Twenty Design Quotes: Witticism by Proxy

Twenty design quotes to inspire the creative mind, or at least supply witty banter for cocktail conversations.

Design is a plan for arranging elements in such a way as best to accomplish a particular purpose.

Happiness… it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.

Everything is designed. Few things are designed well.

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great ones make you feel that you, too, can become great.

People ignore design that ignores people.

Create your own visual style… let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable for others.

Design is where science and art break even.

Don’t design for everyone. It’s impossible. All you end up doing is designing something that makes everyone unhappy.

The design process, at its best, integrates the aspirations of art, science, and culture.

A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.

Truly elegant design incorporates top-notch functionality into a simple, uncluttered form.

A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

— Antoine de Saint Exupéry

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Design is knowing which ones to keep.

Man is happiest when he is creating. In fact, the highest state of which man is capable lies in the creative act.

It’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.

The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.

— Albert Einstein

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

Hell, there are no rules here– we’re trying to accomplish something.

A great architect is not made by way of a brain nearly so much as he is made by way of a cultivated, enriched heart.

Every creator painfully experiences the chasm between his inner vision and its ultimate expression.