Claude Lichtenstein

Playfully Rigid

Swiss Architecture, Graphic Design, Product Design 1950-2006

This colourful anthology of Swiss architecture, graphic and product design from 1950 to 2006 demonstrates that clarity and wit are not opposites, but a uniquely Swiss pairing. Covering three design disciplines, multiple regions and over fifty years of creativity, the nearly 100 featured works reveal a shared culture of ideas – not a parade of “masterpieces,” but a celebration of playful invention and the bold clients who embraced it. A kaleidoscopic portrait of a design culture that is anything but purely correct and sober. 

This colourful anthology of Swiss architecture, graphic and product design from 1950 to 2006 demonstrates that clarity and wit are not opposites, but a uniquely Swiss pairing. Covering three design disciplines, multiple regions and over fifty years of creativity, the nearly 100 featured works reveal a shared culture of ideas – not a parade of “masterpieces,” but a celebration of playful invention and the bold clients who embraced it. A kaleidoscopic portrait of a design culture that is anything but purely correct and sober. 

Dieses Buch ist auch auf Deutsch erhältlich

Author(s): Claude Lichtenstein

Design: Integral Lars Müller

16,5 x 24,0 cm, 6 ½ x 9 ½ in

300 pages, 437 illustrations

hardback

2007, 978-3-03778-090-9, English
CHF 25.00

Claude Lichtenstein

Claude Lichtenstein

Claude Lichtenstein (*1949) is a Swiss architect and an expert on design history. From 1985 to 2001, he was responsible for exhibitions on architecture and design at the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich in the function of curator. He has lectured on design history and design science at various Swiss universities of applied sciences (ZHdK, FHNW, HSLU, ZHAW) and publishes widely on these subjects.