The Refinery

“It’s my first week at Gas and it’s a little crazy- but the good kind. Everyone is welcoming and full of Bronco spirit and so far I am impressed with the level of creative juices flowing in here.”

- Marketing Coordinator, Cathy Neale

F*****g genius.

And one of the the biggest advocates of good design. Wrote bundles and bundles on the topic. Very thoughtful essays from a VERY successful and smart man are out there. For you to read! You should read more! You don’t read enough. Stop reading magazines. Even a lot of those design magazines are dumb. Read books.

I’m want to internalize these and become them. I want them inside me.

Some quotes from him that I like:

Even if it is true that the average man seems most comfortable with the commonplace and familiar, it is equally true that catering to bad taste, which we so readily attribute to the average reader, merely perpetuates that mediocrity and denies the reader one of the most easily accessible means for aesthetic development and eventual enjoyment.

— Thoughts on Design

The roots of good design lie in aesthetics: painting, drawing, and architecture, while those of business and market research are in demographics and statistics; aesthetics and business are traditionally incompatible disciplines.

— Design Form and Chaos

Good design adds value of some kind, gives meaning, and, not incidentally, can be sheer pleasure to behold; it respects the viewer’s sensibilities and rewards the entrepreneur.

— Design Form and Chaos

I use the term play, but I mean coping with the problems of form and content, weighing relationships, establishing priorities. Every problem of form and content is different, which dictates that the rules of the game are different too.

— Graphic Wit “Paul Rand: The Play Instinct” 1991

I steered towards humorous things. People who don’t have a sense of humor really have serious problems.

— Interview with Steven Heller 1988

Mies van der Rohe once said that being good is more important than being original. Originality is a product, not an intention.

— Graphic Wit “Paul Rand: The Play Instinct” 1991