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The Bahá’í House of Worship, a tall, ornate building made of concrete, illuminated against a cloudy sky.

The Beauty of Concrete

Why are buildings today simple and austere, while buildings of the past were ornate and elaborately ornamented? The answer is not the cost of labor.
by Samuel Hughes via Works In Progress on May 17, 2024
Silhouette of Oppenheimer wearing a fedora.

How Do We Know the Motorman Is Not Insane?

Oppenheimer and the demon heart of power.
by James Robins via The Dreadnought on December 20, 2023
African American school children at Horatio Greenough’s statue of George Washington at the US Capitol, 1899.

Why the Age of Revolution Loved the Classical World

Radicals in the Age of Revolution saw the classical world as a common inheritance that could aid their fight for liberty.
by Francesca Langer via Aeon on May 30, 2023
Street Painter among paintings in Rome, Italy

W.E.B. Du Bois and the Aesthetics of Emancipation

“I am one who tells the truth and exposes evil and seeks with Beauty and for Beauty to set the world right,” W.E.B. Du Bois said in his June 1926 lecture.
by Clay Matlin via Black Perspectives on April 21, 2022
Profile photograph of Margaret Wise Brown.

The Radical Woman Behind “Goodnight Moon”

Margaret Wise Brown constantly pushed boundaries—in her life and in her art.
by Anna E. Holmes via The New Yorker on January 27, 2022
New York skyline viewed from the top of the Woolworth building, 1913.

A Brief History of New York’s First Great Architectural Firm

On the eccentric, creative minds behind McKim, Meade and White.
by Henry Wiencek via Literary Hub on July 22, 2025
Trump poster hanging on a federal building, scowling at people below.

If Trump Could Make John Wayne the Head of Homeland Security, He Would

Trump mixes restoration with revolution—his reactionary modernism wooed Silicon Valley, but for everyone else, it signals looming repression.
by John Ganz via The Nation on June 10, 2025
Book cover for The Invention of Design by Maggie Gram features a phone cord snaking around text.
partner

Irrelevant at Best, or Else Complicit

The state of design in 1970.
by Maggie Gram via HNN on June 3, 2025
Mannequins model Black fashion ranging from ethnic apparel to suits.

Turning Style Into Power: How the Black Dandy Used Clothing to Challenge Authority

At the Met, "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style" shows how clothing became a way for Black men to assert presence and push back against control.
by Richard Thompson Ford via The Yale Review on May 20, 2025
An iMac computer displays the starry night screensaver.

Recurring Screens

Reflections on memory, dreams, and computer screensavers.
by Nora Claire Miller via The Paris Review on May 20, 2025
A contact sheet of portraits of James Baldwin, 1972.

For Those Who Would Be Real

James Baldwin’s testimony in images.
by Harmony Holiday via Harper’s on April 29, 2025
Mary MacLane.

“I Am Making the World My Confessor”: Mary MacLane, the Wild Woman from Butte

In 1902, a woman named Mary MacLane from Butte, Montana, became an international sensation after publishing a scandalous journal at the age of 19.
by Hunter Dukes via The Public Domain Review on April 23, 2025
Eugen Sandow flexing his bicep.

The Evolution of the Alpha Male Aesthetic

If you've noticed a certain look common to the manosphere, you're not mistaken. A visual identity has taken hold, with roots that trace back decades.
by Derek Guy via Bloomberg on April 22, 2025
Illustration from the “Projected Trends” section of Hugh Ferriss’ The Metropolis of Tomorrow (1929).

Modern Babylon: Ziggurat Skyscrapers and Hugh Ferriss’ Retrofuturism

In the early twentieth century, architects turned to a newly discovered past to craft novel visions of the future: the ancient history of Mesopotamia.
by Eva Miller via The Public Domain Review on April 9, 2025
Eliot Noyes standing outside of an IBM building.

The Complicated Legacy of Eliot Noyes

Noyes is not a household name, but his evangelism for the notion of design as a holistic strategy is so pervasive that many now take it for granted.
by Menachem Wecker via Humanities on April 2, 2025
Alvin Ailey

How to Forget Alvin Ailey

Even as “Edges of Ailey” gathers such intimate documents, it does not make them legible to its visitors.
by Juliana Devaan via Public Books on March 12, 2025
The word "no" engraved in the Gorton font on different materials.

The Hardest Working Font in Manhattan

A story of a 150-year-old font you have never heard of – and one you probably saw earlier today.
by Marcin Wichary via Aresluna on February 14, 2025
The Griffith Observatory, constructed by the Works Progress Administration, on a hill overlooking Los Angeles.

A New Deal for Architecture

What it conveys is quite specific: grandeur, beauty, dynamism, and power.
by David Schaengold via Compact on December 20, 2024
he obverse (right) and reverse (left) of the James H. Hyde Medallion, designed by Paul H. Manship, on the Janvier reduction machine.

Tokens of Culture

On the medallic art of the Gilded Age.
by James Panero via The New Criterion on December 12, 2024
Jimi Hendrix performing with his guitar.

How Jimi Hendrix Made "Flower Power" Fashionable

The resurgence of “peace and love” aesthetics in menswear today owes itself to the rebellious spirit of the 1960s and 70s, embodied by musician Jimi Hendrix.
by Derek Guy via PBS NewsHour on November 26, 2024
Photo by Ralph Ellison of men standing by a street in New York City.

Ralph Ellison’s Alchemical Camera

The novelist's aestheticizing impulse contrasts with the relentless seriousness of his observations and critiques of American society.
by Jed Perl via New York Review of Books on October 17, 2024
Still from Midnight Cowboy of a man with a gun in Times Square.

How the Movies Captured Times Square’s Grimy Golden Age

Times Square’s decline can be dated to the Depression, but it wasn’t until the 1970s that the bottom fell out.
by Nathaniel Rich via Current [The Criterion Collection] on July 25, 2024
A drawing of a city skyline filled with skyscrapers.

The Man Who Saved the Skyscraper

Fazlur Khan and the idea that would turn architecture on its head.
by Nick Greene via Mental Floss on July 21, 2024
Art installation of cardboard pieces with the Amazon arrow logo, arranged in the shape of a cresting wave.

World in a Box: Cardboard Media and the Geographic Imagination

Cardboard boxes hold a world of meaning that spans from Amazon to the Container Corporation of America.
by Shannon Mattern via Places Journal on May 15, 2024
Keith Haring standing shirtless in front of one of his paintings.

Angels with Dirty Faces

How Keith Haring got his halo.
by Zack Hatfield via Bookforum on April 12, 2024
Posters for Beyonce's "Cowboy Carter" album.
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History Explains the Backlash to Beyoncé's 'Cowboy Carter'

Black cowboys made up as much as a quarter of working ranch hands during late 19th century. That legacy has been obscured.
by Elyssa Ford, Rebecca Scofield via Made By History on April 12, 2024
Covers from Lippincott's and Harper's from the 1890s.

Advertising as Art: How Literary Magazines Pioneered a New Kind of Graphic Design

Allison Rudnick on the rise and fall of the 19th century "Literary Poster."
by Allison Rudnick via Literary Hub on April 3, 2024
Oscar Wilde

“A Nation of Lunatics.” What Oscar Wilde Thought About America

On the Irish writer’s grand tour of the Gilded Age United States.
by Rob Marland via Literary Hub on March 11, 2024
Keith Haring spray painting

Keith Haring, the Boy Who Cried Art

Was he a brilliant painter or a brilliant brand?
by Jackson Arn via The New Yorker on March 4, 2024
"Alien Embrace" repeated artwork

The Institute for Illegal Images

Meditating on blotter not just as art, or as a historical artifact, but as a kind of media, even a “meta medium.”
by Erik Davis via The Paris Review on March 4, 2024
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