Design... is the integration of technological, social, and economical requirements, biological necessities, and the psychological effects of materials, shape, color, volume and space. — Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
I've been amazed at how often those outside the discipline of design assume that what designers do is decoration. Good design is problem solving. — Jeffrey Veen
Design is the organization of materials and processes in the most productive way, in a harmonious balance of all elements necessary for a certain function. — Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
Design is the key to everything. If you learn how to design you can do anything. — Doug Cranmer
Providing, meaning to a mass of unrelated needs, ideas, words and pictures - it is the designer's job to select and fit this material together and make it interesting. — Paul Rand
Design is in everything we make, but it's also between those things. It's a mix of craft, science, storytelling, propaganda, and philosophy. — Erik Adigard
Short Design Work Quotes
Designing is not a profession but an attitude... Thinking in relationships. — Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
Design is the conscious effort to impose a meaningful order — Victor Papanek
Good design is partially creativity and innovation, but primarily knowledge and awareness. — Chuck Green
Design is a solution to a problem. Art is a question to a problem. — John Maeda
Good art inspires; Good design motivates. — Otl Aicher
Design is, literally, purposeful planning. Graphic Design, then, is the form those plans will take. — Chip Kidd
A designer is a planner with an aesthetic sense. — Bruno Munari
Inspiration the seed. Design but the flower. — Michael Langham
Digital design is like painting, except the paint never dries. — Neville Brody
Designing renders visible our hopes and dreams. It is the first signal of human intentions. — William McDonough
Top 10 Design Work Quotes
He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist — Francis of Assisi
Tax credits are designed to help people who work hard but who, through no fault of their own, don't earn enough to keep their families out of poverty. — Nicola Sturgeon
The main purpose of my work is to provoke people into using their imagination and make their surroundings more exciting. — Verner Panton
You can't do better design with a computer, but you can speed up your work enormously. — Wim Crouwel
My work is to help innovators and designers understand that the success of their creativity is in large part based on the success of their products. — Bernard Arnault
If you do good work for good clients, it will lead to other good work for other good clients. If you do bad work for bad clients, it will lead to other bad work for other bad clients. — Michael Bierut
To create great work, here's how you must spend your time:
1% Inspiration
9% Perspiration
90% Justification — George Lois
We are working with a biotech company, Calypte, which has designed a urine test for the HIV antibody. — Luc Montagnier
I was one of the more talented ones at the design firm I joined, so I conducted my work pretty shrewdly. — Akira Toriyama
Today is the child of yesterday and the parent of tomorrow. The work you produce today will create your future. — Bruce Mau
Design Work Image Quotes
My favorite project is always the next one. — Michael Graves
You're a work of art. Not everyone will understand you, but the ones who do, will never forget about you.
Interior Design Work Quotes
You don't have to know anything about a subject as long as you use common sense and imagination, plus enthusiasm! I use all periods of design in my work, for, after all, decorative styles are simply indications of a manner of living. — Dorothy Draper
I am going in now for interior decoration. By that I mean supplying objets d'art and giving advice regarding the decoration of their houses to wealthy persons who do not have the time, inclination, nor culture to do such work for themselves. It is nothing new. Women have done the same thing before. — Elsie De Wolfe
My work is the embodiment of dreams in one form or another. — William Morris
Work hard in silence, let your success be the noise
...If our houses, or clothes, our household furniture and utensils are not works of art, they are either wretched makeshifts, or, what is worse, degrading shams of better things. — William Morris
Ornamental pattern work, to be raised above the contempt of reasonable men, must possess three qualities: beauty, imagination and order. — William Morris
A decorator, no matter how talented, can't always get the desired results because sometimes there is resistance or maybe a lack of understanding on the part of the client. I think it is the decorator's job to work as a guide, to bring out the best qualities and the best attitudes. — Albert Hadley
Work until you no longer have to introduce yourself.
A lot of my ideas come from McNally Jackson bookstore. One of my favorite things to do is just go there and look through architecture books and interior design books. Something about the aesthetics of space and beautiful images works with my brain. — St. Lucia
When talking with a set designer the dialogue is more centered on locations, interior design, what I like and what doesn't work. There is a certain taste I'm drawn to and feel inspired by, and finding that inspiration is what keeps the conversation moving forward. — Marc Forster
I'm not an interior designer - I'm a normal working mum who wants her house to look good and doesn't need a man to do it for her. — Andrea McLean
I have always believed that the more educated the clients are, the easier they are to work with. Clients with a knowledge of decorating, and an ability to articulate what they want from the finished project, make the designer's job easier. — Albert Hadley
How To Design Quotes
You cannot change how someone thinks, but you can give them a tool to use which will lead them to think differently. — Richard Buckminster Fuller
The only important thing about design is how it relates to people. — Victor Papanek
It is difficult to design a space that will not attract people. What is remarkable is how often this has been accomplished. — William H. Whyte
Maybe it won't work out. But maybe seeing if it does will be the best adventure ever.
I couldn't be a cameraman or a designer or an actor - I have to be a director because I learned how to do that from my dad. — Joe Wright
The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design. — Friedrich August von Hayek
Ninety percent of games lose money; 10 percent make a lot of money. And there's a consistency around the competitive advantages you create, so if you can actually learn how to do the art, the design, and the programming, you would be consistently very profitable. — Gabe Newell
Just do what works for you, because there will always be someone who thinks differently.
You have to stand outside the box to see how the box can be re-designed. — Charles Handy
This isn't a picture filled with wonder and a sense of fun; it's so jaded and crass that I almost wonder if it's a highly unscientific experiment designed to gauge how little audiences will settle for these days. Manic and multicolored, "Speed Racer" is an excess of nothingness. — Stephanie Zacharek
I like to mix and match vintage with designer. It's how I create my own style. — Carly Rae Jepsen
Most people have no idea how good their body is designed to feel. — Kevin Trudeau
How To Design Your Own Quotes
People tell you the world looks a certain way. Parents tell you how to think. Schools tell you how to think. TV. Religion. And then at a certain point, if you're lucky, you realize you can make up your own mind. Nobody sets the rules but you. You can design your own life. — Carrie-Anne Moss
Brains aren't designed to get result; they go in directions. If you know how the brain works you can set your own directions. If you don't, then someone else will. — Richard Bandler
I have two rules when you come to my house on Halloween. Wear a costume - 'cause if you've manned your door at your own house, you know how many kids will roll up, 14 years old with no costume and an attitude. My other rule: don't grab. Let me assess you and then design a candy situation for you. — Greg Behrendt
If you're not willing to do the work, don't complain about the result.
Learn how to set goals. That's the key to everything. That includes designing your own success. You define what the goal is, it's not somebody else's goal, it's yours. — Drew Carey
Design Process Quotes
It's a truly disgusting idea that the creator of the universe - capable of inventing the laws of physics and designing the evolutionary process - that this protégé of supernatural intellect couldn't think of a better way to forgive our sins than to have himself tortured to death. — Richard Dawkins
A century ago, most of today's processed foods didn't even exist. Now they are more than half of the American diet. We weren't designed for this. — Will Bulsiewicz
Love is a romantic designation for a most ordinary biological process-or, shall we say, chemical-process ... a lot of nonsense is talked and written about it. — Greta Garbo
Stay positive, work had and make it happen.
Good design is thorough down to the last detail - Nothing must be arbitrary or left to chance. Care and accuracy in the design process show respect towards the consumer. — Dieter Rams
The mantra of any good security engineer is: "Security is a not a product, but a process." It's more than designing strong cryptography into a system; it's designing the entire system such that all security measures, including cryptography, work together. — Bruce Schneier
Design is a way of life, a point of view. It involves the whole complex of visual communications: talent, creative ability, manual skill, and technical knowledge. Aesthetics and economics, technology and psychology are intrinsically related to the process. — Paul Rand
Forget all the reasons why it won't work and believe the one reason it will.
A profound design process eventually makes the patron, the architect, and every occasional visitor in the building a slightly better human being. — Juhani Pallasmaa
It's not clear whether the brain actually is designed to have nightmares or whether this is actually the process going awry. — Matthew Walker
You can't buy something which does not exist. In a way, let's make things exist and then judge later. Don't cancel the process of creativity too early; let it flow. — Ross Lovegrove
Almost all quality improvement comes via simplification of design, manufacturing... layout, processes, and procedures. — Tom Peters
Design And Art Quotes
The life of a designer is a life of fight. Fight against the ugliness. Just like a doctor fights against disease. For us, the visual disease is what we have around, and what we try to do is cure it somehow with design. — Massimo Vignelli
The Jiu Jitsu I created was designed to give the weak ones a chance to face the heavy and strong. — Helio Gracie
The artist constructs a new symbol with his brush. This symbol is not a recognizable form of anything which is already finished, already made, already existing in the world - it is a symbol of a new world, which is being built upon and which exists by way of people. — El Lissitzky
Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.
For me fashion is an expression of art that is very closely related both to me and to my body. I see it as an expression of identity combined with desire, moods and a cultural setting. — Iris van Herpen
The business and design of the Royal Society is: To improve the knowledge of naturall things, and all useful Arts, Manufactures, Mechanic practices, Engines and Inventions by Experiments-(not meddling with Divinity, Metaphysics, Moralls, Politicks, Grammar, Rhetoric or Logick). — Robert Hooke
You must be prepared to work always without applause.
Architecture is the triumph of human imagination over materials, methods, and men, to put man into possession of his own earth — Frank Lloyd Wright
You can have an art experience in front of a Rembrandt... or in front of a piece of graphic design. — Stefan Sagmeister
The life of a designer is a life of fight: fight against the ugliness. — Massimo Vignelli
I never design a building before I've seen the site and met the people who will be using it. — Frank Lloyd Wright
Web Design Quotes
It's through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good. — Paula Scher
Never fall in love with an idea. They're whores: if the one you're with isn't doing the job, there's always, always, always another. — Chip Kidd
The web is more a social creation than a technical one. I designed it for a social effect - to help people work together - and not as a technical toy. — Tim Berners-Lee
Work hard in silence. Let your succes be the noise.
Websites promote you 24/7: No employee will do that. — Paul Cookson
Our weavings in the cosmic web are not self-contained. Rather, they are part of the design of our collective humanity. — Lisa Hunt
Never fall in love with an idea. They're whores. — Chip Kidd
Good Web design is about the character of the content, not the character of the designer. — Jeffrey Zeldman
I love the fact that I work with everything that has to do with the brand, the product, the environment, the online, the architecture, the web design, because I am somebody that loves making things, making experiences, creating things that people love to engage with. — Christopher Bailey
The usability tests we have conducted during the last year have shown an increasing reluctance among users to accept innovations in Web design. The prevailing attitude is to request designs that are similar to everything else people see on the Web. — Jakob Nielsen
Great web design without functionality is like a sports car with no engine. — Paul Cookson
My work is play. And I play when I design. I even looked it up in the dictionary, to make sure that I actually do that, and the definition of “play,” number one, was “engaging in a childlike activity or endeavor,” and number two was “gambling.” And I realize I do both when I’m designing. — Paula Scher
In the best of times, our days are numbered anyway. So it would be a crime against nature for any generation to take the world crisis so solemnly that it put off enjoying those things for which we were designed in the first place: the opportunity to do good work, to enjoy friends, to fall in love, to hit a ball, and to bounce a baby. — Alistair Cooke
We should always look upon ourselves as God's servants, placed in God's world, to do his work; and accordingly labour faithfully for him; not with a design to grow rich and great, but to glorify God, and do all the good we possibly can. — David Brainerd
Creative people have to believe in the value of their work. If you don’t have any belief then you can’t give anything—designing is an act of giving, and a belief in the value of the work fuels the desire to express something. It’s important to know what your values are and to take care of them. — Peter Saville
I love working with a stylist but I also love having personal relationships with designers. A stylist is great for pulling together an entire outfit, accessories included, and for shaking me out of my comfort zone. — Elizabeth Banks
My confidence is placed in God who does not need our help for accomplishing his designs. Our single endeavor should be to give ourselves to the work and to be faithful to him, and not to spoil his work by our shortcomings. — Isaac Jogues
Designers are closer to artists than to engineers. They’re not like normal managers, and you have to balance their creativity and rationality. John, Karl, Marc, they’re genius. You can’t put them into a rational environment. They’re sometimes late, and you have to accept that if you work with them, you have to be understanding with them. — Bernard Arnault
Genius, when employed in works whose tendency it is to demoralize and to degrade us, should be contemplated with abhorrence rather than with admiration; such a monument of its power, may indeed be stamped with immortality, but like the Coliseum at Rome, we deplore its magnificence because we detest the purposes for which it was designed. — Charles Caleb Colton
Designing characters for 'Dragon Quest' is fun but difficult work. — Akira Toriyama
You have to begin to ask yourself which components of my belief system are things that I arrived through naturally from my observation of nature, and which parts of them are placed into me by a system that is designed to turn people into consumers. And I think more often than not that a greater percentage of your personality is not you at all. It’s a tapestry that has been cleverly woven by a system designed to make people feel totally normal spending the majority of their lives driving in a commute and working in a sh*t job and being tired all the time. — Duncan Trussell
After graduating from high school, I worked at an advertising agency as a designer. — Akira Toriyama
There is a rumour that I can't draw and never could. This is probably because I work so much with models. Models are one of the most beautiful design tools, but I still do the finest drawings you can imagine. — Jørn Utzon
For me, the sound design and the musical score is a big part of what makes scary movies work. — James Wan
The opposite of play is not work. It's depression. — Brian Sutton-Smith
No design works unless it embodies ideas that are held common by the people for whom the object is intended. — Adrian Forty
Don't worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop. — Jeffrey Zeldman
People who build their own home tend to be very courageous. These people are curious about life. They're thinking about what it means to live in a house, rather than just buying a commodity and making it work. — Tom Kundig
Follow your instincts - you never know if your ideas will work out unless you try them. — Lulu Guinness
Do work you love and are passionate about, look outside of the world of graphic design for inspiration. — Jessica Walsh
Smart data structures and dumb code works a lot better than the other way around. — Eric S. Raymond
Simplicity and elegance are unpopular because they require hard work and discipline to achieve and education to be appreciated. — Edsger Dijkstra
I never wanted to be well-rounded. I do not admire well-rounded people nor their work. So far as I can see, nothing good in the world has ever been done by well-rounded people. The good work is done by people with jagged, broken edges, because those edges cut things and leave an imprint, a design. — Harry Crews
When you want to know how things really work, study them when they're coming apart. — William Gibson
A dull axe never loves grindstones, but a keen workman does; and he puts his tool on them in order that it may be sharp. And men do not like grinding; but they are dull for the purposes which God designs to work out with them, and therefore He is grinding them. — Henry Ward Beecher
The best design is the simplest one that works. — Albert Einstein
We designers, we don't work in a vacuum. We need business people. We are not the fine artists we are often confused with. — Dieter Rams
A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering. — Freeman Dyson
The Christian must know that the season, measure, and continuance of his sufferings are appointed by Infinite Wisdom, and designed to work for his everlasting good; and that grace and strength shall be afforded him according to his need. — John Newton
I am not concerned with simply surviving. I am very concerned about improving. I start each day by examining yesterday's work and looking for areas where I can improve. I am always trying to draw the characters better, and trying to design each panel somewhat in the manner a painter would treat his canvas. — Charles M. Schulz
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of design work quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about design work to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of design work quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.