Customer Reviews

Eliot Noyes

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Eliot Noyes was a true pioneer, a man ahead of his time. Gordon Bruce tells the story of his amazing life in a nicely designed book.

The cover art of this book bears close scrutiny as it clearly delineates the amazing web of relationships that defined Eliot Noyes, one of the great architects and industrial designers of the 20th century. The book itself is informative and very readable, but could have used a better proof reader as there are more errors of grammar and spelling than there should be. This might be the result of the impact of the computer on the editing process, as I have noted the same sort of errors in many books published in recent years that seem to reflect this.

In any case, Noyes led a fascinating life; this book helps the reader enter into some of the amazingly diverse relationships and ideas that colored that life. But Noyes was more than that. He had a wonderfully clean and rich understanding of design and how it effects human beings. A man of very definate ideas, he also understood that people cannot be forced into living a certain way, as some architects have tried to do. His understanding of people was similarly rich. Perhaps it is this quality that drew so many people to him and allowed for his enormous influence on American life and society in the last half of the 20th century.

If I have a criticism, it is that there could have been more drawings and illustrations, though there are plenty as there are. I would have particularly liked to have seen more of his drawings done for the archeological dig he went on in the 1930's and renderings done for projects that were never undertaken. I suspect there is a treasure trove of ideas there.

This is a wonderful book!

Eliot Noyes is an American original.
Yet no one talks about him...they do mention many other designers and architects, but not Eliot. Big Mistake, from now on, every time you pull into a gas station, think of him as the guy who designed it.
Get this book and see how much we have taken him for granted for too long!

For those interested in the history of industrial design and the architecture of Bauhaus-educated architects like Gropius, Breuer, etc., this is a very intersting book. There are plenty of excellent photos. I have only read a few chapters so far but look forward to the rest.