Our latest book, “Principles of Design” by William H. Varnum, offers a systematic method to design furniture, plus a series of rules that guide you in the process. Perhaps even more importantly, “Principles of Design” shows you how to interpret other people’s design. Or how to fix your own designs.
Instead of saying something looks “unbalanced” or “awkward,” Varnum’s rules allow you to voice what you like (or don’t like) about a piece of furniture. “The dominant mass of this piece is placed too high in the composition, so the piece is top-heavy.” Or “The brackets offer little life or variety to the piece because of their too-obvious curve.”
I find most design books to be too idiosyncratic or tied to a particular furniture style (Shaker, Bauhaus, Arts & Crafts etc.). “Principles of Design” (and the books of Jim Tolpin and George Walker) instead offer you systems that work with any style of furniture. Plus ways of understanding the built world.
After reading Varnum’s “Principles of Design” a few times, I wanted a cheat sheet that could quickly guide me to each of Varnum’s rules and the explanation he offers for them. So I made one. And you can download it here:
Cheat Sheet for “Principles of Design”
So if I’m working on designing a border around a panel, my cheat sheet reads:
Rule 6d. Bands and borders should have a consistent lateral, that is, onward movement. (page 105)
I can then quickly turn to page 105 to see both good and bad examples of borders. (One of the best parts of Varnum is that he offers you just as many examples of poor design as good design. It really helps you sharpen your eye.)
Books on design are a hard sell – it’s like pushing water uphill. And re-printing “Principles of Design” to the high level of the original 1916 volume was expensive. Plus we are strapped for space in our warehouse. As a result, we think we can do only one press run of this book (3,000 copies). We’ve sold about 750 so far.
This is just fair warning that this book probably won’t be offered permanently.
“Principles of Design” is $41 and is made entirely in the USA.
— Christopher Schwarz