Inspirational Graphic Design Quotes

• Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that's why it is so complicated.

  Paul Rand

  Art, Simple, Design

  90 Copy quote

• 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

  Philosophy, Design, Crafts

  45 Copy quote

• Designers can create normalcy out of chaos; they can clearly communicate ideas through the organising and manipulating of words and pictures.

  Jeffrey Veen

  Ideas, Design, Normalcy

  61 Copy quote

• There is no design without discipline. There is no discipline without intelligence.

  Massimo Vignelli

  Discipline, Design, Graphic Design

  Massimo Vignelli (2007). “Vignelli”, p.39, Images Publishing

  186 Copy quote

  Show source

• Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it's really how it works.

  Steve Jobs

  Mean, Creativity, Thinking

  Steve Jobs (0101). “Motivating Thoughts of Steve Jobs”, p.37, Prabhat Prakashan

  24 Copy quote

  Show source

• Don't worry about people stealing your ideas.

  Howard Aiken

  Business, Science, Office Work

  "A Computer Science Reader : Selections from Abacus" by Eric A. Weiss, (p. 404), 1988.

  23 Copy quote

  Show source

• Good design keeps the user happy, the manufacturer in the black and the aesthete unoffended.

  Raymond Loewy

  Design, Black, Experience

  64 Copy quote

• If you can design one thing, you can design everything.

  Massimo Vignelli

  Design, Graphic Design, Designer

  Massimo Vignelli, Lella Vignelli, Images Publishing (2004). “Design is One”, p.4, Images Publishing

  142 Copy quote

  Show source

• 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

  Falling In Love, Jobs, Technology

  77 Copy quote

• A picture is worth a thousand words. An interface is worth a thousand pictures.

  Ben Shneiderman

  Technology, Design, Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

  52 Copy quote

• An idea can turn to dust or magic, depending on the talent that rubs against it.

  William Bernbach

  Motivational, Positive, Creativity

  27 Copy quote

• I want to make beautiful things, even if nobody cares, as opposed to ugly things. That's my intent.

  Saul Bass

  Beautiful, Ugly Things, Design

  122 Copy quote

• Style is a way to say who you are without having to speak.

  Rachel Zoe

  Inspiring, Fashion, Attitude

  36 Copy quote

• It's through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good.

  Paula Scher

  Mistake, Technology, Order

  268 Copy quote

• A designer is a planner with an aesthetic sense.

  Bruno Munari

  Badass, Bad Ass, Design

  76 Copy quote

• You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

  Mark Twain

  Life, Inspiring, Meaningful

  Mark Twain (1889). “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court”, p.422, Createspace Independent Pub

  92 Copy quote

  Show source

• Design is as much an act of spacing as an act of marking.

  Ellen Lupton

  Technology, Design, Spacing

  Ellen Lupton (2014). “Thinking with Type”, p.91, Chronicle Books

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• You don't take a photograph, you make it.

  Ansel Adams

  Inspirational, Photography, Art

  33 Copy quote

• It's very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better.

  Jonathan Ive

  Philosophical, Difficult And Easy, Different

  57 Copy quote

• 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

  Design, Clients, Good Work

  76 Copy quote

• 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 Peters

  Mistake, Issues, Design

  7 Copy quote

• Drawing is not what you see but what you must make others see.

  Edgar Degas

  Beauty, Dance, Art

  "The shop-talk of Edgar Degas".

  117 Copy quote

  Show source

• Art has to move you and design does not, unless it's a good design for a bus.

  David Hockney

  Art, Moving, Design

  1988 In The Guardian, 26 Oct.

  53 Copy quote

  Show source

• Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.

  Steve Jobs

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  87 Copy quote

• Design is the application of intent - the opposite of happenstance, and an antidote to accident.

  Robert L. Peters

  Opposites, Design, Antidote

  55 Copy quote