press releases—sometimes the very ones I’d help pen for my job. I wanted to learn more about design, and was unsure where an MFA in Design Criticism could take me, but I figured it would be more interesting than seeing my own words turn up beneath someone else’s byline.1 www.dcrit.sva.edu

@aileenkwun www.aileenkwun.com

What is your professional life post-D-Crit? The morning after our thesis conference, I began my first day as a freelance researcher and writer at Metropolis magazine. I had previously worked in book publishing, where deadlines seemed much more theoretical than practiced, so it was a great way to experience an accelerated pace of writing (and of course, Justin Davidson’s “Criticism Lab” was great bootcamp prep for this). By summer’s end, I began working as manager of Project Projects. Aside from specializing in work with some of the best museums, architects, schools, galleries, and cultural institutions around, the design studio also produces a significant amount of self-initiated side projects, including critical essays, panels and lectures; a paperback imprint of books focused on visual culture; and most recently, an experimental exhibition space in Chinatown. It’s been a really energetic, inspiring environment to spend my nine-to-five (or actually, ten-to-seven), and has been a revolving door of interesting characters: everyone from Karel Martens C to Emily King,D Zoe Ryan, and producers of Swiss-Italian public television. Never a dull moment here, and I mean that literally, too— we’re located above a chandelier shop on the Bowery. Working at Project Projects has certainly motivated me to keep my own pursuits and side projects running as well, so I’ve also been trying to keep up the writing, editing, and my involvement with Superscript, an editorial consultancy Molly, Avi, Vera, and I started last May. We recently wrapped up our third Architecture and Design Book Club with the architecture critic Mark Lamster E leading a discussion of W.G. Sebald’s Austerlitz.F ADBC is a public event that explores design themes in all sorts of texts, from Edith Wharton to science fiction. We invite guest speakers from the design world to help lead the conversation.

What is your first memory of D-Crit? The Aeron Chairs in the D-Crit Reading Room, and Russell Flinchum’s double-slide lecture2 H format. Seeing iconic design history moments in double vision has never been so gratifying, if slightly punishing.

Design historian Russell Flinchum used slide projectors for his first years teaching at D-Crit and subjected students to a barrage of images—up to 300 per class—accompanied by his rapid-fire, in-depth commentary.

Aileen was the recipient of the 2010 Winterhouse Award for Design Writing and Criticism in the Education category, for an analytical essay paralleling architecture and fashion through a critique of Lady Gaga’s costume. During her time at D-Crit she also edited Dress, the second D-Crit chapbook,G which collected short essays by D-Crit students on the personal style of figures in the public eye such as Karl Lagerfeld, Pope Benedict XVI, and Muammar al-Gadaffi. Copies are available for purchase or free download on http://www.lulu.com.

D-Crit in 10 words or less: A really general, yet specific, liberal arts course of study.

SVA MFA Design Criticism

14 see more at http://www.flickr.com/groups/dcrit/pool/

www.dcrit.sva.edu

Derrick Mead

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2011 Design writer

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D-Crit in 10 words or less. Examining, understanding, and contextualizing the world of things through writing.1 What initially attracted you to D-Crit? The program attracted me away from a professional life writing about contemporary visual art because of its focus on “the stuff” that didn’t seem to merit careful thought in the arts and so many other professional and academic fields. The time and resources the program provided to do intensive research and practice professional, journalistic writing were invaluable.

2 The program is suited to anyone with a passionate interest in design and its social implications. Students come to D-Crit to deepen their understanding of the designed environment, to hone their skills in writing and critical thinking, to work alongside New York’s best-respected editors, authors, critics, and historians, and to communicate their unique perspectives through a range of media, including exhibitions, radio podcasts, events, blogs, and books.

Your biggest surprise? I was surprised and gratified to find others like me—people interested in explaining how the things we’re surrounded by became the way they are, whether quotidian or monumental, at every conceivable scale.2 How did your thesis help define your territory as a writer and a thinker? D-Crit followed directly from a year spent working full time for my family’s orchard in Tivoli, New York, a business that will celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2016. My thesis on the impact of design on the repair of everyday objects like appliances and personal items B arose from a fascination with how differently tools and implements C were considered on the farm than in other businesses I’d been exposed to.3 For agricultural implements repair wasn’t considered optional; it was an obligatory, periodic state that punctuated the working life of everything from hand tools to complex machinery. Old equipment was often disassembled and reincorporated, either in the form of parts or as a source of raw materials, in the construction and repair of newer broken things. . . but there were differences. Many of the newer tools and machines at the farm didn’t seem to lend themselves to repair. SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Orchardist A (fourth-generation); cataloguer of contemporary art for Phillips de Pury and Company; publications consultant to the Guggenheim International Foundation Career after D-Crit: Contributor to Design and Culture and Metropolis magazine, among other publications

Parts often needed to be replaced with manufacturer-produced spares, at considerable expense, and many contemporary materials—plastics first and foremost—couldn’t be repaired at all. The scope of my investigation gradually widened, and it seemed at times that our entire material culture was being designed to be thrown away after use, and that a fundamental human virtue was being discarded along with the skills and volition to fix. Was this a designer-led conspiracy, or another nefarious outcome of our short-term minded, corporation-driven economic model? These are the kinds of questions design critics are equipped to answer, or at least attempt to answer. This sort of investigation seems incredibly important to me, as we forge ahead toward a Western-style standard of living for billions of people currently living in more traditional material cultures.4 How have the skills you learned and the people you met at D-Crit helped you in your professional life? The editor of Design and Culture D attended our graduating conference and liked my presentation enough to commission me to edit an extract from my thesis, focused on the role designers stand to play resurrecting repair from an untimely fate, to appear in a forthcoming issue of the journal. I write articles on product design for Metropolis E magazine thanks to a connection forged during my first year in the D-Crit program—Avinash Rajagopal (Class of 2011), is associate editor there. At the moment, my professional life is back at Mead Orchards, helping to bring in the 2012 harvest and fixing things when they break. In the future, I hope to find work in design education, instructing emerging designers in research techniques and writing. Ω Ω

@derrickmead www.surfacehot.com

3 “Designing for Repair: Things Can Be Fixed”

Date of birth: 1981 Hometown: Tivoli, NY Current location: Red Hook, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, Creative Writing & English Literature, magna cum laude, Bard College

Wow, that’s exactly 10 words!

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The range of topics under investigation at D-Crit challenges the very definition of design in contemporary society. In their thesis research, the class of 2012 addressed such issues as the lack of firearms in design museum collections, the design of fitness culture, the misleading use of pastoral imagery in food packaging design, the disconnect between policy and design in American public housing, and the role of interaction design in childhood development, among others.

From an orchard in upstate New York to an MFA at D-Crit, he’s on a mission to build repair back into the industrial design process.

www.dcrit.sva.edu

The business manager who wanted to write a book on biology and design, and get it published—and did! Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1979 Hometown: New York, NY Current location: Astoria, Queens Education prior to D-Crit: BA, Marketing, Management, Art History, Pace University

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What is your professional life post-D-Crit? It’s a hybrid of all the things I’ve wanted to do: D-Crit enabled me to make the leap to be a published writer and to pursue teaching and curating. My book Bio Design: Nature + Science + Creativity A surveys recent design projects that harness living materials and processes, presenting strategies for achieving sustainability, new aesthetic possibilities enabled by biotechnology, and provocative experiments that illuminate the opportunities and dangers in manipulating life for human ends. I am currently exploring opportunities to curate an exhibition based on my research. What initially attracted you to D-Crit? The reputations of the faculty members and their collective expertise. What is your first memory of D-Crit? Reading aloud my first graduate school essay in our “Urban Curation” class. It was an anxious, but ultimately fulfilling, moment that marked the beginning of my progression toward becoming a writer. Your biggest surprise? Number one: making fourteen friends who I trust, admire, and will be checking in on and collaborating with for years to come— one of the great benefits of the program.1 Number two: seeing how much a piece of writing can be improved through the editing process.

SVA MFA Design Criticism

Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit? Yes, I’ve come to think of design much more broadly and I have a much deeper understanding of how all design, from the street grid B to the coffee cup lid,C tells the story of a culture.2 What are the priorities for design critics now? Among the many priorities, I think ecological impact is the most important. Design approaches need to change drastically to address the climate crisis. I am most interested in design that integrates with, and enhances, natural environments. How did D-Crit help prepare you to write your first book? My book Bio Design grew from my thesis, a summer internship at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and Karen Stein’s “Design Book” course at D-Crit.3 These experiences were essential to build the skills and accumulate the specific knowledge required to successfully pitch, develop, and complete a full-length book. It was also a tremendous help that Alice Twemlow set up my first meeting with a commissioning editor from Thames & Hudson! Ω Ω

@wmyersdesign www.biology-design.com

3 Assignments in Karen Stein’s course follow the stages of book conception and development, from crafting proposals, researching a target audience and assessing a project’s commercial viability, to drafting sample materials. Students then pitch their book idea to guest critics from the publishing world.

In addition to the connections maintained outside of the department, alumni are invited to stay in touch with the goings-on within D-Crit, by joining Tuesday night lectures and receptions, a program of weekly lunchtime conversations with special guests, and class field trips to nearby sites such as the New York Maker Faire in Queens. Some alumni instruct classes at D-Crit and others appear as guest critics.

D-Crit 10 words or less: The best decision I made since growing a beautiful beard.

Career prior to D-Crit: Manager of Business Development, Museum of Modern Art, New York Career after D-Crit: Author of Bio Design (Thames & Hudson, and The Museum of Modern Art, 2012); contributes to Domus, Metropolis magazine, The Architect’s Newspaper, and Next American City Newspaper magazine; teaches at Hunter College and Genspace, the country’s first community biotech laboratory

In the second-year course “Typologies,” instructed by The New York Times car critic Phil Patton, students study an object, a building or a graphic element and assemble and evaluate variants of it. By looking at types and typeforms (coffee cup lids, magnetic car ribbons, military unit patches, manhole covers around the world) students learn to identify what doesn’t change in a design in order to come closer to its essence.

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2010 Design writer, author, educator, and curator

Will Myers

www.dcrit.sva.edu

Avinash Rajagopal

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2011 Assistant editor at Metropolis magazine

A mover and shaker in NYC’s design and architecture publishing scene, his Indian roots are never far away. Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1985 Hometown: Ahmedabad, India Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, Industrial Design, National Institute of Design (NID), Ahmedabad, India

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Career prior to D-Crit: Instructor, Cultural Studies at NID Career after D-Crit: Assistant editor at Metropolis magazine; instructor at D-Crit and University of Texas, Austin

A B

D D

SVA MFA Design Criticism

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? I had always wanted to eventually end up teaching, but I had imagined something more academic and research-oriented in the interim. D-Crit changed that in many ways. The first was by making me realize how much I enjoyed the act of writing itself. The second way was by making me temporarily blog-crazy (I had three going at one time including Little Design Book,B a design criticism blog with an Indian voice), which led to the internship at Metropolis Metropolis, and then my editorial position there. What initially attracted you to D-Crit? There was, quite simply, no other course like it. I was working in India then, considering courses in design history, but I also wanted to deal with the new, the now. I needed a program that felt flexible enough to let me change my mind often and find my place. The stellar faculty was the icing on the cake.

of design and hacking, and the emergence of open design as a new model for responsible, sustainable practice,2 I learned that it’s so much better to ask a person than to search an online archive. The best part is that people tell you things that you didn’t ask in the first place. Opinions and impressions matter as much as facts. Do you stay in touch with your fellow classmates both personally and professionally? Immediately after D-Crit, Molly, Vera, Aileen, and I founded Superscript, so we have collaborated on a fair number of projects, including an Architecture and Design Book Club. Aside from that, several D-Critters have written for Metropolis Metropolis, some of them pretty regularly, and it has been such a pleasure to work with them. D-Crit has given me a peer network that I enjoy, trust, and rely upon. Little D-Crit groups form almost instantly at most design events, and not just here in New York—last year, four of us, along with Alexandra Lange, ended up together at the Lisbon Design Biennale. D-Crit has created some truly international collaborations! Ω Ω

@avirajagopal www.littledesignbook.in

What is your first memory of D-Crit? Catching the wrong train, arriving for orientation all flustered and lost, and being greeted by Emily Weiner and Alice Twemlow. I no longer remember what was said, but I do remember how happy they were to see me. It was all very comforting. What are your fondest/funniest memories? One really fond memory is gathering at Ralph Caplan’s home at the end of the first year. Ralph and Judith are wonderfully caring people, and live in the most perfect apartment in the world. And then there was the time that we had a long, serious discussion with Paola Antonelli at MoMA, going over the materials for her upcoming show. At the end of it she asked us, “Where are you guys headed now?” Our prompt answer: “To see Justin Bieber Live, in 3D.” C How did your research process change or evolve? What sources for information do you turn to now? I think the big change is in how I view primary sources. In the process of researching and writing my thesis, “Tinkering with Design,” D which tracked the convergence www.dcrit.sva.edu

2 Avinash’s thesis, Tinkering with Design, Design will be published as an e-book by the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum.

1 D-Crit students are encouraged to gain professional experience by taking on summer internships and fellowships after their first year of study. Since 2009, students have interned at Surface magazine, LOT-EK, AIGA, Pentagram, Museum of the Moving Image, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Office for Metropolitan Architecture in Rotterdam, Metropolis magazine, The Museum of the City of New York, Change Observer, Observer Judy Wert & Company, the Detroit research collaborative D Flux, and The Philip Johnson Glass House, among other establishments.

What is your professional life post-D-Crit? I am an assistant editor at Metropolis magazine,A a position that evolved out of a summer internship and a part-time role there.1 Over the past year, some of my most demanding work, though, has been in the classroom. I gave three lectures in “Design History” for first year students at D-Crit, and followed that up with helping MFA Design students at the University of Texas, Austin, write their final reports for their graduation projects. It has been a very busy year, but a very happy one.

A book editor with a philosophical turn of mind, he quit San Francisco for NYC and a chance to write thoughtful design commentary, and to inspire emerging designer and critics through his teaching.

Critics, including Sasha Frere Jones, Jody Rosen, Paola Antonelli, and Philip Nobel, were invited to read aloud short pieces of criticism they had written, grouped into themes such as sports, food, evil, and home. The KGB Bar is well-known as the site of literary reading nights.

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Date of birth: 1971 Hometown: Tempe, AZ Current location: Brooklyn, NY Education prior to D-Crit: BA, English (Writing concentration), Loyola Marymount University

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D-Crit in 10 words or less: D-Crit is a laboratory for understanding the world we’ve built. What is your professional life post-D-Crit? Being able to develop design pedagogy for the next generation—as a thesis instructor at Pratt, RISD, and SVA—is hugely important to me, and teaching brings to bear almost every design, research, and humanities skill I have. In Fall 2010, I was managing editor for an innovative weekly newspaper, The New City Reader,A which was produced in public on the gallery floor of the New Museum in conjunction with the exhibition, “The Last Newspaper.” In 2011, I was the US editor for DomusWeb International. Today, in addition to teaching, I continue to work with artists, photographers, and organizations to develop books and other editorial projects at ARstudio. In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? I would not have had been introduced to the people behind The New City Reader and Domus, for one thing. Exposure to the writers, researchers, and practitioners who turned out to be future collaborators and colleagues has been critical for me. Likewise, I would not be teaching now. What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I was an art/design book editor at Chronicle Books in San Francisco and wrote some freelance on the side, and felt increasingly drawn to research and develop my own interests. Going back to school made SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Senior editor of art, design, and photography books, Chronicle Books in San Francisco Career after D-Crit: Thesis instructor, MFA Design programs at Pratt and RISD and SVA MFA Design Criticism; book developer at ARStudio; contributes articles to DomusWeb, Dwell, Imprint Imprint, The New City Reader, Reader Urban Omnibus, Design Observer, and Photo District News

the most sense, but I was frustrated by the options—art history and visual criticism programs were too constrained. I learned about D-Crit through the enthusiasm of one of its co-founders, Steve Heller, who was also one of my authors. The more I learned about the program in its incipient phase, the more interested I became. Once I saw the faculty roster, I was hooked. What is your first memory of D-Crit? Before the program began there were a few events at the KGB Bar B in the East Village,1 where I met a number of my future colleagues, as well as some people whose careers I would come to admire and follow, including the blogger Paul Lukas and filmmaker Gary Hustwit.2 The fact that this program could be deployed out into a (fun!) public realm, and be a source of interest for people outside the design world, made an impression on me. What were the most important skills that you learned? Editors do not always make good writers, and I needed time, brain-space, and direction to concentrate on developing those skills. I majored in English literature and writing in my undergraduate degree, and I found that I could call on that training and my interests to enrich my critical writing. I also worked to integrate other aspects of my liberal arts background, from philosophy to art history, into my research. Exposure to new research methodologies and critical frameworks was also very important for me. And knowing how to listen and participate in a seminar environment was key.

In 2010, Independent filmmaker Gary Hustwit lectured at D-Crit on the creative process behind his films, and the power and shortcomings of documentary filmmaking as a critical tool. He has produced six feature documentaries, including Helvetica, a documentary about graphic design and typography, and Objectified Objectified, which examines our complex relationship to manufactured objects.

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2010 Writer, educator, book developer

Alan Rapp

3 Alan’s thesis, “The Esoteric City: Urban Exploration and the Reclamation of the Built Environment,” argued that the city we truly experience is only the small portion we are allowed into. As he explains, entire swaths of the built environment are off-limits to most people—sites of infrastructure, the remains of yesterday’s heavy industry, outmoded hospitals, dead shopping malls. A few dedicated people defy the prohibitions against entering these spaces, creating an unsanctioned (and often illegal) practice of independent urban exploration committed to investigating largely unseen corners of the city. Those who infiltrate these sites comment on the kinds of quotidian urban experience the rest of us normally have. “The Shadow City” explores the implications of their alternative use of urban space.

What did the experience of writing and presenting your thesis teach you? The thesis process was the core and culmination of our efforts in the program. The process taught me to be true to my interests, which allows me to synthesize research and critical conventions with more imaginative methods, including speculative writing and firsthand experience. There are ways to synthesize a range of operations—from poetic to aleatory to “gonzo”—into the thesis, which should be a completely ambitious document. How did your thesis help define your territory as a writer and a thinker? My thesis subject, urban exploration,C is still relatively new, and it was meaningful to contribute to its critical literature.3 Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit? Yes; design in the most diffuse sense is “everywhere” in the products and environments that humans create and consume. We have to understand the radical contingency of these systems in order to know how, or if, to sustain them. Increasing literacy in design is one of the best possible tools we have for our long-term sustainability, if not survival. I am aware that sounds grandiose, but some of the most pressing concerns of our time in terms of globalization, resource management, technology, and economies converge in design. And the most compelling philosophical issues converge there as well. www.dcrit.sva.edu

What advice would you give to prospective students? Be clear in your objectives for the program— and after. Your faculty and colleagues may be excellent collaborators in the future, but do look at what they do in their professional lives and see if those are paths you emulate—or indeed, if they are not, can you see opportunities for a new path that you largely strike on your own? What are the priorities for design critics now? What kind of design interests you now? I am very interested in the ways that graphic design and architecture contend with their status as disciplines within the broader culture. They both remain specialized pursuits, but their cultural influence is variable. There is still a huge design literacy gap to address with the public at large, and part of my teaching addresses finding ways for designers to talk to the rest of the world, not just the design-literate. I am interested in design communication that reveals itself as directly relevant to people’s lives and experiences. Ω Ω Ω

@AlanRappStudio www.alanrappstudio.com www.criticalterrain.wordpress.com

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Date of birth: 1983 Hometown: Lisbon, Portugal Current location: Milan, Italy Education prior to D-Crit: BA, Communication Design, University of Porto; BA, Contemporary Culture and Post-Colonialism, New University of Lisbon

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What is your professional life post-D-Crit? After I graduated I returned to Lisbon to work as the international press officer for Experimentadesign, the Portuguese design biennale. I also helped to found the editorial consultancy Superscript.1 In January 2012, I started my current job—I’m web editor for the international website of Domus magazine,A a monthly magazine of art and architecture, in Milan. I’m also working on the editorial coordination of the catalogue for Joseph Grima’s exhibition “Adhocracy,” B for the first Istanbul Design Biennial. In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? Completely. I entered D-Crit a designer, and left as a writer and a critic. I abandoned the practice to start writing about it. What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I was working as a graphic and exhibition designer in Lisbon, Portugal. I remember sitting at my desk—it was 2008—and stumbling across the D-Crit website,2 C just a few months before the program started. I loved my job and my life at the time, but I wanted something more—and nothing but instinct drew me to D-Crit. It took me a while to figure out how to get there, since grad school is so much more expensive in the US than in Europe, but I managed to get a Fulbright scholarship, and arrived in New York in August 2009. What is your first memory of D-Crit? When I first visited, I was so impressed by the department: all the light pouring into the main room, amazing desks,D a kitchen—wow! Then, I remember orientation and our first class: Design History with Russell Flinchum.3 What a ride. I have to SVA MFA Design Criticism

Career prior to D-Crit: Graphic designer Career after D-Crit: Web editor, Domus magazine; co-founder, editorial consultancy Superscript; co-editor, “Adhocracy Reader” exhibition catalogue, for the 2012 Istanbul Design Biennial; contributor to Domus, Disegno Disegno, Frame, Change Observer, Observer Metropolis POV, The Architect’s Newspaper, Newspaper and The New City Reader

admit I was seriously panicking afterwards. I thought to myself, “if it’s all like this, I’m never going to be able to keep up.” What were the most important skills that you learned? D-Crit made me change my life course. I learned how to find my voice and opinion, how to write (and in English!), and how to hone my views on what matters in design and architecture. D-Crit made me to realize how I can contribute to the design discourse. It has also introduced me to a fabulous network of people—Alice works tirelessly to have everyone that matters come to the department and talk to us.4 What was your biggest challenge? Writing has always been my biggest challenge. It still is. Your greatest triumph? I never thought I’d be able to pull off my thesis (an account of the failures of the social design movement). I can still feel the pain of the process, and still can’t believe it went as well as it did.5 What are your fondest/funniest memories? Our late-night writing marathons in the department, which turned into everything from Oscar- and movie-watching nights (projector!) to thesis and therapy sessions, impromptu dinner parties, and writing workshops. We worked and talked together through assignments, presentations and thesis, and learned so much from each other.

4 Since its inception in 2008, the MFA Design Criticism program has been host to more than 300 guests, both as in-class visitors and as speakers in the D-Crit Lecture Series: On Tuesday evenings the department presents formal talks by the most thoughtful and provocative writers, editors, designers, and curators practicing today in the interrelated fields of design, architecture, and urban planning. Selected to supplement the core curriculum with their original methods and alternative viewpoints, these speakers inspire and challenge D-Crit students. Students, in turn, through the discussions they lead, help illuminate the preoccupations of design criticism today.

Hailing from Lisbon, she challenged the social design movement to do better and was catapulted to the web editorship of Domus in Milan.

Beginning with the roots of mechanization and the Industrial Revolution, this course traces key concepts of modernism in design as manifested in the first half of the twentieth century. A special emphasis is placed on the definition and history of mass production. By using texts taken from the history of technology, design history, and cultural studies, students formulate their own approaches to understanding the products of the industrial design process.

SVA MFA Design Criticism Class of 2011 Web editor, Domus

Superscript is an editorial consultancy working with designers and architects. It specializes in content strategy and development across a broad range of media channels and platforms—from Twitter wall to TED talk—finding effective ways of communicating ideas through writing, editing, curation, and programming. The four partners at Superscript come from diverse professional and cultural backgrounds, and were brought together by D-Crit. Their interest in how design is presented in the public realm is the basis for independent projects, including exhibitions, publications, and events. 1 Designed by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the D-Crit Web site is home to more than 150 videos archived from past departmental lectures and conferences, as well as a library of over 120 recommended articles written by faculty, students, friends, and progenitors of the program. 2

Vera Sacchetti

C D

How did your research process change or evolve? What sources for information do you turn to now? Alice always pushed us to go for primary research, which I now think is absolutely fundamental in any research process. Steve’s class taught me to lose fear, and just go ahead and ask—you might be surprised by the results.

How have you deployed skills learned at D-Crit in your professional life? D-Crit has trained me well. I wouldn’t be able to do the job I’m doing now without the skills the program taught me.7 What advice would you give to prospective students? Talk to all the guest lecturers; stay long hours at the studio. Do a summer internship; go to all events in and outside the department.

How did your thesis help define your territory as a writer and a thinker? I had absolutely amazing feedback about my thesis. Today I keep writing and researching on social design, which is a field I want to be involved in even more. Do you think about design differently now than you did pre-D-Crit? How/Why? Let’s say that before D-Crit I was looking into a petri dish—that was my design universe— and now I can look at the entire laboratory. Or something like that.

What are the priorities for design critics now? What kind of design interests you now? Social design, design in emerging economies, new models of design with opensource, ad-hoc, and informal qualities. I’m interested in the links between design, architecture, and the shifting terrains of economy, politics, and social sciences. Ω Ω Ω

www.dcrit.sva.edu

@verasacchetti www.verasacchetti.net www.superscript.co

What did the experience of presenting your thesis teach you? The video of my presentation E still today serves as such an amazing calling card. It was great to train and prepare for that—I learned so much.6

Do you stay in touch with your fellow classmates both personally and professionally? Absolutely. I regularly commission writing for the Domus website from the D-Crit network and often collaborate on projects with D-Crit alums. I count D-Critters among my best friends.

Along with Saundra Marcel, Vera co-edited the D-Crit Chapbook At Water’s Edge, Edge working with D-Crit faculty member Akiko Busch.

D-Crit students work closely with speaking coach Stephen Nickson to refine their presentation skills before making their way to the conference stage.

5 Vera’s presentation of her thesis at the 2011 D-Crit Conference was highlighted by the New York Times blog: “Our Weekend Reading (and Watching and Listening).” And the same year Vera won the 2011 Design History Society Postgraduate Essay Prize for her thesis, “Design Crusades: A Critical Reflection on Social Design.”

Paola Antonelli, senior curator in the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art, instructs the second-year course, “Design and Museums: An Analysis in Four Movements.” From the Victoria and Albert, MoMA and the Newark Art Museum, to Vitra and the London Design Museum (and more), this class provides an overview of how visionary founders, directors, and curators of the past have celebrated design’s unique position connecting art, industry, innovation, progress, and real people. Students examine different philosophies and directions for collections and exhibitions, and MoMA is the in-depth case study for possible future strategies.

Already a design journalist in Vienna, her dream was to become a design curator. She graduated from D-Crit in May 2009 and two months later she was curator at the Vitra Design Museum in Germany. Ω Ω Ω Ω

Date of birth: 1971 Hometown: Vienna, Austria Current location: Weil am Rhein, Germany Education prior to D-Crit: Master of Social and Economic Sciences, Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, Austria

Ω Ω

D-Crit in 10 words or less: Fantastic faculty, great opportunities, made me a better thinker/writer. What is your professional life post-D-Crit? As curator at the Vitra Design Museum, I have organized two exhibitions—the first about Dutch designer Gerrit Rietveld.A The other is called “Confrontations,” B where I confronted five Dutch designers with partners from different professions like a chocolatier, or a woman who makes her own charcoal, and each pair worked together to come up with a project.

Career prior to D-Crit: design journalist, Die Presse Career after D-Crit: Curator at the Vitra Design Museum in Germany

theatre criticism, opera criticism, music criticism—even pop music—and cinema. But not design criticism; “design” for them is not about culture. That was my initial attraction to D-Crit: an opportunity to think about design as culture. “Finally,” I thought, “there’s a platform for me to share my views.” What is your first memory of D-Crit? The first time I visited D-Crit, I sat in on a class with Karrie Jacobs. I remember they had a discussion about Hello Kitty. And I thought, “wow, this is mind-blowing,” because I had never thought about Hello Kitty D as design. I soon recognized that it’s a design phenomenon, it’s so ubiquitous, and it’s an interesting artifact—of course we should be discussing it.2

In what ways did D-Crit change the course of your career? I would not have gotten the job at the Vitra Design Museum C without D-Crit. I didn’t have professional experience as a curator; I was hired because they saw that I went through the D-Crit program. They said because I learned from the faculty there,1 they were very confident that I would be able to do the job even though I didn’t have previous experience.

What were the most important skills that you learned? I got a new perspective on everything. When I left D-Crit, I was well educated in history and French theory. D-Crit taught me to look at design in a broader way than I did before. Before D-Crit, design for me meant furniture. And now everything is design. Always.

What initially attracted you to D-Crit? I read about D-Crit in a German design magazine. (I’m not a regular reader of the magazine and I had randomly bought two different issues, and both had stories about D-Crit. I thought, “Wow, this is a sign!”) Prior to D-Crit, I worked as a design journalist for the lifestyle supplement of Die Presse, a daily newspaper in Vienna. It was a high-end, well-respected newspaper. But advertising always drove the lifestyle supplement. I got so tired of that. The newspaper was super-serious about

What was your biggest challenge? Language was a big challenge. I’m a pretty good writer in German. I use specific words because I really want to say very specific things. So not being able to find the right words in English was tough. It was also challenging to move to New York. I gave up a lot in Austria—a really good job, and I was not that young—I was thirty-nine.3 So it took me a while to settle. In retrospect, I see D-Crit and my whole stay in New York as a gift. I got so much. I got new friends. I got new insights. I got new skills. . .

SVA MFA Design Criticism

2 “While design criticism is often directed at museum exhibitions, or pre-selected examples of significant design, and architecture critics tend to focus their efforts on showcase examples of buildings by well-known architects, the true range of the design critic is the entire manmade world. Any object, whether or not it has a designer pedigree, can be a worthy subject of criticism. And there is perhaps no greater assemblage of manmade objects than the city of New York.”—Karrie Jacobs, overview from her “Urban Curation” syllabus.

SVA MFA Design Criticism, Class of 2011 Curator, Vitra Design Museum, Germany

3 Demographics, class of 2011: Average Age — 30.9; Background Education — 27.2% Visual/ Communication Design, 27.2% English Literature and Composition, 27.2% History of Art and Architecture, 27.2% History of Art and Architecture, 9.1% Industrial Design, 9.1% Other; Geography — 45.5% New York City, 36.3% International, 18.2% Elsewhere in the United States.

Amelie Znidaric

What were your great triumphs? My great triumph was that I finished my thesis.4

present your thesis at this conference and you’re supposed to give your best presentation. I guess that’s what I did.

What are your fondest or funniest memories? Classes with Ralph Caplan and Akiko Busch, and the very last few weeks before thesis deadline when we basically lived at the department. My friend Avi is incredibly intelligent and gifted in everything, and while I was sweating and writing my thesis, he was watching “Desperate Housewives” on his computer. Obviously he finished his thesis earlier than I did. That was not fair.

What advice would you give to prospective students? Do it. And also take advantage. You only get what you put into it.

How did your research process change or evolve? What sources for information do you turn to now? Thanks to Steven Heller I realized it’s possible to do research without the Internet.5 So I do use archives and libraries much more than I did before as a deadline-driven journalist.

What are the priorities for design critics now? In Europe I think the most important priority for design critics is to establish design as a cultural discipline rather than a branch of lifestyle journalism. We need to inform people about design. People know about Mozart and Fellini—famous composers, movie directors—but they should also know about Ray and Charles Eames.6 Ω

What did the experience of writing and presenting your thesis teach you? I obviously learned a lot about my topic. My research skills improved. My presentations became a lot better over the course of D-Crit. And my thesis presentation was the best. That’s why they make you present and present and present and then in the end you www.dcrit.sva.edu

www.design-museum.de

First-year “Design History” required Reading: Pat Kirkham, Charles and Ray Eames: Designers of the Twentieth Century. Century

5 In Steve Heller’s first-year design research course, “No Google,” students learn how to research design through the use of archives, libraries, collections, interviews, and databases, without turning to Internet search engines.

Amelie’s 2011 thesis, “Listen to Your Chair: Design and the Art of Storytelling,” examined the narratives and associations of objects by examining three in particular: Ettore Sottsass’s Valentine typewriter, Jasper Morrison’s Basel chair, and Tokujin Yoshioka’s Stellar lamp.

Other D-Crit Alumni

SVA MFA Design Criticism Alice Twemlow, writer and chair and program cofounder, writer Ω Teaches: “Conference Workshop,” “Thesis,” and “Applied Thesis” Ω @DCrit

Alumni, Class of 2012 Tara Gupta Ω Design writing and communications consultant at Carbone Smolan Agency Ω Thesis topic: Honed/Toned: A Critique of Fitness Culture. Ωeastmeetszest.com Ω @eastmeetszest

Steven Heller, program co-founder, chair of SVA MFA Design Ω Teaches: “Researching Design” Ω @thedailyheller Kurt Andersen, author, critic, and host of WNYC’s “Studio 360” Ω Teaches: “Radio and Podcast Workshop” Ω @KBAndersen Paola Antonelli, senior curator of Architecture & Design and director of R&D at Museum of Modern Art Ω Teaches: “Exhibition and Collection Curation” Ω @curiousoctopus Akiko Busch, author of books on design, culture, and nature Ω Teaches: “Reading Design” Andrea Codrington Lippke, design and culture critic Ω Teaches: “Thesis Consultation” Russell Flinchum, archivist at Century Association Archives Foundation Ω Teaches: “Design History” Adam Harrison Levy, writer, documentary filmmaker and producer Ω Teaches: “Art of the Interview” and “Video Essays” Karrie Jacobs, author and contributing editor to Metropolis Ω Teaches: “Urban Curation” Ω karriejacobs.com Alexandra Lange, architecture critic and Design Observer blogger Ω Teaches: “Architecture and Urban Design Criticism” Ω @LangeAlexandra Leital Molad, senior producer of WNYC’s “Studio 360” Ω Teaches: “Radio and Podcast Workshop” Ω @studio360show Daniella Ohad Smith, design historian Ω Teaches: “Collecting Design” Ω daniellaohad.com Phil Patton, car critic at The New York Times Ω Teaches: “Typologies” Ω @pattonp Robin Pogrebin, culture reporter at The New York Times Ω Teaches: “Reporting Tools Workshop” Ω @rpogrebin Elizabeth Spiers, former editor-in-chief at New York Observer, founding editor of gawker.com Ω Teaches: “The Online Media Workshop” Ω @espiers Karen Stein, writer, architectural consultant and former editorial director at Phaidon Press Ω Teaches: “The Design Book” Faculty at large Ralph Caplan, author and lecturer, former editor-in-chief of I.D. Magazine Justin Davidson, architecture and classical music critic at New York Magazine Peter Hall, design critic, design department head at Griffith University Queensland College of Art Ω peterahall.com Meredith TenHoor, associate professor at Pratt Institute’s School of Architecture Ω mtenhoor.net

SVA MFA Design Criticism

Anna Kealey Ω Associate at creative recruitment firm Wert & Company; lecturer at International Conference for Designing Food and Designing For Food (ICDFDFF) at London’s Metropolitan University Ω Thesis topic: Unpacking the Pastoral Food Package: Myth-Making in Graphic Design. Ω annakealey.com Ω @annakealey Katya Mezhibovskaya Ω Designer at Vintage Books Ω Thesis topic: Collection/Recollection: On the Place and Meaning of Nostalgia in Home Merchandising and the Domestic Interior. Ω katyamezhibovskaya. com Ω @katiphon Erin Routson Ω Senior researcher at Public Policy Lab; freelance art director for Ralph Lauren Fragrances at L’Oreal; developer of Where We Live is Called the Projects, a playlist and website about NYCHA public housing; writes about music for b3sci and Unbest and basketball at I Go Hard Now Ω Thesis topic: Towers to Town Homes: Public Housing Policy & Design in the United States. Ω emrgency. tumblr.com Ω @dietcokeforever Amna Siddiqui Ω Communications director at Eyebeam Art & Technology Center; producer at Institute of Play, managing the organization’s game design endeavors and producing a webinar series called Playtime Online. Ω Thesis topic: Whiz Kids: Exploring New Definitions Of Touch Through Intelligent Play. Ω designthug.tumblr.com Julia van den Hout Ω Manager of press and exhibitions at Steven Holl Architects; founding co-editor of CLOG magazine; curator and editor with Fernando Romero for a book launching in December 2012 at the Guggenheim Museum Ω Thesis topic: Patterns of Ornament. Ω www.clogonline.com Ω @jtlvdhout Ann Weiser Ω Producer of a documentary film (in development) based on her thesis; author, forthcoming book on kitchen utensils; contributing writer, The Architect’s Newspaper, and Reserved. Ω Thesis topic: Main Street, USA and the Power of Myth. Ω style-elements.blogspot.com Ω @damnann Cheryl Yau Ω Designer at software company Squarespace; founder of Hide x Stitch, a website and online store for hand-sewn leather work Ω Thesis topic: Intrinsic Expressions: Uncovering the Performativity of Figurative Typography. Ω cherylyau.com Ω @cherylyau Alumni, Class of 2011 Kimberlie Birks Ω Contributing writer at DomusWeb and Azure magazine; communications associate for Word Above the Street’s “The Water Tank Project,” a public art exhibition in NYC, summer 2013; former writer and program coordinator for Deepak HomeBase, a conversational platform headed by Deepak Chopra at ABC Carpet & Home Ω Thesis topic: Recreate: New Grounds for New York’s Playgrounds. Ω kimbirks.com Ω @kimbirks Sarah F. Cox Ω Editorial director of Curbed; founding editor of Curbed Detroit; former press relations consultant for design firms Ω Thesis topic: The Detroiter: Resident Design Initiatives in a City Reshaping. Ω detroit.curbed.com Ω @xoxocox

1 Not featured in this brochure.

D-Crit Faculty

Stephanie Jönsson Ω Copywriter at UncommonGoods; freelance restaurant listings contributor for New York Magazine online; former curatorial intern for the contemporary design department of the Museum of Modern Art and public relations intern at Susan Grant Lewin Associates Ω Thesis topic: Designing Sound: Aural Agency in the Twenty-First Century. Ω patrickandstephaniecoffee. carbonmade.com Ω @coffeestephanie Saundra Marcel Ω Graphic designer; contributor to Design Bureau; co-editor of D-Crit Chapbook, At Water’s Edge; former contributor to AIGA’s online magazine, Voice: AIGA Journal of Design Ω Thesis topic: Living Licensed: Consuming Characters in Girls’ Popular Culture. Ω thedesignminded.com Ω @SAUNDR1A Zachary Sachs Ω Coordinator at The SVA Library’s Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives; editor of the archive’s blog, Container List; editor of the music magazine Ply; contributor to Artforum. com, Domus and BOMB magazine; contributor to The Push Pin Era, a forthcoming book drawn from materials in the Glaser Archives, for Picturebox Books Ω Thesis topic: Change and Decay in the Life of Buildings and Objects. Ωplyzine.com Ω containerlist.glaserarchives.org Ω @CerealRecords

Kathryn Henderson Ω Marketing specialist in creative and design at Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP; contributing writer at Complex.com; Formerly, deputy editor of content development for Pentagram.com Ω Thesis topic: Two Decades of Failure, Betrayal & Disaster: The Production Design of Wes Anderson’s Films as it Relates to the Family Dynamic. Ωkehcreative.com Ω @hondohondohondo Emily Leibin Ω Public relations manager and editor of the online Glass House Conversations at The Glass House; former editorial intern and freelance writer at Surface magazine Ω Thesis topic: Hidden Nature: Elroy Webber’s Connecticut Valley Modern Homes. Ω philipjohnsonglasshouse.org Ω @emilyleibinko Mike Neal Ω Instructor at UCLA Extension (design sustainability) and Chapman University (advertising); Creative Director (specializing in branding and creative strategy for environmental education) at public relations firm S. Groner Associates. Formerly, executive officer and journalist of Crew 84 of the Mars Desert Research Station Ω Thesis topic: Tabula Rubra: Critical Reflections on the Design of Mars. Ω thethingsofman.com Ω twitter.com/thethingsofman Ω @MikeANeal

Michele Washington Ω Graphic designer, educator and writer; consultant for non-profits such as desigNYC to rebuild their social media platform; producer (along with videographer, George Larkins) of a series of short films featuring “Designers, Makers + Thinkers.” Ω Thesis topic: Untangling the Naps: The Cultural Significance of the Afro and How it is Imagined Today. Ω culturalboundaries.com/ wordpress Ω @culturalboundar

Becky Quintal Ω Masters student in the history and philosophy of design at Harvard University Graduate School of Design; editor of Reiser + Umemoto’s book, O-14: Projection & Reception; writer for Architects’ Newspaper, CLOG, and The Designer’s Review of Books; formerly, editorial and research assistant at Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in Rotterdam; researcher at Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in NYC Ω Thesis topic: Import/Export: Delivering Architecture in a PublicFriendly Format. Ω beckyquintal.com Ω @bq_bq_bq

Alumni, Class of 2010 Hala Abdulmalak Ω Principal of The Design Critic, a design and branding consultancy; co-founder (with Tarek Atrissi) of KAFLAB, a foundation devoted to experimenting with Arab identity through art and design; co-founder of Kettle Falafel; editor of Arabictypography.com Ω Thesis topic: al-Kafiye: A Potent Symbol Uncovered, A Story of Design and Identity. Ω thedesigncritic.com Ω kaflab.org Ω arabictypography.com Ω @thedesigncritic

Angela Riechers Ω Founder and developer of Sites of Memory and Forgetting, a multimedia project funded by $25,000 grant by AOL; writer for Print Magazine, Wallpaper, The Atlantic, Metropolis, Design + Culture; instructor of Architectural Criticism at NYU and Graphic Design History at SVA MFA Design Criticism; Deputy Art Director at O, The Oprah Magazine Ω Thesis topic: Designing Grief: Personal Memorial Objects in the 21st Century. Ω sitesofmemory.com Ω @sitesofmemory

Amelia Black Ω Content strategist at Sawyer/ Berson; verbal identity consultant for Interbrand; co-founder, Manifest Projects; formerly, freelance design assistant and researcher at IDEO, New York; researcher, Noguchi Museum & Socrates Sculpture Park Queens; publications director at xDesign/ Environmental Health Clinic New York, NY Ω Thesis topic: Design Smells: Odorous Rhetoric For Embodied Experience. Ω ameliablack.com

Jim Wegener Ω Designer and writer Ω Thesis topic: Lived-In: User Experience in Architecture and Design Criticism.

Laura Forde Ω Designer at Google Creative Lab, contributor to Eye Magazine and Back Cover, and former visiting artist at Cooper Union School of Art Ω Thesis topic: Objects to be Read, Words to be Seen: Design and Visual Language in the Films of Jean-Luc Godard 1959–1967. Ω lauraforde.com Ω @lauraforde Sarah Froelich Ω Lifestyle product writer for Frontgate and Grandin Road brands; social media writer and marketing consultant at Boris Litwin Jewelers; former editorial intern at Surface magazine Ω Thesis topic: Dansk Designs, Reinventing the American Tabletop, 1954–1985. Ω sarahfroelich.com Ω @sfro

www.dcrit.sva.edu

Design Criticism Department School of Visual Arts 136 West 21st Street, 2nd Floor New York, NY 10011

in 10 words or less: 1 “Totally unique. A faculty and curriculum unlike any other.” Ω “Intellectually gratifying.” Ω “Crafting and creatively broadcasting informed opinions on design.” Ω “Everything comes together at D-Crit.” Ω “A really general, yet specific, liberal arts course of study.” Ω “Examining, understanding, and contextualizing the world of things through writing.” Ω “The best decision I made since growing a beautiful beard.” Ω “D-Crit is a laboratory for understanding the world we’ve built.” Ω “Fantastic faculty, great opportunities, made me a better thinker/writer.”

1 As described by its alums.