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27 Quotes About Design to Get Your Creativity Flowing

Updated: March 11, 2022

Published: February 11, 2019

Inspiration can often seem illusive and out-of-reach when you need it most.

Unfortunately, you often can't call it a day when you're feeling uninspired or frustrated by your designs -- or lack thereof. Oftentimes, you're working on a strict deadline, keeping you up late into the night thinking, How can I make this design great?

When this is the case, it's likely helpful to read some wisdom from some true masters of design. Here, we've cultivated a list of 27 inspiring and thought-provoking quotes that will undoubtedly get your creative juices flowing.

Keep reading, and remember, it's like Maya Angelou said -- "You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have."

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Design Quotes

1. "Have no fear of perfection -- you’ll never reach it." -- Salvador Dali, artist

2. "Design is intelligence made visible." -- Alina Wheeler, author

4. "You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have." -- Maya Angelou, author, poet, civil rights activist

5. "Design adds value faster than it adds costs." -- Joel Spolsky, web programmer, writer, and creator of Trello

6. "The public is more familiar with bad design than good design. It is, in effect, conditioned to prefer bad design, because that is what it lives with. The new becomes threatening, the old reassuring." -- Paul Rand, graphic designer

7. "Designers are meant to be loved, not to be understood." -- Margaret Oscar, designer

8. "Make it simple, but significant." -- Don Draper, fictional character on Mad Men

9. "Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ballpark. Aim for the company of immortals." -- David Ogilvy, advertising tycoon, known as the "Father of Advertising"

10. "Every great design begins with an even better story." -- Lorinda Mamo, designer

12. "The function of design is letting design function." -- Micha Commeren, designer

13. "Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works." -- Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, Inc.

14. "The more I deal with the work as something that is my own, as something that is personal, the more successful it is." -- Marian Bantjes, designer and author

15. "Design is not a single object or dimension. Design is messy and complex." -- Natasha Jen, designer and educator

16. "Design is the intermediary between information and understanding." -- Hans Hoffman, artist and teacher

17. "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, French writer and poet

18. "Design is a formal response to a strategic question." -- Mariona Lopez, business owner

19. "Styles come and go. Good design is a language, not a style." -- Massimo Vignelli, Italian designer

21 . "Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that's why it is so complicated." -- Paul Rand, graphic designer

22. "It's through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good." -- Paula Scher, graphic designer and painter

23. "Good design is good business." -- Thomas Watson Jr., businessman, second president of IBM

24. "Accessible design is good design." -- Steve Ballmer, American businessman and former CEO of Microsoft

25. "Where you innovate, how you innovate, and what you innovate are design problems." -- Tim Brown, CEO and president of IDEO

26. "I strive for two things in design: simplicity and clarity. Great design is born of those two things." -- Lindo Leader, graphic designer and creator of the FedEx logo

27. "Design is as much an act of spacing as an act of marking." -- Ellen Lupton, designer and educator

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100 Design Quotes That Spark Inspiration and Creativity

Quotes are not just words on a page. They are a compilation of experiences. And these design quotes are exactly that.

Creativity is all around you— in your environment, your hobbies, your clothes, the food you eat— it is everywhere. Despite that, it isn’t always easy to see the wonders and beauty of the little things. So, where do you turn for creative inspiration?

All creative souls understand the frustration of a creative block. It often strikes when there are important deadlines or in the middle of the night, where you can’t help but wonder, “How do I recapture my passion for great design?” Inspiration comes in many forms, and it can often seem out of reach when you need it the most.

Reading design quotes is one of the many motivating ways to recall the heart of design. The best inspiration often comes from the people who have been there done that.

Below is a curated list of 100 thought-provoking design quotes that may ignite your desire to create an amazing design.

100 Design Quotes To Fuel Your Inspiration And Creativity

1. “Every great design begins with an even better story.” — Lorinda Mamo (designer)

2. “Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that's why it is so complicated.” — Paul Rand (graphic designer)

3. “Design is as much an act of spacing as an act of marking.” — Ellen Lupton (designer and teacher)

4. “Where you innovate, how you innovate, and what you innovate are design problems.” — Tim Brown (CEO of IDEO)

5. “Good design is good business.” — Thomas Watson Jr. (co-president of IBM)

6. “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 (French author and poet)

7. “The more I deal with the work as something that is my own, as something that is personal, the more successful it is.” — Marian Bantjes (designer and author)

8. “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” — Steve Jobs (co-founder of Apple)

9. “Have no fear of perfection— you’ll never reach it.” — Salvador Dalí (artist)

10. “Everything is designed. Few things are designed well.” — Brian Reed (musician and front-end developer)

11. “It’s through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good.” — Paula Scher (graphic designer and painter)

12. “Good design is all about making other designers feel like idiots because that idea wasn’t theirs.” — Frank Chimero (designer)

13. “Design is thinking made visual.” — Saul Bass (graphic designer and filmmaker)

14. “Color does not add a pleasant quality to design— it reinforces it.” — Pierre Bonnard (French painter and illustrator)

15. “No design works unless it embodies ideas that are held common by the people for whom the object is intended.” — Adrian Forty (professor)

16. “Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas, worry about the day they stop.” — Jeffrey Zeldman (web designer and entrepreneur)

17. “Design creates culture. Culture shapes values. Values determine the future.” — Robert Peters (graphic designer and educator)

18. “Colors, like features, follow the changes of the emotions.” — Pablo Picasso (artist)

19. “Design is as much a matter of finding problems as it is solving them.” — Bryan Lawson (architect)

20. “Bad design shouts at you. Good design is the silent seller.” — Shane Meendering (designer)

21. “Good design begins with honesty, asks tough questions, comes from collaboration and from trusting your intuition.” — Freeman Thomas (industrial designer for Porsche)

22. “When typography is on point, words become images.” — Shawn Lukas (artist and designer)

23. “People don’t use a product because of the great design; great design helps them use the product.” — Viran Anuradha Dayaratne (designer)

24. “A user interface is like a joke. If you have to explain it, it’s not that good.” — Martin LeBlanc (designer)

25. “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.” — Steve Jobs (co-founder of Apple)

26. “It’s very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better.” — Jonathan Ive (architect)

27. “To create a memorable design you need to start with a thought that’s worth remembering.” — Thomas Manss (German graphic designer)

28. “The alternative to good design is bad design, not no design at all.” — Douglas Martin (author)

29. “A good designer finds an elegant way to put everything you need on a page. A great designer convinces you half that shit is unnecessary.” — Mike Monteiro (co-founder of Mule Design)

30. “It’s art if it can’t be explained. It’s fashion if no one asks for an explanation. It is design if it doesn’t need explanation.” — Wouter Stokkel (designer)

31. “I strive for two things in design: simplicity and clarity. Great design is born of those two things.” — Lindo Leader (designer and creator of the FedEx logo)

32. “The function of design is letting design function.” — Micha Commeren (designer)

33. “Design adds value faster than it adds costs.” — Joel Spolsky (creator of Trello)

34. “Design is where science and art break even.” — Robin Mathew (designer)

35. “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 (designer)

36. “Art is solving problems that cannot be formulated before they have been solved. The shaping of the question is part of the answer.” — Pete Hein (architect)

37. “I’m convinced that without bad design, the world would be a far less stimulating place; we would have nothing to marvel over and nothing to be nostalgic about.” — Carrie Phillips (model)

38. “Just because something looks good doesn’t mean it’s useful. And just because something is useful does not make it beautiful.” — Joshua Brewer (co-founder of Abstract)

39. “Simplicity carried to an extreme becomes elegance.” Jon Franklin (writer)

40. “What works good is better than what looks good, because what works good lasts.” — Ray Eames (designer)

41. “Truly elegant design incorporates top-notch functionality into a simple, uncluttered form.” — David Lewis (industrial designer)

42. “There are three responses to a piece of design: yes, no, and WOW! Wow is the one to aim for.” — Milton Glaser (graphic designer)

43. “No masterpiece was ever created by a lazy artist.” — Salvador Dalí (artist)

44. “Design is a solution to a problem; art is a question to a problem.” — John Maeda (designer and executive)

45. “Design is the body language of your marketing. Don’t slouch.” — Mark King (musician)

46. “Good design is obvious. Great design is transparent.” — Joe Sparano (graphic designer)

47. “Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous.” — Bill Moyers (journalist)

48. “You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.” — Maya Angelou (poet and activist)

49. “If you can design one thing, you can design everything.” — Massimo Vignelli (Italian designer)

50. “Intent not followed by action is an insult to your design. Decide what you want, create a plan, and get your ass out there!” — Steve Maraboli (writer)

51. “Designing a product is designing a relationship.” — Steve Rogers (graphic designer)

52. “Design is an opportunity to continue telling the story, not just to sum everything up.” — Tate Linden (marketing consultant)

53. “The dumbest mistake is viewing design as something you do at the end of the process to ‘tidy up’ the mess, as opposed to understanding it’s a ‘day one’ issue and part of everything.” — Tom Peterson (television personality)

54. “Thinking about design is hard, but not thinking about it can be disastrous.” — Ralph Caplan (design consultant and writer)

55. “Design that mimics the sensual continuity of nature's subtle connections of color, light, and texture invite the viewer's receptivity.” — Maggie Macnab (logo designer)

56. “As a designer, you have to think in time and see things in sequence. You have to see information as a narrative form.” — Paul Mijksenaar (designer and author)

57. “Art is self-centered. Design is user-centered.” — Mario Maruffi (product designer)

58. “Design is action at a distance.” — Robin Evans (architect)

59. “Look deep into your user problem, and you will design better.” — Mario Maruffi (product designer)

60. “Design is intelligence made visible.” — Alina Wheeler (author)

61. “Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ballpark. Aim for the company of immortals.” — David Ogilvy (advertising tycoon, known as the "Father of Advertising")

62. “Design is the intermediary between information and understanding.” — Hans Hoffman (artist and teacher)

63. “Design is a formal response to a strategic question.” — Mariona Lopez (business owner)

64. “Good design is like a refrigerator— when it works, no one notices, but when it doesn’t, it sure stinks.” — Irene Au (designer)

65. “Digital design is like painting, except the paint never dries.” — Neville Brody (graphic designer)

66. “Design transcends agenda. It speaks to the politics of optimism.” — Paul Bennett (author and typographer)

67. “Get rid of everything that is not essential to making a point.” — Christoph Niemann (graphic designer and illustrator)

68. “Whitespace is like air: it is necessary for the design to breathe.” — Wojciech Zieliński (director and filmmaker)

69. “People ignore designs that ignore people.” — Frank Chimero (designer)

70. “You don’t have to be ‘a creative’ to be creative.” — Drory Ben-Menachem (product designer)

71. “To design is much more than simply to assemble, to order, or even to edit: it is to add value and meaning, to illuminate, to simplify, to clarify, to modify, to dignify, to dramatize, to persuade, and perhaps even to amuse. To design is to transform prose into poetry.” — Paul Rand (graphic designer)

72. “Where do new ideas come from? The answer is simple: differences. Creativity comes from unlikely juxtapositions.” — Nicholas Negroponte (architect)

73. “You don’t think your way to creative work. You work your way to creative thinking.” — George Nelson (industrial designer)

74. “Design everything on the assumption that people are not heartless or stupid but marvelously capable, given the chance.” — John Chris Jones (Welsh designer)

75. “Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful.” — John Maeda (designer and executive)

76. “Design is more important than technology in most consumer applications.” — Dave McClure (entrepreneur)

77. “Practice safe design: Use a concept.” — Petrula Vrontikis (creative director of Vrontikis Design Office)

78. “Great design is a multi-layered relationship between human life and its environment.” — Naoto Fukasawa (Japanese industrial designer)

79. “Design isn’t crafting a beautiful textured button with breathtaking animation. It’s figuring out if there’s a way to get rid of the button altogether.” — Edward Tufte (statistician and artist)

80. “Curiosity about life in all its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” — Leo Burnett (advertising executive)

81. “Here is one of the few effective keys to the design problem: the ability of the designer to recognize as many of the constraints as possible; his willingness and enthusiasm for working within these constraints.” — Charles Eames (designer and architect)

82. “Content precedes design. Design in the absence of content is not design, it’s decoration.” — Jeffrey Zeldman (web designer and entrepreneur)

83. “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” — Sir Ken Robinson (British author and public speaker)

84. “An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail." — Dr. Edwin Land (scientist and inventor)

85. “Design is the search for a magical balance between business and art; art and craft; intuition and reason; concept and detail; playfulness and formality; client and designer; designer and printer; and printer and public.” — Valerie Pettis (typographer)

86. “Typography is to literature as musical performance is to composition: an essential act of interpretation, full of endless opportunities for insight or obtuseness.” — Robert Bringhurst (poet and typographer)

87. “Design is more than just a few tricks to the eye. It’s a few tricks to the brain.” — Neville Brody (graphic designer)

88. “The truth is, it’s not the idea, it’s never the idea, it’s always what you do with it.” — Neil Gaiman (author)

89. “Rules are what the artist breaks; the memorable never emerged from a formula.” — Bill Bernbach (creative director)

90. “Typography needs to be audible. Typography needs to be felt. Typography needs to be experienced.” — Helmut Schmid (typographer)

91. “That’s the great secret of creativity. You treat ideas like cats: You make them follow you.” — Ray Bradbury (author and screenwriter)

92. “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” — Leonardo da Vinci (artist)

93. “The key to great ideas is not having them, it is executing them. And great ideas come from problems. As designers we call problems briefs, and we call reactions to problems concepts.” — Kate Moross (graphic designer)

94. “Work for money, design for love.” — Issey Miyake (Japanese fashion designer)

95. “Graphic design is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity, heresy, abnormality, hobbies, and humor.” — George Santayana (philosopher and poet)

96. “I don’t want something special. I want something beautifully plain.” — Anne Lamott (writer and activist)

97. “Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.” — Steve Jobs (co-founder of Apple)

98. “If you are to create something powerful and important, you must at the very least be driven by an equally powerful inner force.” — Ryan Holiday (author and PR strategist)

99. “Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context – a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan.” — Eero Saarinen (architect)

100. “The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct. The creative mind plays with the objects it loves.” – Carl Jung (psychoanalyst)

Conclusion: Inspiring Design Quotes

Inspiration can come and go, but the best thing you can do is continue pushing and making your designs come alive. Mistakes are part and parcel of the experience, and they contribute to your overall creativity.

There is one last design quote to leave you with.

“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.”

Don’t wait for that spark to come to you— you have to allow it to find you.

Hopefully, these design quotes helped you find the creativity in you. Whether it’s a digital design, illustrations, logos— every bit of inspiration helps you to the finished product where you can proudly say, “This is mine, and it works.”

What are you waiting for? Give it a try! Make the beautiful designs in your head a reality.

Speaking of beautiful designs, if you ever feel like letting your creative juices flow with a brand new logo, check out our logo maker . It is a design tool that allows you complete control of your creative process.

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May 7, 2019

66 Best Quotes About Design (Of All Time)

The right words at the right time can help you solve a difficult project, rethink your perspective and even change your life. Whether you’re looking for inspiration or just want to sample the wisdom of other designers and thinkers, here are 66 of the best design quotes.

The Meaning of Design

1. “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 , Communication and Experience Designer

2. “Design is where science and art break even.” — Robin Mathew, Designer

3. “To say that something is designed means it has intentions that go beyond its function. Otherwise it’s just planning.” — Ayse Birsel , Designer, Author and Co-founder of Birsel + Seck

4. “Design is as much a matter of finding problems as it is solving them.” — Bryan Lawson , Author, Architect and Scholar

5. “Truly elegant design incorporates top-notch functionality into a simple, uncluttered form.” — David Lewis, Industrial Designer

6. “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” — Steve Jobs

7. “Art is solving problems that cannot be formulated before they have been solved. The shaping of the question is part of the answer.” — Pete Hein, Architect, Poet and Mathematician

8. “In a very real way, designers create the human environment; they make the things we use, the places we live and work, our modes of communication and mobility. Simply put, design matters. And at a moment in our history in which the scientific community has issued serious warnings about the negative impacts of our flawed designs-from global warming and water pollution to the loss of biodiversity and natural resources-designers have a critical role to play in the creation of a more just, healthful and sustainable world.” — William McDonough , Architect, Designer and Author

Mobile Design Quotes

9. “Experiences we have come to expect on mobile apps have created new standards and expectations for all digital media including the web. The result is websites are evolving to become more app-like in their rich functionality.” — Raj Aggarwal , Cofounder of Stealth Startup

10. “End users not technologies shape the market. Consequently, marketers need to stay abreast not only of technological developments but also of the way people respond to them.” — Matt Haig, Author of Mobile Marketing: The Message Revolution”

11. “Mobile is the enabling centerpiece of digital convergence. Mobile is the glue for all other digital industries to use when approaching convergence, but mobile is also the digital gateway for the real world to join in this global metamorphosis of human behavior.” — Tomi Ahonen , Author, Consultant and Motivational Speaker

Good and Bad Design

12. “Good design is obvious. Great design is transparent.” — Joe Sparano , Designer and Teacher

13. “The public is more familiar with bad design than good design. It is, in effect, conditioned to prefer bad design, because that is what it lives with. The new becomes threatening, the old reassuring.” — Paul Rand, Art Director and Graphic Designer

14. “You can have an art experience in front of a Rembrandt… or in front of a piece of graphic design.” — Stefan Sagmeister, Designer at Sagmeister & Walsh

15. “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

16. “I’m convinced that without bad design, the world would be a far less stimulating place; we would have nothing to marvel over and nothing to be nostalgic about.” — Carrie Phillips

17. “The alternative to good design is always bad design. There is no such thing as no design.” — Adam Judge , Author of “The Little Black Book of Design”

18. “Just because something looks good doesn’t mean it’s useful. And just because something is useful does not make it beautiful.” — Joshua Brewer, Co-founder and CEO of Abstract

19. “Simplicity, carried to an extreme, becomes elegance.” Jon Franklin, Writer

20. “Designers think everything done by someone else is awful, and that they could do it better themselves, which explains why I designed my own living room carpet, I suppose.” — Chris Bangle, Automobile Designer

21. “What works good is better than what looks good, because what works good lasts.” — Ray Eames, Designer

22. “Designers love subtle cues, because subtlety is one of the traits of sophisticated design. But Web users are generally in such a hurry that they routinely miss subtle cues.” — Steve Krug , Author and UX Professional

23. “The next big thing is the one that makes the last big thing usable.” — Blake Ross , Software Engineer

24. “A Design isn’t finished until somebody is using it.” — Brenda Laurel , Scholar, Author and Researcher

Clients and Users

25. “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 , Designer and Educator

26. “I’ve never had a problem with a dumb client. There is no such thing as a bad client. Part of our job is to do good work and get the client to accept it.” — Bob Gill, Illustrator and Graphic Designer

27. “If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.” — Red Adair, Oil Well Firefighter

28. “The role of the designer is that of a good, thoughtful host anticipating the needs of his guests.” — Charles Eames, Designer

29. “The customers, the visitors, the patients, the readers, the guests, whatever you call them — their experience is what determines the company’s success or failure. So focus first on the overall experience. It’s strategic, not tactical. It’s about the people, not the tool. Focusing on the larger picture first will set a better context in which to work — later — on usability tactics.” — Mark Hurst , Founder and CEO of Creative Good

30. “ Pay attention to what users do, not what they say” — Jakob Nielsen, Usability Expert, Co-Founder and Principal of the Nielsen-Norman Group

31. “You have to start with the customer experience and work your way back to technology.” — Steve Jobs

Art and Design in Life

32. “Art must not be concentrated in dead shrines called museums. It must be spread everywhere — on the streets, in the trams, factories, workshops, and in the workers’ homes. — Vladimir Mayakovsky, Artist, Writer and Actor

33. “Each color lives by its mysterious life.” — Wassily Kandinsky, Painter and Art Critic

34. “The conception of ‘artistic work’ presupposes a distinction between useful and useless work and as there are only a few artists, buyers can be found even for their useless products. The artist’s work lies beyond the boundaries of the useful and the useless.” — El Lissitzky, Artist, Typographer and Architect

35. “I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies.” — Le Corbusier, Architect, Urban Planner and Designer

36. “Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen. — Leonardo da Vinci

Learning and Design Quotes

37. “I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.” — Pablo Picasso

38. “It’s through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good.” — Paula Scher , Designer and Partner at Pentagram

39. “It took me a few seconds to draw it, but it took me 34 years to learn how to draw it in a few seconds.” — Paula Scher

Quotes About the Creative Process

40. “Love blinds us. Don’t love anything — an idea, a tool, a graphic, a technique, a technology, a client, or a colleague — too much.” — Adam Judge

41. “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” — Mark Twain

42. “Every great design begins with an even better story.” — Lorinda Mamo , Designer, Blogger and Interior Stylist

43. “Accidents often produce the best solutions. Only you can recognize the difference between an accident and your original intent.” — Jennifer Morla , President and Creative Director of Morla Design

44. “Engineers and designers simultaneously know too much and too little. They know too much about the technology and too little about how other people live their lives and do their activities”. — Donald Norman, Author, Professor and Co-founder of the Nielsen-Norman Group

45. “Have no fear of perfection — you’ll never reach it.” — Salvador Dali

46. “A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.” — Shigeru Miyamoto, Pioneering Nintendo Game Developer

47. “Testing with one user early in the project is better than testing with 50 near the end.” — Steve Krug

48. “You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” — Maya Angelou

49. “This is what happens when we design for everyone — we ‘dumb things down’ to the point that they become useless or inefficient for most people. How does this happen? Well, because although everyone in the world might want to use your product or your website, they’ll want to use it in a very particular way. In order to design your product well for them, you need to understand how they’ll use it and design to support that behaviour.” — Leisa Reichelt , Head of Research and Insights at Atlassian

50. In order to design your product well for them, you need to understand how they’ll use it and design to support that behaviour.” — Leisa Reichelt , Head of Research and Insights at Atlassian

51. “A startup founder who ‘gets’ user experience and design will likely create a more successful product than one who does not. It’s not just because a great user experience makes a product more enjoyable and ultimately fun to use. It’s because this type of design thinking and understanding of the customer seeps into every other aspect of the product.” — Jeff Gothelf , Author, Business Consultant

52. “Design thinkers look past a project to the next project, to the next step in the strategy. They look sideways to the tangents that are affected by the result, and longer term to the investment required as a result of solving the problem currently in front of the team. No problem is solved in isolation-either from the past, or from the future.” — Mark Dziersk , Industrial Designer, Managing Director at LUNAR

53. “Usability testing should not be a stage gate in your design and development process. It should be a tool with which to gather helpful, diagnostic information from your target users. It’s a means of understanding the goodness of a design’s fit to the intended users’ problems.” — Paul J. Sherman, Founder and Principal Consultant of ShermanUX

54. “If you can make something significantly clearer by making it slightly inconsistent, choose in favor of clarity.” — Steve Krug

55. “Far too often, we treat web development as a sprint rather than a marathon. It is the experience designer’s job, in part, to help everyone walk the steps of the experience they’ll create before they run — especially when they’ll be doing so in tandem.” — Andrew Maier , Design Researcher

Quotes About Teamwork in Design and Beyond

56. “A healthy team is made up of people who have the attitude that it is better to learn something new than to be right.” — Bill Buxton, Computer Scientist and Designer

57. “Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships.” — Michael Jordan

58. “Paradoxically, when we advocate for the user within our product or service development teams, we are, in effect, simultaneously advocating for the team to our users.” — Michael Cummings, Usability Analyst

59. “UX suffers when we wall ourselves off from the rest of the organization. Getting people from other disciplines involved gives them the opportunity to feel that you’re all working toward a common goal. At the same time, it gives you the opportunity to advocate user-centered thinking and gain that critical buy-in.” — John Ferrara , Senior UX Designer at Ferrera

60. “Remember, teamwork begins by building trust. And the only way to do that is to overcome our need for invulnerability.” — Patrick Lencioni, Author and Founder of The Table Group

61. “Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much.” — Helen Keller

62. “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” — Phil Jackson, Basketball Player, Coach, and Executive

63. “There is no such thing as a self-made man. You will reach your goals only with the help of others.” ― George Shinn, Sports Executive

64. “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” ― Sir Isaac Newton

65. “None of us is as smart as all of us.” — Ken Blanchard, Author

66. “Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.” — Amy Poehler, Actress, Author, and Television Producer

And finally, a bonus quote for designers, and anyone striving to make their mark on the world:

67. “Be a first rate version of yourself, not a second rate version of someone else.” — Judy Garland, Actress

Proto.io lets anyone build mobile app prototypes that feel real. No coding or design skills required. Bring your ideas to life quickly! Sign up for a free 15-day trial of Proto.io today and get started on your next mobile app design.

Have a great designer quote we missed? Let us know by tweeting us @Protoio !

Originally published at https://blog.proto.io on March 6, 2019.

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101 Interior Design Quotes

Quotes can be an incredible source of motivation, especially when it comes to interior design.

These interior design quotes from designers and leaders both past and present are a source of inspiration, guidance and knowledge for experienced designers and newbies alike.

Sourced from interviews, books , blog posts, news articles and more.

These wise interior design quotes from some of history’s most influential architects and interior designers, including Albert Hadley, Bunny Williams, and Zaha Hadid, are sure to inspire you.

“Good design doesn’t date.” – Harry Seidler

“Architecture is inhabited sculpture.” – Constantin Brancusi

“A room is not a room without natural light.” – Louis Kahn

“We shape our homes and then our homes shape us.” – Winston Churchill

“The door handle is the handshake of the building.” – Juhani Pallasmaa

“The home should be the treasure chest of living.” – Le Corbusier

“No pattern should be without some sort of meaning.” – William Morris

“Interior decoration partly thrives on being social.” – Nicholas Haslam

“One should never be the oldest thing in one’s house.” – Patsy Stone

“The details are not the details. They make the design.” – Charles Eames

“Real comfort, visual and physical, is vital to every room.” – Mark Hampton

“I always put in one controversial item. It makes people talk.” – Dorothy Draper

“Dare to be different and unique but make sure you answer the brief ” – @amiconsulting

“Architecture is a visual art and the buildings speak for themselves.” – Julia Morgan

“Being identifiably ‘something’ will help you stand out from the crowd. ” – @RunForTheHillls

“Every room needs a touch of black, just as it needs one antique piece.” – Jan Showers

“I’d say the most important advice would be to network, network, network. ” – @chapter7design

“The best rooms have something to say about the people who live in them.” – David Hicks

“I am going to make everything around me beautiful—that will be my life.” – Elsie De Wolfe

“Be patient and positive. These things take time and do not happen overnight. ” – @noushkadesign

“Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness.” – Frank Gehry

“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” – Steve Jobs

“Most importunely enjoy it and welcome to this fabulous world of interior design ” – @Twist_Interiors

“Underneath all I design lies the solid belief that beauty is a positive force.” – Barbara Barry

“Architecture starts when you carefully put two bricks together. There is begins.” – Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

“Good buildings come from good people and all problems are solved by good design.” – Stephen Gardiner

“If your client doesn’t already know they’re style be the one to help them find it ” – @atominteriors”

“Chandeliers are the marvels of drop-dead showiness, the jewelry of architecture.” – Peter York

“Be faithful to your own taste, because nothing you really like is ever out of style.” – Billy Baldwin

“To create an interior, the designer must develop an overall concept and stick to it.” – Albert Hadley

“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Design is knowing which ones to keep.” – Scott Adams

“A house is much more than a mere shelter—it should lift us emotionally and spiritually.” – John Saldino

“Architecture is the learned game correct and magnificent of forms assembled in the light.” – Le Corbusier

“Design is defined by light and shade, and appropriate lighting is enormously important. ” – Albert Hadley

“With plenty of self belief, ambition and hard work you can turn your passion into a career.” – @bhavintdesign

“Listen to the building and the project rather than impose a specific style and design to it ” – @AzouInteriors

“Architecture is really about well-being. I think that people want to feel good in a space .” – Zaha Hadid

“There are two things that make a room timeless: a sense of history and a piece of the future.” – Charlotte Moss

“My advice to new interior designers would be to have confidence in your ability and your vision ” – @mrs__w

“Whether spare or elaborate, harmonious moldings are the mark of a successful classical interior.” – Peter Pennoyer

“Design is a plan for arranging elements in such a way as best to accomplish a particular purpose.” – Charles Eames

“A room should never allow the eye to settle in one place. It should smile at you and create fantasy.” – Juan Montoya

“Furniture that is too obviously designed is very interesting often belongs only in museums.” – Milo Baughman

“Another word for minimalism is ‘elegance.’ Elegance is beautifully resolving an issue with minimal means.” – Tom Kundig

“True modernism always appears effortless but can only truly be achieved by exercising the utmost discipline.” – Waldo Fernandez

“When you’re building a room, you’re building character, and character is the strength and wisdom of a home.” – Rose Tarlow

“The principle of the design – the harmony, rhythm and balance are all the same with interior design.” – Venus Williams

“I like an interior that defies labeling. I don’t really want someone to walk into a room and know that I did it.” – Bunny Williams

“Form follows function—that has been misunderstood. Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union.” – Frank Lloyd Wright

“All rooms ought to look as if they were lived in, and to have so to say, a friendly welcome ready for the incomer.” – William Morris

“For a house to be successful, the objects in it must communicate with one another, respond and balance one another.” – Andrée Putman

“Don’t undersell yourself – you have worked hard for your qualifications, your clients have come to you for those skills ” – @reynedesign

“Design for the present, with an awareness of the past, for a future which is essentially unknown.” – Norman Foster

“The key to being successful is being really practical and totally understanding how your clients live and what their needs are” – @Urban_Grain

“A modernist seeks rigor and honesty beyond ‘form follows function,’ creating spaces that transcend enclosure and become an art form.” – Lee F. Mindel

“Tonal and subtle color combinations allow us to mix furniture and pieces from different eras together to create a cohesive narrative.” – Rafael de Cárdenas

“There is a real sense of perfection of scale in the neoclassical period. When mastered, it becomes easy to adapt to any kind of style.” – Jean-Louis Deniot

“It has to be a subtle, un-strident mix, and the key, of course, is getting the personality of both house and those living in it right.” – Nicky Haslam

“Innovation is often the ability to reach into the past and bring back what is good, what is beautiful, what is useful, what is lasting.” – Sister Parish

“Classicism is about remembering instead of forgetting. I’m interested in making the old new and seeing what is modern in historical things.” – Thomas O’Brien

“Get paid for your time and for your work, otherwise you will be pursuing an expensive hobby rather than a professional interior design career. ” – @adriennechinn

“Minimalism is designing to allow the art, the books , the view, the people—whatever matters most to the inhabitant—to be the soul of the space.” – Deborah Berke

“Learn to look not just with your eyes but with your heart. Find the things that connect with you. How else will you know how to design your home?” – Kelly Hoppen

“Listening to a client when taking a brief is one of the most important skills you can have as an interior designer and one that is often over-looked” – @myintdesign

“The best traditional houses are anchored by a low-key sophistication—elegance and refinement balanced by understatement and an abundance of comfort.” – Gil Schafer

“Rawness and refinement are not opposite ends of a luxurious spectrum. They are two complementary features with which to populate a luxe environment.” – Kelly Weartsler

“If you want a golden rule that will fit everything, this is it: Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” – William Morris

“Luxury is when it seems flawless, when you reach the right balance between all elements. Understated theatricality – that is what my luxury is all about.” – Jean-Louis Deniot

“Don’t be tempted just to pick any job, really go with what feels right in the aesthetic as you need to create beautiful things that you love and relate to. ” – @osborninteriors

“I want to create a place, like a little island, where you can have all your things around you and be comfortable and read a book and even sleep overnight.” – Patricia Urquiola

“Design is coming to grips with one’s real lifestyle, one’s real place in the world. Rooms should not be put together for show but to nourish one’s wellbeing.” – Albert Hadley

“Classicism is not to say it is staid—quite the contrary, as it is rooted in the classic elements that write the rules and then allow you to reinterpret them.” – Brian McCarthy

“You create your own decoration. You choose your color, you choose your mood…. If you are depressed, you put some bright yellow and suddenly you are happy.” – Phillip Starck

“Chairs are uniquely the best expression of design. They encompass more of the challenges by which I live and work than any other single component of furniture.” – Vladimir Kagan

“We often think of the principal responsibility of a modern interior, particularly one in a project with a beautiful site or a great view, as staying out of the way” – Steven Harris

“It’s the antithesis of ‘decor’ and the opposite of ‘designed.’ It’s full of personality and comfort. It’s collecting and layering to create a style entirely one’s own.” – Roman Alonso

“A designer has a duty to create timeless design. To be timeless you have to think really far into the future, not next year, not in two years but in 20 years minimum.” – Phillip Starck

“Designers and people in general are too attracted by ‘new’, but nothing ages more quickly than ‘newness’. All my objects reflect [a] marriage between past and present.” – Marcel Wanders

“In modernism there’s a certain openness, transparency, and relationship to context, how it deals with the pragmatics of the situation—all of these things are part of it.” – Richard Meier

“Integrating reclaimed materials into the architecture—among them, wood or stone flooring, rough-hewn beams, and parged walls—creates a very engaging and tactile environment.” – Darryl Carter

“We’ve found that bringing back objects from travels can add an almost totemic resonance to a space, invoking a different perspective and recalling that nomadic state of mind” – Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch

“Yves Saint Laurent’s fantastically eclectic rue de Babylone residence inspires me for all those überchic clients of ours today who follow their own paths and make their own rules” – Jamie Drake

“An iconoclast has vision. They mix things up and make you see things in a fresh way. They also often have a wicked sense of humor, which makes them so fun to sit next to at dinner.” – Miles Redd

“A combination of texture, soft patinas, warm woods, and old stone mixed with down-filled furniture, graphic textiles, and ceramics creates spaces that are easy, comfortable, and warm.” – Mark Cunningham

“In the case of not obeying the rules of design, something becomes incredibly personal. It becomes your own, and it becomes also something that nobody else shares because it’s your own eye.” – Robert Couturier

“Proper proportions, grounded compositions, and identifiably correct details make me feel rooted in time, place, and culture, but they also free me up to dive into decorative flights of fancy.” – Alexa Hampton

“To design for a globe-trotting client is always an exciting adventure. I love to use vintage ikats from the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. And exotic tiles always add an air of fantasy to a space.” – Martyn Lawrence Bullard

“Minimalist design is deceptively complicated. Those clean lines and unbroken planes don’t come easily. Cornices, moldings, trim, and the like were invented to hide construction imperfections.” – Russell S. Groves

“I think my unrelenting drive for order is what makes me a modernist. It’s about creating an atmosphere with an economy of means and allowing anything extra or unnecessary to fall by the wayside.” – Thad Hayes

“Ultimately it’s about working with clients so they are comfortable and excited about all the new changes that are going to happen in their home and with trades to ensure the project is delivered! ” – @fbainteriors

“Furniture is needed for practical reasons, and because it must be there, it may as well be as pleasant as possible to look at, and in a less definable psychological way, comforting to the spirit.” – Edward J Wormley

“What is quality? Quality design must have a sense of authenticity. My work is not cutting edge, it is not supposed to be, but sometimes, the middle of the road is the most dangerous place to walk.” – David Collins

“Being an iconoclast is a state of mind and heart. It’s having a free spirit, finding inspiration everywhere, and not minding rules. It’s appreciating the raw and natural, finding beauty in anomalies.” – Kelly Wearstler

“The here and now defines modernity—being present in the moment while equally aware of past experiences and the likely future, thus able to synthesize this knowledge into a coherent and inimitable design.” – Alan Wanzenberg

“I like to try to achieve a calm serenity in my work. I want to create interiors that allow furniture, art, and, of course, architecture space to breathe—but there must always be a warmth in the atmosphere.” – Rose Uniacke

“Minimalists can answer the what, where, and why for everything they own. It’s designing to allow the art, the books, the view, the people—whatever matters most to the inhabitant—to be the soul of the space.” – Deborah Berke

“From the primitive crafts I discover to the changing colors of the sand dunes of Namibia as the day progresses, the constant awareness while traveling brings more depth and a broader color palette to design.” – Vicente Wolf

“Get to understand and know the market you are trying to build your business in and above all listen to your clients as it is important to create a scheme that suits them not you but have a little bit of you in it too… ” – @SassyProperty

“I love creating rooms that are layered, cozy, and familiar—filled with deep overstuffed sofas, venerable brown furniture, a friendly mix of patterns, colors, collections, and paintings, and carpets that look better with age.” – Richard Keith Langham

“To be a modernist is a way of living, and how one approaches life. It’s not just about having the latest design from Milan, because if you know what you’re doing you can have an antique piece that feels very modern in an environment.” – Steven Volpe

“The essence of interior design will always be about people and how they live. It is about the realities of what makes for an attractive, civilized, meaningful environment, not about fashion or what’s in or what’s out. This is not an easy job.” – Albert Hadley

“First and foremost, travel to exotic places informs me as a designer as to pattern, color, and texture usually expressed in local crafts. It’s wonderful to work with the traditional artisans to produce a design element, then use it in a modern way.” – Richard Mishaan

“The basis of being a modernist and designing for one is clarity. Achieving the latter requires distilling an idea to its elements, and then carefully calibrating proportion, light, and materiality to most honestly reflect the way the client wants to live.” – Ron Radziner

“Nothing adds soul to a space like a distinctive wall covering. It envelops the room in such unique spirit. Designs that may read as too loud in larger quantities are a great choice to accentuate in moderation, such as on a ceiling or one wall. In smaller doses, they evoke just the right amount of drama.” – Kelly Weartsler

Woah. And there we have it. Over 100 incredible interior design quotes. Which ones are your favourites?

Want to read about the best interior design trends? Read our article on everything you need to know about Scandinavian Interior Design.

Top tips for creating an interior design proposal, 14 tips for your interior design blog: get more clients from your blog, how to create a mid-century modern-inspired living room, how to create a mid-century modern-inspired kitchen, about the author.

Freddie Chatt

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100 design quotes to ignite your inspiration - Learn
His quote shows that design can be a daunting thing, but it must be taken seriously, and if it isn’t it will be a real detriment to society. 07. Informational Understanding. Hans Hofmann was a teacher and painter, as well as one of the most important postwar American artists.
Abstract Art Quotes (24 quotes) - Goodreads
“Abstraction allows man to see with his mind what he cannot see physically with his eyes....Abstract art enables the artist to perceive beyond the tangible, to extract the infinite out of the finite. It is the emancipation of the mind. It is an exploration into unknown areas.” ― Arshile Gorky tags: abstract-art , infinite , perception 20 likes Like
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27 Quotes About Design to Get Your Creativity Flowing 1. "Have no fear of perfection -- you’ll never reach it." -- Salvador Dali, artist 2. "Design is intelligence made visible." -- Alina Wheeler, author 3. "Everything is designed. Few things are designed well." -- Brian Reed, front-end developer and musician 4. "You can't use up creativity.
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Below is a curated list of 100 thought-provoking design quotes that may ignite your desire to create an amazing design. 100 Design Quotes To Fuel Your Inspiration And Creativity. 1. “Every great design begins with an even better story.” — Lorinda Mamo (designer) 2. “Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that ...
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“No matter how tough times are, you just do not compromise on the product. You just don’t.” “Taste making takes time. So if you get it wrong, you get it really wrong.” Episode 6 Graphic designer...
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Abstract Art Quotes - BrainyQuote. There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward you can remove all traces of reality. Pablo Picasso. Just as pure abstract art is not dogmatic, neither is it decorative. Piet Mondrian. What goes on in abstract art is the proclaiming of aesthetic principles...
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1. “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, Communication and Experience...
101 Interior Design Quotes - Decor Blueprint
“One should never be the oldest thing in one’s house.” – Patsy Stone “The details are not the details. They make the design.” – Charles Eames “Real comfort, visual and physical, is vital to every room.” – Mark Hampton “I always put in one controversial item. It makes people talk.” – Dorothy Draper