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A Smile in the Mind: Witty Thinking in Graphic Design: Revised and Updated Edition
Forty years of "witty thinking" from over 500 designers, including hundreds of visual examples and interviews with the world's top practitioners
First published in 1996, A Smile in the Mind rapidly became one of the most influential books in graphic design – a rich sourcebook of design ideas and an entertaining guide to the techniques behind witty thinking.
Now extensively revised and updated, this book explores the powerful role of wit in graphic design, making the case for wit, as the magical element that builds the world’s biggest brands and engages people with messages that matter. Packed with illustrations showcasing the use of wit by today’s practitioners alongside classic examples, A Smile in the Mind brings together the best projects from around the world and across the decades. The different routes designers can take are examined and illustrated with inspirational examples, exploring wit by technique (such as ambiguity, substitution and double takes), application (including posters, packaging and data visualization) and business area, spanning digital, retail, arts and culture, politics and even matters of life and death.
The book also features interviews with legendary designers past and present, answering the biggest question of all: how did they get the idea? Designers offer a glimpse into their private working methods and thought processes, and reveal the inspiration behind classic pieces of work.
Showcasing forty years of witty thinking and including over 1,000 projects and 500 designers and creative thinkers, A Smile in the Mind is an essential compendium of contemporary designs and a celebration of classic pieces, resulting in the definitive guide to wit in graphic design. Written with humour and insight, it offers designers a friendly read, a helpful sourcebook and a trigger for ideas.
First published in 1996, A Smile in the Mind rapidly became one of the most influential books in graphic design – a rich sourcebook of design ideas and an entertaining guide to the techniques behind witty thinking.
Now extensively revised and updated, this book explores the powerful role of wit in graphic design, making the case for wit, as the magical element that builds the world’s biggest brands and engages people with messages that matter. Packed with illustrations showcasing the use of wit by today’s practitioners alongside classic examples, A Smile in the Mind brings together the best projects from around the world and across the decades. The different routes designers can take are examined and illustrated with inspirational examples, exploring wit by technique (such as ambiguity, substitution and double takes), application (including posters, packaging and data visualization) and business area, spanning digital, retail, arts and culture, politics and even matters of life and death.
The book also features interviews with legendary designers past and present, answering the biggest question of all: how did they get the idea? Designers offer a glimpse into their private working methods and thought processes, and reveal the inspiration behind classic pieces of work.
Showcasing forty years of witty thinking and including over 1,000 projects and 500 designers and creative thinkers, A Smile in the Mind is an essential compendium of contemporary designs and a celebration of classic pieces, resulting in the definitive guide to wit in graphic design. Written with humour and insight, it offers designers a friendly read, a helpful sourcebook and a trigger for ideas.
272 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
April 5, 2026
So many clever, lively and interesting ideas in here from iconic brand logos to quietly arch slogans which may not be as well known, but still deliver plenty of bang for the buck.
Some of my favourites included the Hitchcock/Mickey mouse silhouette from the Radio Times in 1979 by Peter Brookes. It’s often the smaller, more understated gestures Hedger Mitchell Stark’s flying logo to promote the Gatwick Express from 1984 which can prove to be bigger than the sum of their parts.
My only criticism of this would be in the closing chapter, where I thought that they made a mistake with interviewing many of the graphic designers who turn out to be quite dull and charmless and far lesser than the sum of their work. It was a bit of a flat and disappointing end to an otherwise really interesting and informative read, which still makes for relevant and enjoyable reading 30 years on.
December 28, 2020
A great collection of examples.
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"But when wit is involved, the designer never travels 100% of the way. The idea has to be 'seen' or decoded, and this demands an active recipient. <...> It is as if the designer throws a ball which then has to be caught. So the recipient is alert, with an active mind and a brain in gear."
"The most valuable accessory in my studio is a large wastepaper basket. Getting ideas is easy: deciding on the right idea and developing it is the difficult thing." — Abraham Games.
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"But when wit is involved, the designer never travels 100% of the way. The idea has to be 'seen' or decoded, and this demands an active recipient. <...> It is as if the designer throws a ball which then has to be caught. So the recipient is alert, with an active mind and a brain in gear."
"The most valuable accessory in my studio is a large wastepaper basket. Getting ideas is easy: deciding on the right idea and developing it is the difficult thing." — Abraham Games.
July 5, 2020
In the world where you are overloaded with the visuals and data, this book focuses primarily on the hidden Witt and humour.
This non-fiction teaches one how to be a lateral thinker and more importantly how can one bring the same in action.
This non-fiction teaches one how to be a lateral thinker and more importantly how can one bring the same in action.
January 9, 2014
I couldn't agree with the subject matter of this book more. Wit and humour are without a doubt some of the most important things you can possibly put into your work as a designer. As they rightfully point out it helps to engage your audience, it makes them want to interact with your work and it provides them with rewards that make them feel good.
Why then has this book lost two stars in the rating?
Simply because the authors have not heard their own message. The writing in this book was as engaging as school textbooks. Everything was analysed and broken apart well but it lacked the wit and humour that helps greatly in more than just design but in all aspects of learning as well. If the content of this book had a bit more of what they were discussing built into it then this would have been a five star book. As it was it ended up being a long winded book that, as with all overly analytical books, started to kill its subject matter through boredom.
Overall not a bad book and an interesting topic but it could have been covered better.
Why then has this book lost two stars in the rating?
Simply because the authors have not heard their own message. The writing in this book was as engaging as school textbooks. Everything was analysed and broken apart well but it lacked the wit and humour that helps greatly in more than just design but in all aspects of learning as well. If the content of this book had a bit more of what they were discussing built into it then this would have been a five star book. As it was it ended up being a long winded book that, as with all overly analytical books, started to kill its subject matter through boredom.
Overall not a bad book and an interesting topic but it could have been covered better.
August 3, 2007
in my first year at pratt i had this douche of a teacher who made us all look at this book which he had put on reserve in the library. I think his last name was burton or something either way, he was a total ass who would tell you to do one thing after a critique and then at the next critique would ask why you did it and say it was better before. At the end of the year he told me i had to work on my hand-eye coordination, what the hell does that even mean? Should i go home a play video games, play with that paddle with the ball attached to it, what? And that is why he and his dumb book are the doucheiest things ever to exist in brooklyn.
September 16, 2018
The work featured in this book is so good it almost makes me angry.
June 30, 2020
Awesome book. Read as part of my reading list for my BA Graphic design course I'm starting in September.
Extremely helpful for ideas generation. Really liked the passages at the end by famous designers. Would definetly recommend.
Extremely helpful for ideas generation. Really liked the passages at the end by famous designers. Would definetly recommend.
September 2, 2022
the book mostly contains witty designs examples, the last chapter contains many designers statements about their design process which was a great insight for me.
January 12, 2026
Amazing collection of clever, meaningful design that flipped on a light bulb in my head
January 27, 2018
spent a couple of hours at the library this evening scrambling to finish this whopper because it was due today, so i can't insert word-for-word quotes into this review, but somewhere in there a designer is quoted as saying something along the lines of, "i spend three days coming up with a witty design, and then i have to make it look as if i'd thought of it in three minutes."
a very thought-provoking book on the use of wit in design! while still in the middle of this book i read a couple of reviews that criticised it for being a long-winded exegesis on the theory of the use of wit, but honestly, i think that the length of this book simply reflects the reality of the effort that goes into the production of witty graphics. i'm sure i've come across wit many times in advertisements, promotional material or awareness-raising efforts and enjoyed a chuckle to myself, but i've never quite stopped to think about the thought process that its creator might have taken to arrive there from the reverse end of the joke. this book is pretty comprehensive in giving not just a categorical sweep of the styles and applications in which wit is used, but also includes at the end anecdotes from professional designers on how they come up with their stuff: and the answer is... magic. no one can quite describe the exact moment when an idea strikes and the joke finds itself fitting together on paper, but one thing that seems to be clear is that that moment becomes mirrored in both the designer's and the audience's minds, and it forms a connection that conveys the original message in a way that is much more satisfying to both parties.
other food for thought: that the use of wit seems to be quite a cultural thing, and... why is that? whenever i make a trip to new zealand to visit family i find myself struck by the way the people and brands there boldly use wit in all sorts of ways that you might not find in singapore - be they quirky shop signs, car plate numbers or food labels. maybe not taking ourselves so seriously is one thing that this country could stand to learn a little better.
overall: just amazed and in awe of all the ideas that have sprung from minds past and present. creativity and the human brain are such curious things. (were these people Ne types?)
a very thought-provoking book on the use of wit in design! while still in the middle of this book i read a couple of reviews that criticised it for being a long-winded exegesis on the theory of the use of wit, but honestly, i think that the length of this book simply reflects the reality of the effort that goes into the production of witty graphics. i'm sure i've come across wit many times in advertisements, promotional material or awareness-raising efforts and enjoyed a chuckle to myself, but i've never quite stopped to think about the thought process that its creator might have taken to arrive there from the reverse end of the joke. this book is pretty comprehensive in giving not just a categorical sweep of the styles and applications in which wit is used, but also includes at the end anecdotes from professional designers on how they come up with their stuff: and the answer is... magic. no one can quite describe the exact moment when an idea strikes and the joke finds itself fitting together on paper, but one thing that seems to be clear is that that moment becomes mirrored in both the designer's and the audience's minds, and it forms a connection that conveys the original message in a way that is much more satisfying to both parties.
other food for thought: that the use of wit seems to be quite a cultural thing, and... why is that? whenever i make a trip to new zealand to visit family i find myself struck by the way the people and brands there boldly use wit in all sorts of ways that you might not find in singapore - be they quirky shop signs, car plate numbers or food labels. maybe not taking ourselves so seriously is one thing that this country could stand to learn a little better.
overall: just amazed and in awe of all the ideas that have sprung from minds past and present. creativity and the human brain are such curious things. (were these people Ne types?)
January 17, 2010
This book is a pointy-headed treatise on wit—where it comes from, what it consists of, how it works—with examples drawn from several decades of print advertising. My favorite chapter is devoted to holiday cards created by advertising agencies for their clients, where a whole company of sharp designers and copywriters work together to create an image that celebrates the holidays, exemplifies the firm's wit and style, and, hopefully, leaves the holiday cards created by rival firms in the dust. (British designers seem to get seriously competitive about holiday cards—it's wonderful.)
July 11, 2016
How can material required to convey the crisis and recovery strategies reach the audience better. Tired of reviewing plans that people just can't pick up (or more usual - don't or can't use or feel involved with etc) get the picture - how can we do better? This is the reason for search of better graphics and ways of presenting programmes and process. Using accelereated solutions development process provides the cue for better and better visuals. Please let me know if you have seen a killer reference here!
December 8, 2008
Smile in the Mind goes beyond the typical eye candy that is the focus of so many design books – and actually shows the possibilities of concept with intelligence and wit. The text is also informative and worth reading, discussing work from over 300 designers in the USA, Britain, Europe and Japan. Documenting the power of intellectual playfulness, it is interesting and even a bit inspiring.
Recommended by Amy, Powells.com
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio...
Recommended by Amy, Powells.com
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio...
September 17, 2010
A delightful book. It was a much-needed reminder to me that good design is about ideas first, execution of those ideas second. The book was published in 1996, but most of the work in it still feels fresh and classic. The writing, for the most part, was insightful and witty, though there were some points where it felt like just filler.
The book inspired me to turn away from the computer screen a little more and pick up a pen and paper.
The book inspired me to turn away from the computer screen a little more and pick up a pen and paper.
August 19, 2012
A must for any graphic designer. Especially if they have concerns to understand the importance of lateral thinking in design. Humour being one of the fundamental aspects of good advertising and design, makes this book invaluable, as it explores the many techniques open to make the involved consumer more able to be subject to the product, or at least enjoy the product.
With hundreds of examples, this book is a good reference to any designer's library.
April 18, 2016
"Witty thinking in graphic design" is the sub-title and that's the content. You can see and read about witty designs, witty companies, witty designers and the invaluable short pieces on how certain designers came by their inspiration including Saul Bass and Peter Brookes. A great book to browse for hope in mankind!
May 23, 2019
Stefano brought this book with him to school today to show something to Lili. I had a chance to peek inside before Sarah abscondended with it. He picked it up at a museum in Amsterdam and I must say it is quite cute and I smiled and LOL'd a lot. From the foreward, I noted "humor is the shortest distance between two people" and that "wit makes memes - a currency in the age of sharing."
November 25, 2024
Not bad for a coffee table book about wit in graphic design. The text is interesting for the most part, though one might get almost as much just from looking at the pictures. The perspective is largely British and male, and some of the images are too small to make out crucial details. Otherwise, however, this is a good survey of creative approaches to using wit for a variety of design needs.
September 3, 2018
I always look for something related to humor, this one is by far best collection of the witty visual thinking.
On the bookshelf for the go-to book if need some inspiration for something witty in my work with design.
On the bookshelf for the go-to book if need some inspiration for something witty in my work with design.
May 3, 2008
WOW is a word to describe this book. A collection of witty design that truly makes you smile in the mind. A must have!
October 26, 2008
The essence of what design is
January 5, 2009
Very clever, very quirky, a collaboration of great designs
May 17, 2009
Not so much a book to read but a book to look at - again and again and regularly. Jam-packed with brilliant witty thinking in design. A bible of ideas.
May 27, 2010
super
to-read-if
October 11, 2011I glanced through this and it looks like something that is intended more for graphic artists than a lay person like myself at this point in life.
April 11, 2013
كانت قراءة جماعية مع طالبات التصميم القرافيكي.. تجربة ممتعة..
June 12, 2012
Designs with wit. Love it!
December 3, 2015
Absolutely Amazing!
Read
July 21, 2016The main body text can be a little dry but the image examples make up for that slightly. Starting to age a bit, but worth a read to see the different ways witty and clever design can be used.
May 13, 2019
The importance of simple designs and how it redefines the market so that it leaves a long lasting impact.
Creativity is the spark!
Creativity is the spark!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews