Studied in a top design university. Worked as the Vice
President to one of the most famous designers in history.
Partner at one of the greatest design firms in the world—
Pentagram. The senior critic of graphic design at Yale School
of Art. Author of two books on design. President of the
New York AIGA chapter for two years. Founder of a famous
design forum. His accolades include features in the Moma.
The Met. The Cooper Hewitt.
Michael Bierut makes design seem easy. With only three
steps in his professional career—the University of Cincinnati,
Vignelli Associates, and Pentagram—Michael Bierut has
become the liaison of design and one of the most important
graphic designers ever because of how he makes his work
and opinions available, interesting, and easy to understand.
Growing up in a Cleveland, Ohio suburb, Michael Bierut
believes that he was “a graphic designer in the middle of
nowhere.”[03]
Graphic Design was not well-known there, so
it was not encouraged as a career to creative youth, like
Bierut. He was always good at art as a child but discovered
graphic design through books he found in the library by
Milton Glaser, S Niel Fujita, and Armin Hoffman.
[04]
Following creating his first poster in the ninth grade, he
realized that the reason he liked design so much more than
art was that it had purpose.[05]
Watching people view his
posters, Bierut found he loved the way that through design,
he was able to speak to many people at onceMichael Bierut studied in the University of Cincinnati’s world-
renowned DAAP Graphic Design program in 1775 for 5
years. While there, he met a girl named Dorothy. She later
became his wife, and still holds the title of “first and only
girl Michael Bierut has kissed.”[08]
The school’s design
program taught the popular Yale-Swiss Education style,
which contrasted greatly with the Glaser-style of the books
that Michael Bierut grew up loving.[09]
He grew to love the
school’s Swiss style even though it greatly differed from
what he independently enjoyed exploring. At school, he was
able to learn and appreciate different styles.
While at UC, he had an internship with an AIGA medalist,
named Chris Pullman, at a Boston public television station,
WGBH. Bierut advises toward finding as many mentors as
possible and learning as much as you can from them.[10]
Perhaps as a result of this, Michael Bierut, too, became an
AIGA medalist later in life.
For creative people, he believes “the real reward is to simply
do the work.”[11]
It stems from the way that he does not
think designers should rely so hard on creativity. Famous
for his work ethic, he admires those who can simply show
up for work every day and do the best they can because
of passion and determination. As evidence of this, he often
worked for clients and friends without charging them. He
individually explored ways to combine his love for illustration,
commercial art, and the classic form resolution that was
taught in his studio courses. To do this, he worked on side
projects, such as a student-run newspaper.
An important lesson he had during a client project for the
Contemporary Art Center was that as important to style is
being interested in what you’re designing for.[12]
Bierut has
fallen in love with how his career as a Graphic Designer
allows him to vicariously partake in different fields and
attributes his success to being able to be interested in many
topics. Michael Bierut greatly enjoys his role of learning from
clients and communicating to others.
Following his studies in Ohio, Bierut moved to New York
and entered the center of the “design universe.”[14]
He
worked under the great Massimo and Lella Vignelli at their
firm, Vignelli Associates. It was the first of the only two
jobs that compose his career.
Every day, Michael Bierut would work two shifts. The first
was at normal hours and then later at night, following saying
goodnight to his wife, he would return for a second late-night
shift. Massimo Vignelli soon picked up on Bierut’s incredible
work ethic. They assigned him more and more work as they
observed how efficient he was with time. Eventually, they
promoted him to be Vice President, which allowed him to
manage the company’s Graphic Design Operations. Bierut
became very close to the Vignellis, citing Massimo as one of
his greatest inspirations.[15]
“Massimo taught me to focus on the big ideas, and I thought
that big ideas were what connected with the greatest number
of people.”
—Michael Bierut[16]
As part of the Vignelli Style, Massimo used only five fonts
because he believed that these were the only good fonts
that existed. Michael Bierut could understand Massimo’s
way, but only because five fonts is all that an ordinary person
can distinguish. He believes in designing so that ordinary
people, like his mom, for example, can understand him.[17]
Though he endlessly studied and imitated the Vignelli Style
to the point where the difference was incredibly minute, he
does not believe that an idea can be communicated through
solely a color and a typeface. Bierut disagrees with Massimo
and believes “good design” transcends style and is more
concerned with how to communicate an idea to an audience.
Therefore, Michael Bierut learned from his time with the
Vignellis how to make his work understandable to the masses
because he realized that having only one style is not effective
for every design.
Michael Bierut wanted to have a design partner that would
be as good a complement to him as Lella was to Massimo.
He found the perfect opportunity after ten years at Vignelli
Associates when he was offered the once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity to be a partner at Pentagram.[21]
He has stayed
there since 1990, leading an exemplary team of Graphic
Designers. Bierut excels as an identity and branding designer,
with most of his work at Pentagram being either print or
environmental Graphic Design. He develops brands from the
ground up and revitalizes them.[22]
Some notable client work he has done has been for the Jets,
United Airlines, Yale, Downtown NYC signage, and the MIT
Media Lab. Recently, he and his Pentagram group were
behind Hillary Clinton’s campaign logo. The spectrum of
styles in Michael Bierut’s work speak for his talent of creating
Graphic Design for any kind of brand and identity.[23]
All of his work is widely seen due to many of Pentagram’s
clients being either famous or globally commercialized.
They are also one of the best regarded and known design
firms in the world. However, in a classic Michael Bierut move,
he has created additional means to be seen and heard. His
work and opinions can be easily accessed in many different
ways. His design work can be viewed in his recently published
monograph, How To. This book, combined with his other
book of his essays, completes a painting of who Michael
Bierut is, what he believes, and what he has done. He has
also co-founded an online forum and blog called Design
Observer, where he has an outlet to speak about news in
design, among other topics.
His ability to speak about design lets him reach a universal
and unbounded audience. Bierut has been interviewed
alongside design legends such as Erik Spiekermann, Stefan
Sagmeister, Hermann Zapf, and David Carson.
[24]
He has
gained the image of the vocalist of the design world, now
known not only for his pieces of communication design, but
also his ability to communicate what design is.
“Most people don’t understand what a graphic designer does,
let alone what they see.”
—Michael Bierut[27]
As a result of his time at the University of Cincinnati, at
Vignelli Associates, and at Pentagram, Michael Bierut has
become increasingly fearful of styles and movements in
design and considers himself to be a pluralist because of
his appreciation for lots of different work. Other designers,
including Paula Scher, note how knowledgeable he is when
it comes to design approaches. Bierut feels that designers
should focus less on stylistic novelty, and instead concentrate
on creating content that people actually want to read.[28]
Michael Bierut currently lives in Westchester, New York
with his family of his wife and two children.[29]
A present-day
designer, he is incredibly active in the world of design. Today,
he travels frequently, stays in-touch with media, is active on
Twitter, and speaks publicly. While still working at Pentagram,
he remains a strong voice of design and continues to create
incredible work for others to see and appreciate. Michael
Bierut designs for himself out of passion for the practice, but
also designs so that he can speak to a global audience. As a
result, Michael Bierut is most famous for his creativity and
skill when designing and the way that he has effectively
democratized design.[30]
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