Design Classes Meet with Special Collections

Two of Dr. Russell Flinchum's classes recently met with Special Collections as they continued to explore materials in the collections relating to design. This photograph, taken by undergraduate Art and Design student Tyler Farlow, shows Dr. Flinchum as he discusses a series of volumes available in Special Collections, The coal tar colours of Farbwerke vorm. Meister Lucius & Brüning: Hoechst on Main: and their application in dyeing cotton and other vegetable fibres . This item can be viewed here .

Dr. Flinchum noted, "Hoechst immediately jumped out at me because I knew it was part of I.G. Farben, the massive German dyeworks and chemistry cartel, for whom Peter Behrens designed a beautiful headquarters in the early 1920s making extensive use of color. I've always been interested in the 'coal tar revolution' and how garbage became gold and led to organic chemistry. This beautifully preserved copy demonstrated to my students that there was a fully-formed system of color specifications as early as 1907, as seen in this example, and that the 'pre-Pantone' world was a very sophisticated one...even if it was analog."

In light of Image Discovery Week, courtesy of the Design Library, we in the Special Collections Research Center will be highlighting some of our visual resources this week.