“Apple’s hardbound photo book, ‘Designed by Apple in California,’ is now available for purchase in five additional countries around the world,” Juli Clover reports for MacRumoors.
“As of this month, Apple’s websites and retail stores in the following countries carry the book: Canada, Brazil, Singapore, New Zealand, and Ireland,” Clover reports. “The book is text-free, featuring 450 large, high-quality images of Apple products, highlighting the company’s design process.”
“It costs $200 for the small version and $300 for the large version in the United States,” Clover reports. “Prices are higher in other countries like Brazil due to import taxes and other fees.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Rejoice, lovers of world-class industrial and product design in Canada, Brazil, Singapore, New Zealand, and Ireland!
We’ve called the book gorgeous and sumptuous, but even those words don’t do it justice. It’s something you have to hold, see, and leaf through in order to really appreciate its intrinsic, pristine quality which, as one might expect, it gushes with utter confidence.
The book is gorgeous in either size.
SEE ALSO:
(Coffee-table) book review: ‘Designed by Apple in California’ – December 12, 2016
‘Designed by Apple in California’ photo book chronicles 20 years of Apple design, dedicated to the memory of Steve Jobs – November 15, 2016
Steve Jobs left design chief Jonathan Ive ‘more operational power’ than anyone else at Apple – October 21, 2011
I guess not enough peeps are buying it here.
IMO… it would have been a lot more elegant and tasteful if some authority outside of Apple had published this book.
To me it comes across as very Arrogant and Boastful when Apple itself pats itself on his back… and tells the world… look look aren’t we so great !
…with at least their traditional 40% net margin.
The really sad thing about this book is that it isn’t a book about ‘Apple products’ but the SHAPE and CUT of Apple products as the book almost has NO TEXT and thus no context. There is practically no explanation how their shape and design facilitated their use or the part of the software etc. i.e they are treated as ‘fashion’ items vs ‘functional technology’. Many reviewers (whose comments i’ve cut and pasted in previous posts on the topic) lambasted the book as they couldn’t even tell (unless they had PREVIOUS knowledge of the items) what some of the objects photographed were. Like with no text one reviewer said ‘what is that Mac Cube’ ? They sometimes couldn’t tell the TOOLS (used in the fabrication) photographed vs the Apple PRODUCTS.
Why is this ‘sad’? It’s sad as it illustrates the power and direction of leaders of Apple products today where ‘shape and cut’ overshadows in many case ‘use’. Not only is it a self indulgent book (specially made paper, silver edged etc) it’s a self indulgent in a perverse way. It’s the ONLY Apple made history book yet it is NOT aimed at loyal Apple fans but the RICH FASHIONISTAS that Ive is hobnobbing with, fashionistas who don’t care or understand tech but are INTERESTED ONLY IN ‘SHAPE AND CUT’.
(if people don’t understand me see examples : Mac Pro: devolved from a beautifully functional ‘Cheese Grater’ Tower to a Cylinder that is beautiful but has a NON UPGRADABLE GPU and cause’s rat’s nest of wires and the MAC MINI which devolved from a ( possible) QUAD core and upgradable Ram to a soldered RAM non upgradable dual core machine to MAKE IT THINNER to fit a fashionista aesthetic. Ask yourself is it more important for DESKTOP to have more power, upgradable components or to be an inch thinner? ).
The backwards HISTORY aspects is also troubling as it’s so not Jobs. Jobs told a reporter the reason he didn’t have a old Apple products on display was because Apple was NOT a museum (he gave products away to Smithsonian etc). Ive HAD TO BUY some of the products for the book to be photographed).
Also when Jobs was given a the suggestion by a staffer that Apple hold a grand 30th Anniversary gala in the park with celebrities etc, Jobs famously wrote in reply to the staffer:
“Apple is focused on the future, not the past. Steve . “
Bingo. Apple is living in the past.
I got one for Christmas. It’s really pretty cool. The timing worked well as I don’t think I would’ve bought it myself. Opening it was reallly cool though because it opens just like any other Apple product.
Overpriced and overrated, just like Apple under Tim Cook.
I think a book of plates, hard pressed on acid free paper with rice sheets between the pages, with both images and illustrations would have been appropriate.
I think Ive’s intent was not to influence the viewer, but allow them to make up their own opinion about each peice. I am not defending the book or its value, but offering what might be a valid consideration of its purpose.
You are not supposed to know what the object is but appreciate it for its artistic value.
Have many of you ever owned an art book? Sure they have titles and text explaining each piece, but sometimes they don’t. Many times the artist wants you to make your own conclusion. Ive put more into each piece than you care to know.
He decided to assemble the book as a collection, to give his work a separate chance – another objective critique for each item – which they would never have had if they were left to the scrap heap.
Ive works for an industrial design firm and wants to make more of it than he next guy. He put is heart and soul into it. Why not let him do this without making a stink about it?
I don’t disagree with what you say as it’s an opinion and we’re all entitled to our own
you say : “appreciate it for its artistic value”
The problem is that the book to me beyond it’s value intrinsically as a ‘book’ is that it’s an INDICATION of the direction or emphasis of Apple products today which is too often ‘Form’ (or artistic value) trumps Function.
Like My Mac Mini example (above) : the current Mini is smaller, more jewel like, but you can’t ADD RAM and they dropped the Quad core. For a DESKTOP an inch or two smaller for that amount of lost functionality is sliding into the ‘fashionista’ abyss.
another example is the Apple TV Remote….
(like a BEAUTIFUL sports car with a sticky transmission…. )
Apple products are not ‘just’ sculpture but functional tech objects. To me the real incredibleness of Ive’s objects was when Jobs was around he managed to keep so much tech functionality , in fact ENHANCE it, while making them beautiful. Now like the Mac Pro and the Mini it’s more beauty while functionality and tech take a back seat which is sad.
(I remember Ive saying he sometimes had big arguments with Jobs and even stormed out of them. I think Jobs was a balancing influence. Nobody dares to stand up to Ive now. When objects fall into the ‘fashionista’ jewel like frame like iPhones it’s fine, when he does ‘trucks’ he seems not interested. )
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I have two Fine Art degrees and I have hundreds of art books. Personally I have Mac Pros, 12.9 iPad Pro, a MBP and an Apple TV etc.
Thanks… I liked your response. Jobs added balance to Ive. Someone has to say no.
I have been an Apple user for over 20 years and I don’t a severely overpriced oversized coffee table sized pictures-only book.
I have lots of far more interesting over sized coffee table books (one on Apple that is far FAR better than the effort Apple put out) that I paid quite a bit for and have far more to offer a reader.
Apple, once agsin, putting form. fashion over function and informative history.
Ive appears to be an eloquent speaker in interviews and promotions and it is sad that when provide with an opportunity to do an “official” Apple book that he had nothing to say or offer about each of his own / tems designs presented in this book!
I would have strongly considered purchasing THAT book for the money Apple is asking.
A fancy photographed and printed picture only book full of Apple products does nothing for me.
I would have been even more thoroyghly impressed if both Sir Ive and the Apple design team designed, printed and die-cut a 3D ppo-up style book of all of their products!
I have one of these, along with a large printed gatefold blueprints book, that was done for all of Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural designs.
This 3D pop-up book as both a delight AND amazing!
I have actually saved a YouTube video of someone who either bought the Apple book or was given a copy to review and slowly, methodically flipped through every page of this book for all to see to online. Cost me nothing and as far as I am concerned, I now have this book!