Designa: Technical Secrets of the Traditional Visual Arts (Wooden Books Compendia)

Designa looks gorgeous and is a pleasantly compact size. It's stuffed full of history, art and design nuggets and applied geometry. It's actually a collection of six other Wooden Books titles: Celtic Pattern, Islamic Design, Curves, Perspective and Other Optical Illusions, Symmetry and the Golden Section; as such, it is excellent value for money if you don't have any of those titles.

Very interesting facts etc. Really enjoying it.

Excellent collection of all the tips and tricks of the sacred arts, as well as the philosophy behind them, in a beautiful presentation. This makes a real heirloom gift (including for yourself).

Excellent book with some amazing concepts and ideas that could have been lost over time. Recommended for anyone designing pattern work in any format.

I was planning on buying the Islamic Art book but decided to get the Designa compilation instead - a good choice. Such a rich book! I will be reading it for a long time to come. Amazing detail, amazing imagery.

A wonderful and thorough book!

Bought as present for husband - beautiful book with great artwork. It will keep him engrossed for ages!

a super diagrammed text - really helpful

Libro composto da sei libri con bellissime immagini.

Everyone who sees this falls in love. Its a thousand hours of enthralled thought. Makes a stunning gift for anyone who even vaguely likes art/design.

Amazón tardó tanto tiempo en mandarlo que la tarjeta con la que se había pagado caducó. 🤣 Así es, después de casi 5 meses por fin lo tengo en mis manos, es un regalo que llevo queriendo más de una década y 5 meses de espera compara poco con una década. Es un libro magnífico, hay gente que dice que es muy básico, puede ser pero si quisiera algo más … avanzado/ completo/ profundo(?). Me hubiera comprado un libro (o incluso una enciclopedia) de cada tema específicamente. Como bien se especifica son 4 libros sucintos en 1, no esperen más que unas maravillosas ilustraciones e información sucinta de varios temas interesantes. Si conocen esta casa saben a lo que atenerse, sino pueden ver algún resumen en su página o comprarse uno de los libros pequeños. Si se es parte del mundo del arte, ilustración, animación o diseño pueden darle una oportunidad y no creo que les defraude, a no ser que sean especialistas en la materia, es ahí donde lo pueden encontrar … poco informativo. Respetuosamente recuerden que esto es mi humilde opinión. Espero lo disfruten. :3

A very covetable and very comprehensive volume on sacred geometry...

I thought this would be one of those large-format books, like a magazine with better covers. But it's 8 inches by 6 inches and 1.5 inches thick with 410 pages including a 5-page Index at the back for cross-reference. DESIGNA is packed with examples from thousands of years: Graphics and Architectural styles from around the world as well as Scientific examples of ideas like symmetry and repetitive examples from Nature. All sorts of patterns, from strict order to random fields. An arcane tour of relationships compiled for those who can take advantage of this information and not have to reinvent the wheel. It's fascinating reading, and going through the illustrations there are Artistic designs you may have seen (for example in works by M.C. Escher) that are broken down into their elements to show how they work, both visually to massage the brain through the optical cortex, and aesthetically, as they show you WHY they are beautiful. You could view this as someone seeking a specific solution to a problem or as a tourist who just wants to explore where they've never been before. There are carved pieces from 200,000 years ago that are just as modern-looking as Art made yesterday, using the same designs for the same reasons, proving that early humans were more like we are now (and maybe even more, because considering the difficultly level of those pieces, the nameless creators were geniuses.) I wasn't quite sure what this book would contain and now I'm pleased (and amazed) at the depth and scale of the resources that were assembled to inform as well as entertain.