EXHIBITION OF AMERICAN PRODUCT AND PACKAGE DESIGN
Robert Zeidman Associates [Designers],
Aaron Burns & Co. [Typographers]
Robert Zeidman Associates [Designers], Aaron Burns & Co. [Typographers]: EXHIBITION OF AMERICAN PRODUCT AND PACKAGE DESIGN. Washington, DC: U. S. Department of Commerce in Coöperation with Industrial Designers Society of America and Package Designers Council, 1965. Original Impression. 18 x 24” (45 x 61 cm) trim size image printed via offset lithography by on Finch Opaque by Argus-Greenwood. Machine folded into halves [as issued]. Lightly handled, but a very good example.
Vintage Cultural Exchange exhibition poster of American product and package design held at the US Trade Center in London from June 15 – 25, 1965.
The IDSA organization of professional designers can be traced to the beginning of the profession itself, which first came to the attention of the general US public in 1927. That year, Macy's in New York held a well-attended Exposition of Art in Trade. This featured "modern products," many of them from the 1925 International Exposition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris, which was belatedly recognized by the US government as an important "modern movement."
Immediately, some of these professionals founded the American Union of Decorative Artists and Craftsmen (AUDAC) to protect their industrial, decorative and applied arts concepts from piracy, and to exhibit their new work. AUDAC attracted a broad range of artists, designers, architects, commercial organizations, industrial firms and manufacturers. Within a few years, it had more than a hundred members, and held major exhibitions in 1930 and 1931.
In 1933, The National Furniture Designers' Council (NFDC) was founded, bringing together a number of furniture representatives and designers to draw up a code for the National Recovery Administration (NRA) to prevent design piracy. But in 1934, NRA was declared unconstitutional and NFDC disbanded.
In 1936, the American Furniture Mart in Chicago invited leading designers to form a new organization called the Designers' Institute of the American Furniture Mart. Some members felt restricted by the sole patronage and sponsorship of the furniture industry, and in 1938 they founded a broader-based organization called the American Designers Institute (ADI), which allowed specialization in one of many design areas, including crafts, decorative arts, graphics, products, packaging, exhibit or automotive styling, to name a few. ADI's first president was John Vassos (1898-1985).
In February 1944, fifteen prominent East Coast design practitioners established the Society of Industrial Designers (SID). Each of the founding members invited one additional designer to join the following year. Membership requirements were stringent, requiring the design of at least three mass-produced products in different industries. SID was formed in part to reinforce the legality of industrial design as a profession, and to restrict membership to experienced professionals. SID's first president was Walter Dorwin Teague.