Designing Worlds ― National Design Histories in an Age of Globalization

From consumer products to architecture to advertising to digital technology, design is an undeniably global phenomenon. Yet despite their professed transnational perspective, historical studies of design have all too often succumbed to a bias toward Western, industrialized nations. This diverse but rigorously curated collection recalibrates our understanding of design history, reassessing regional and national cultures while situating them within an international context. Here, contributors from five continents offer nuanced studies that range from South Africa to the Czech Republic, all the while sensitive to the complexities of local variation and the role of nation-states in identity construction.

Grace Lees-Maffei is Professor of Design History at the University of Hertfordshire and Programme Director for DHeritage, the Professional Doctorate in Heritage. She is author of Design at Home: Domestic Advice Literature in the UK and the US since 1945, editor of Writing Design: Words and Objects and Iconic Designs: 50 Stories about 50 Things, co-editor with Kjetil Fallan of Made in Italy: Rethinking a Century of Italian Design, and co-editor with Rebecca Houze, of The Design History Reader.