Give a fresh update to your bookcase (opens in new tab) with our edit of interior design books. These are the essential books every design lover should read, the starting point for learning about design from the best in the field and being inspired by the world's most influential creatives. The perfect introduction to the design world, these books will look beautiful on your coffee table. Browse our interior design library for some visual escapism, inspiration and creativity.
INTERIOR DESIGN BOOKS: THE BEST TITLES FOR YOUR COFFEE TABLE
Barbie Dreamhouse: An Architectural Survey (Pin-Up, December 2022)
The Barbie Dreamhouse, America’s most adored dollhouse, is now celebrated with a definitive tome. In celebration of the house’s 60th anniversary, Mattel Creations and the architectural magazine Pin-Up have come together to release a 152-page hardcover design book that comprehensively charts the fantasy home’s evolution, from its first appearance in 1962 to its latest iteration in 2021. Filled with architectural drawings, original photography by Evelyn Pustka and a collection of essays and interviews with academics and designers, such as Kelly Wearstler, Rafael de Cardenas, the DJ/producer Honey Dijon and curator Alexandra Cunningham, the book is as legitimate an architectural study as that of any other iconic home. Pei-Ru Keh
creations.mattel.com (opens in new tab)
Lee Broom: Fashioning Design (Rizzoli, November 2022)
In the 15 years since launching his studio and eponymous brand, British designer Lee Broom has got us used to larger than life theatrical presentations and product compositions inspired by history and fashion. Broom now celebrates his studio and brand with a new tome, Lee Broom: Fashioning Design. Published by Rizzoli, the book charts his career influences using his background in fashion and theatre as the starting point.
leebroom.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
How to Live With Objects (Sight Unseen, November 2022)
'When we founded Sight Unseen more than a decade ago, we made a conscious decision to approach interiors from a radically different point of view,' say Sight Unseen co-founders, Monica Khemsurov and Jill Singer. Their interior design book is 'a wall-to-wall guide to finding your personal style and incorporating those meaningful works of art and design into your home.' The pair gathered everything they have learned from working in design and condensed in a desirable tome that includes design history, practical advice, personal stories by designers who select their favourite objects and house tours.
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
Made in London (Merrell Publishers, October 2022)
Made in London is a photo essay that will confound urban pessimists. Its subject is London’s manufacturing scene, not 50 or 100 years in the past, but now, in the present day. Shot by photographer Carmel King, with an introduction by Mark Brearley and texts by regular Wallpaper* contributor Clare Dowdy, Made in London travels the length and breadth of the capital to find makers big and small from a rich diversity of industries. Brearley – professor of urbanism at London Metropolitan University and a former head of design for London at the GLA – is also owner of Kaymet, a south London manufacturer of spare and simple aluminium trays and trolleys. Jonathan Bell
Available from Waterstones (opens in new tab)
Workstead: Interiors of Beauty and Necessity (Rizzoli, September 2022)
This new book charts the sophisticated interior work of Brooklyn-based design studio Workstead. Combining traditional inspiration with contemporary elegance, Stefanie Brechbuehler, Ryan Mahoney, and Robert Highsmith set up the studio in 2009 and have since created high profile interiors that include the Wythe Hotel in Brooklyn and the Olympia Dumbo, New York. The book, created in collaboration with New York writer David Sokol, is a piece of eye candy featuring beautiful imagery of their historic renovations and new buildings.
Available from Hive (opens in new tab)
Offcuts by Studiomama (September 2022, Studiomama and Twentytwentyone)
Studiomama presents The Off-cuts, a book chronicling the design studio’s collection of animals made in its workshop using scraps of wood. Featuring contributions by Libby Sellers, Max Fraser and Catharine Rossi, the book gathers the duo's collection of improbable animals, demonstrating the studio’s playful and humorous personality through a succession of bunnies, owls, elephants and more creatures that could be birds, or could be dogs.
studiomama.com (opens in new tab)
twentytwentyone.com (opens in new tab)
LDF 20 Years Anniversary Book (London Design Festival, September 2022)
London Design Festival celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2022 with a limited-edition collector's book that explores the last two decades of installations and collaborations through design. This visual journey looks at works by the likes of Es Devlin, John Pawson, the late Zaha Hadid and Yinka Ilori. Designed by Pentagram and with a foreword by Deyan Sudjic, the unbound large format book demonstrated how through its commissions, London Design Festival has offered a rethink of how we use public spaces in the city – from a glowing red lion that roared poetry in Trafalgar Square to a 22 metre-tall paper tower outside Royal Festival Hall. 'This festival will mix fireworks and contemplation,' Deyan Sudjic writes in the book's foreword, recalling co-founder Sir John Sorrel's words describing the Festival at its inception in 2002. '"It will not be confined to convention centres and exhibition halls, it will spill out into the city and take over the whole street." Twenty years later, this is pretty much how London Design Festival has turned out.'
londondesignfestival.com (opens in new tab)
Layer, Benjamin Hubert (Phaidon, September 2022)
A new book takes us behind the scenes at Layer, the experience design agency founded by Benjamin Hubert. Written by design curator Max Fraser, the book ‘is a reflection on the first decade of the studio and its design process.’ Through seven chapters, it explores Hubert’s career and his studio’s collaborations with brands including Bang & Olufsen, Airbus, Vitra, Braun, and Moroso. ‘Looking back on our work has given us the opportunity to consider the way we work now and in the future,’ says Hubert. ‘It also gave us insights into how our work has evolved and is testament to the talent of the team and our creative partners over the years. LAYER remains a work in progress, but this book is an amazing moment to celebrate how far we have come.’
Available from End (opens in new tab)
HAY (Phaidon, June 2022)
In the 20 years since its founding, Danish brand Hay has reached cult status among design aficionados. Through design collaborations with some of the best designers of our time (including Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, Doshi Levien and Muller Van Severen), and a liberal approach to colour and pattern (their partnerships with French artist Nathalie du Pasquier and George Sowden brought some Memphis tones back into our homes), Hay has become a destination for great, accessible design. This book charts the brand’s young history, through interviews with its collaborators and photography illustrating their products, creative collaborations and events.
hay.dk (opens in new tab)
Available from Hive (opens in new tab)
U-Joints – A taxonomy of connections (U-Joints, June 2022)
Following a memorable exhibition at Fuorisalone in 2018, U-Joints – A Taxonomy of connections is a new tome exploring the world of joins, ‘from the technical to the poetic.’ Curated by Anniina Koivu and Andrea Caputo, with an extensive taxonomy of 1300 joints by Eleonora Castellarin and design by Graphic Thought Facility, the 900-page book is the most comprehensive publication on the topic.
u-joints.com (opens in new tab)
The ECAL Manual of Style (Phaidon, June 2022)
How to best teach design today? ECAL director Alexis Georgacopoulos and designer Jonathan Olivares try to answer through the pages of The ECAL Manual of Style. Published by Phaidon, this new design book offers an overview of the Swiss design school's teaching methodology, illustrated through some of its most innovative student projects. The photographic portfolio is sandwiched between two sections for which internationally renowned designers, critics, and writers linked to ECAL have answered the question, exploring a formula for good design teaching.
ecal.ch (opens in new tab)
Available from Waterstones (opens in new tab)
David Rockwell: Drama (Phaidon, May 2021)
A thematic overview of American designer David Rockwell’s expansive body of work, this new interior design book explores the main topics recurring throughout his oeuvre. The book’s chapters include Audience, Ensemble, Worlds, Story, Journey and Impermanence, each demonstrating how Rockwell applied the principles of set design (his original area of expertise) to a wider spectrum of interior design projects, using performance, showmanship and, as the book’s title suggests, drama to create his spaces. The book includes the Rockwell Groups’ works for theatre and designs for the Oscars (opens in new tab), as well as products, interior design (opens in new tab) and installations (opens in new tab). In collaboration with Bruce Mau, edited by Sam Lubell, and filled with in-depth details of Rockwell’s most striking projects, Drama is a celebration of the designer’s immersive creative universe.
rockwellgroup.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Farfetch (opens in new tab)
Woman Made: Great Women Designers (Phaidon, November 2021)
Ray Eames, from Woman Made
A new tome published by Phaidon and the luxury fashion group Kering, is shining an overdue spotlight on creatives of the fairer sex from the past and present. Titled ‘Woman Made: Great Women Designers’, the book features over 200 designers from the world, ranging from icons like Lucienne Day, Lina Bo Bardi and Ray Eames to trailblazers such as Lindsey Adelman(opens in new tab), Kazuyo Sejima and India Madhavi(opens in new tab), along with a wide array of up and comers including ceramicist(opens in new tab) Dina Nur Satti, textile designer Hiroko Takeda and furniture designer Lani Adeoye. Authored by Jane Hall, an academic, activist and founding member of the UK-based art collective, Assemble, the book notably features practitioners from over 50 countries across the globe.
Available from Farfetch (opens in new tab)
India Mahdavi (Chronicle Books, September 2021)
It’s 20 years since Mahdavi founded her studio, and this long-overdue publication is packed with an entire career’s worth of creations. Mahdavi, who trained at Paris’ Beaux-Arts and worked for Christian Liaigre before setting up her own studio after the birth of her son, has barely stopped for two decades, as this retrospective makes clear. There have been hotel designs in Mexico and Monte-Carlo, private cinemas and residences, and restaurants in New York and Paris. She’s also opened three spaces of her own – a showroom, a boutique and a gallery – near her office on Rue Las Cases, from where she has launched designs including elegant blown-glass lamps, Mickey-shaped rattan masks, and her iconic ‘Bishop’ stools, the last now part of the collection of Musée des Arts Décoratifs de Paris.
india-mahdavi.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Hive (opens in new tab)
Omer Arbel (Phaidon, May 2021)
Best known for founding lighting company Bocci, Omer Arbel’s career spans design, architecture, sculpture and experimental creation: his work is now chronicled through a new monograph that details his eclectic creative output. The book showcases Arbel’s affinity for parametric design, experimental glass and metal sculptures (opens in new tab) (pictured above), architectural works and more, divided by thematic chapters that include titles like “Uncanny,” “Entropy,” “Transdisciplinary,” and “Futurism.” A further glimpse into his universe is given by a plethora of drawings and collections of ephemera, as well as texts from works by Sigmund Freud, Robert Smithson, and science fiction author Bruce Stirling offering cultural context to Arbel’s oeuvre.
omerarbel.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Farfetch (opens in new tab)
tat* (Circa Press, April 2021)
‘As an art student in the early 1980’s I stumbled across a fading newsagent in my home town of Warrington, that was clearing out its old stock. Amongst the dusty shelves were quirky musical birthday cards, tiny comics, B-movie jigsaws and cheap plastic novelties; I eagerly purchased two bags for next to nothing.’ recalls art director Andy Altmann. ‘As I admired my new haul of graphic treasure strewn across the bedroom floor, my mum enquired “What are you going to do with all this rubbish?” – now I finally have an answer for her.’ Published by Circa Press, his book of ‘tat’ is just that: a personal collection of images that range from the nostalgic to the intriguing, gathered over three decades and including a lot of printed ephemera, old-school typography and what Altman affectionately calls ‘graphic nonsense’.
circa.press (opens in new tab)
By Design: The World’s Best Contemporary Interior Designers (Phaidon, April 2021)
An atlas of global design creativity, Phaidon's By Design offers a dynamic overview of the world's best interior designers operating today. Selected by an international committee including Wallpaper* editor in Chief Sarah Douglas, curator Aric Chen and Designer Nikki Haas, this interior design book covers creatives from 30 countries and including hospitality, retail and interiors. Names to look out for throughout the book include interior design household names from Neri & Hu to Kelly Wearstler and Pamela Shamshiri, as well as Italian film director Luca Guadagnino.
phaidon.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
Assemblage 6: Unlearning by Faye Toogood (Apartamento Publishing, March 2021)
The process behind Faye Toogood’s Assemblage 6 collection is documented through a book featuring images of the creative process behind the designs. Nearly 300 maquettes of chairs, lamps, stools and daybeds made of wire, cardboard, tape and canvas are featured throughout the pages – seventeen of these pieces were chosen to eventually become life-size works. The book, the designer explains, ‘gives space to all the original maquettes and their occasional passage into the real world of furniture and sculpture.’ The book by Apartamento publishing opens with a short story by Sophie Mackintosh, while an essay by Glenn Adamson forms its epilogue. In between, the images speak, visually showcasing what Toogood calls her ‘new vocabulary’.
t-o-o-g-o-o-d.com (opens in new tab)
Design Commune: A Love Letter to California (Abrams, November 2020)
Since 2004, Roman Alonso and Steven Johanknecht of design studio Commune has developed an aesthetic firmly rooted into its Californian heritage, creating a striking visual language that has garnered cult status among contemporary interior design. Their new interior design book forms a visual archive of their projects across various creative disciplines, from private and commercial spaces, artist collaborations, products, packaging, and graphics. ‘The design of the book is based on the stream of consciousness process we embark on with every project,’ explains Johanknecht. ‘[It] has no chronology or parameters, we juxtaposed images focusing on ideas and the way we look at things. It is driven by emotion, the power and relationship between images and the diversity of the work.’
communedesign.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
Materialising Colour, Journeys with Giulio Ridolfo (Phaidon, May 2020)
Giulio Ridolfo is the man behind some of the most successful textiles and chromatic palettes in contemporary interior design. The Italian colourist is the ultimate expert when it comes to colour, and his chromatic touch has been applied to furniture by brands such as of Moroso and Vitra, while his work for textile authority Kvadrat is legendary in the design world. The Danish fabric company celebrates this colour legacy with a new book. Published by Phaidon, Materialising Colour, Journeys with Giulio Ridolfo follows the designer through his travels to unpack his incredible colour sensibility. Botanical photographer Howard Sooley accompanied Ridolfo on his journeys to document the process, while curator Jane Withers wrote the stories behind the trips.
Available from Hive (opens in new tab)
Liaigre: Creation 2016-2020 (Rizzoli, April 2020)
Rizzoli New York, £60
This interior desing book is a window into the extraordinary world created by Parisian designer Christian Liaigre, whose sophisticated aesthetic is chronicled through five key residential projects he created before his departure from the company in 2016. A Japanese house overlooking hot thermal springs; a modernist palazzo in New Delhi; a villa in St Moritz; a Parisian mansion and a Bavarian-style project in Munich (pictured) were all created in collaboration with the current creative director Frauke Meyer, who was tasked with taking the maison’s heritage into the future. Also featuring in the book is a ‘behind the scenes look into the company’s creative laboratory,’ which includes an essay by French art historian Françoise-Claire Prodhon alongside captivating photography – a small window into this incredibly rich visual universe.
studioliaigre.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
Pierre Yovanovitch: Interior Architecture (Rizzoli, September 2019)
Rizzoli New York, £35
Pierre Yovanovitch’s oeuvre is full of rigour, whimsy and humour, and now we can experience this in a new tome. This interior design book is drenched in Yovanovitch’s bold style, including exclusive shots of his own property in Provence – ‘this book marks an important milestone in my career.’ Delve into a theatre of the Parisian master’s work, from a remodelled mansion in Ixelles Ponds in Brussels (right) to Fabrègues castle in Provence (left), right from your sofa. Writer: Sujata Burman
pierreyovanovitch.com (opens in new tab)
Available from Amazon (opens in new tab)
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Watch Ryuichi Sakamoto's mesmerising musical experience at the Brooklyn MuseumAn iconic composer who traverses popular and high culture, Ryuichi Sakamoto pushes music into new frontiers, most recently in ‘Seeing Sound, Hearing Krug’, a new composition that pairs sound, flavour, light and texture
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Last chance to see: ‘Strange Clay’ at The Hayward Gallery, London
At London’s Hayward Gallery, group show ‘Strange Clay: Ceramics in Contemporary Art’ sees ceramic artists explore the physical, psychological, political and power of their medium
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Aehra is Italy’s first all-electric luxury car brand. We preview its forthcoming SUV
Aehra’s proposed electric SUV is brimming with cutting-edge technology. The Italian company hopes to shake up the high-end EV market in 2025
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India Mahdavi monograph reveals a life in full colour
An ode to the power of colour, India Mahdavi’s first monograph shines the spotlight on the designer’s trendsetting interiors and signature pieces
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Aldo Rossi’s work and legacy celebrated
While Molteni & C celebrates the furniture design of Aldo Rossi, MAXXI Museum pays tribute to the postmodernist architect through a series of sketches, photographs and models, on show in Rome until 17 October 2021
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Pierre Jeanneret’s midcentury designs for Chandigarh get an LA audience
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Photographer John Myers’ portraits of 1970s Middle England suburbia
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How Industrial Facility creates a visual narrative of its unique design dialogue
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Success by the book: the tale of Italian brand Natuzzi’s evolution is revealed in a new tome
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Cassina’s furniture as seen through the lens of Karl Lagerfeld
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Space race: a new tome captures 70 years of Pierre Cardin’s designs
