We’re taking the summer off and rebroadcasting some old favorites from the archives. In August, we went back to 2022 to revisit our conversation with Nicole Killian (who was just named Associate Director of Yale’s Graduate Graphic Design Program and to 2019 for our conversation with Kurt Andersen (whose new novel, The Breakup, is out now!)
EDITOR’S NOTE
Happy back-to-school season! The new semester is underway which means it is time for a new season of Scratching the Surface! After a summer of sharing old favorites, it’s nice to be back with new conversations. In case you missed it, our first episode of the Fall season came out last Wednesday, and was a really wide ranging conversation with Central Saint Martins Provost Rathna Ramanathan about the state of design education today. That episode paired nicely, I thought, with my members-only conversation with CalArts Vice Provost Rachel Berger about how she’s thinking about education. Look for new episodes every other Wednesday for the rest of the year!
My new book, Graphic Designers After Graphic Design, is launching at the end of the month and we’ll be doing a special episode around the book a bit closer to the publishing date. Members who join our Substack at the annual tier — that’s $50 for the year — will get a one-time 50% off coupon to use in my online shop to buy the new book (or any of my previous books!). Additionally, paid members get bonus interviews each month — like this month’s interview with Rachel — and help keep the show free for everyone, all the time.
This issue is packed with links of recent work, interviews, and essays from previous guests as well as design news and friends taking on new jobs. If you have news to share, don’t hesitate to send it over!
Thanks for listening.
See you next month,
Jarrett
SCRATCH
Recent essays, interviews, and stories published on our Scratch platform.
Back to (art) school with Rachel Berger
For our members-only newsletter, we caught up with the recently appoint Vice Provost at CalArts, Rachel Berger, to talk about the state of design education, the challenges of higher education, and what it is a Provost actually does.
PAST GUESTS
Recent work, writing, and news from former guests of Scratching the Surface.
💔 Kurt Andersen asks if America has already undergone a breakup? (NYT)
🚧 Forget the East Wing, writes Paul Goldberger, the real demolition has only just begun. (NYT)
👏 Reframing leadership as a design problem: Nicholas de Monchaux reflects on his tenure running MIT’s Department of Architecture. (MIT News)
🛁 Alexandra Lange on the art deco bathhouses that showcase the glory of NY’s Public Beaches (CityLab)
🧩 Design with AI? Jack Cheng thinks you should make a jig. (Every)
📚 Jack Murphy recommends summer reads that travel well. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
🏡 Rory Hyde on the new Fitzroy Neighborhood House designed by Kennedy Nolan. (Architecture,Au)
📕 No history to rule them all: Aggie Toppins reviews the seventh edition of Meggs’ History of Graphic Design (Eye)
🩸 Craig Mod’s recent adventures in LLMs involve geneaological research and administrative tasks. (craigmod.com)
🔋 Mindy Seu: what’s intimacy when our closet encounters happen at a distance? (Family Style)
🌊 “Nautilus” is a new short story from Geoff Manaugh. (Plotter)
😴 Dream Machine is a new podcast from KQED about AI hosted by Alexis Madrigal and Robin Sloan. (YouTube)
🤫 Sam Jacob on the secret life of objects. (ArtReview)
😍 Dori Tunstall on the long and beautiful story of Native American graphic design. (Fast Company)
🚨Rob Walker on how Flock became the house brand of dytopia. (Fast Company)
👨🏫 New School President Joel Towers on what universities offer in the age of AI. (New School)
READ/WATCHED/HEARD
Articles, books, videos, and other ephemera that caught our eye this month.
🤑 The luxury scaffolding face-off on Fifth Avenue, or the architecture of branding. (Curbed)
🪦 Thomas Hines, who helped put L.A. Architecture on the map, dies at 89. (NYT)
🌎 Responding to the climate crisis demans expanding our view of what counts as design, and who we consider a designer. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
✋ No shortcuts: friend of the shoe Andrew Shea on why AI threatens creative instinct. (It’s Nice That)
📚 The highs and lows of “Inland Architect” (MAS Context)
⛰️ As the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts celebrates its 75th anniversary, it is looking for ways to sustain craft for generations to come. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
🎧 The Department of Buildings is a new podcast from MOS’s Michael Meredith where he interviews architects about a single building. (Spotify)
🪦 Elia Zenghelis, OMA cofounder, dies at 89. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
JOB WATCH
People getting new jobs in and around the design world.
Cranbrook Academy of Art named Brandon Little its new Maxine And Stuart Frankel Director.
Emmett Zeifman is joining UC Berkely’s department of architecture. (CED)
SOM Foundation names Peter MacKeith as its executive director, succeeding Iker Gil. (SOM Foundation)
POSTSCRIPT
I enjoyed a quick family trip to Denver, CO at the beginning of August and I was able to convince the family to come with me on a little architectural tour. I was most interested in the Denver Art Museum, which not only includes Daniel Libeskind’s first US building but also Gio Ponti’s — a polymathic designer whose practice has long inspired me — only North American building. Those were great to see but I have to admit the building that has lingered in my mind since returning home was actually Michael Graves’ very-post-modern central library branch across the street from the museum (above). Over the last year or so, I’ve visited a series of PoMo buildings around the country and they continue to dazzle me in a way no other style/genre/era does. I explained to my (non-design) family the histories of the Art Museum buildings but they were more interested in this library too, even if it was just because it seemed goofy to them.
