Since the days of radical printer-pamphleteers, design and designers have a long history of fighting for what’s right and working to transform society. The rise of the literary form of the manifesto also parallels the rise of modernity and the spread of letterpress printing.

This list of design manifestos was buried in a previous post but deserves its own permalink. The original list was largely drawn from Mario Piazza’s presentation at the Più Design Può conference in Florence, though I’ve edited and added to it. I’ve also incorporated links where I was able to find them.

• 1883   The Ideal Book, William Morris
• 1889   The Arts and Crafts of To-day, William Morris
• 1909   The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism, F.T. Marinetti
• 1914   Manifesto of Futurist Architecture, Antonio Sant’Elia
• 1918   De Stijl Manifesto
• 1919   Bauhaus Manifesto, Walter Gropius
• 1919   Das grüne Manifest (“The Green Manifesto”), Leberecht Migge on the economic, political, and social importance of public gardens in urban environments
• 1920   Down with Seriousism!, Bruno Taut
• 1922   Manifesto of the Painters’ Union, Taller de Grafica Popular
• 1923   Topology of Typography, El Lissitzky
• 1923   The New Typography, László Moholy-Nagy
• 1933   Charter of Athens, Congres Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne
• 1959   The journal "New Graphic Design," though not explicitly a manifesto, called for a radical rethinking of design along more scientific lines.
• 1964   First Things First, Ken Garland
• 1967   The Society of the Spectacle, Guy Debord
• 1971   La coscienza del designer, Albe Steiner
• 1978   Atlante Secondo Lenin - not so much a design manifesto, as a designed manifesto. The innovative infographics visualize theories for gaining power.
• 1979   Ahmedabad Declaration on Industrial Design for Development
• 1983   The Free Software announcement, later clarified in 1985’s GNU Manifesto
• 1987   Design memorandum. Dall’etica del progetto al progetto dell’etica.
• 1987   Ten Rules of Good Design, Dieter Rams
• 1989   Carta del progetto grafico, Giovanni Anceschi, Giovanni Baule, Gelsomino D’Ambrosio, Pino Grimaldi, Giancarlo Iliprandi, Giovanni Lussu, Alberto Marangoni, Gianfranco Torri
• 1990   A Scandinavian Design Council Manifesto on Nature, Ecology and Human Needs for the Future
• 1991   The Social Role of the Graphic Designer, Pierre Bernard
• 1991   The Munich Design Charter
• 1996   Viewer's Declaration of Independence
• 1998   Ne Pas Plier statement
• 1998   People's Communication Charter
• 2000   First Things First update - not just about advertising this time, but setting new values.
• 2000   Incomplete Manifesto for Growth, Bruce Mau (though I thought Dean Allen did a tidy job of demolishing this.)
• 2001   Diseno etica e comunicazione, AIAP
• 2001   Socialist Designer's Manifesto - a series of ideologically driven limitations along the lines of Dogme 95.
• 2001   Designers Against Monoculture, Noah Scalin
• 2001   Manifesto for Agile Software Development
• 2002   First Declaration of the St. Moritz Design Summit
• 2004   The Free Culture Manifesto
• 2006   The Public Role of the Graphic Designer
• 2006   Free Font Manifesto, Ellen Lupton
• 2006   Owner’s Manifesto, The Maker’s Bill of Rights
• 2007   The Designer’s Dilemma and subsequent Designers Accord
• 2007   1000 Words: A Manifesto for Sustainability in Design, Allan Chochinov
• 2007   Um Manifesto Anti-Design. (Automatic English translation.)
• 2008   White Night Before A Manifesto, Metahaven
• 2008   Kyoto Design Declaration, Members of Cumulus
• 2009   The Repair Manifesto from Platform21
• 2009   A Short Manifesto on the Future of Attention, Michael Erard
• 2009   Information Visualization Manifesto, Manuel Lima
• 2009   The Awesomeness Manifesto, Umair Haque
• 2009   Charter for Innovation, Creativity and Access to Knowledge, assembled at the Barcelona Culture Forum for citizens’ and artists’ Human Rights in the digital age

And a few un-/anti- manifestos:

• 2008   Project H Design (Anti)Manifesto: A Call To Action For Humanitarian (Product) Design
• 2009   This is Not Manifesto — towards an alternative design practice - hard-hitting anarchist perspective

 

Our project, simplicity in inner city bicycling, was at first glance a fun aesthetic opportunity in new trends, color, and materials. Our target lived / worked in an inner city environment with minimal space. Bicycling at this level can be more about fashion and culture than speed and performance. After the first few brainstorm sessions we knew there where bigger opportunities. The project ended up rethinking what a “frame” meant, getting ride of basic key components, and creating a new type of compact bicycling. Inspired by the first the "hobby horse" from it's simplicity and secondly the cafe race scene. Each is an exercise in stripping something down to its core.

I understand where the designer is coming from, and the reduction of parts to the core is logical. However the cramp posture makes me feel that this bike will be very difficult to ride long distances on.

Sunning together with her stunt double. This iconic bikini was the obsession of many a geek's childhood fantasy. Nice to see it actually works!

This made me smile!