Devin Alvarez

Open Format is a new community-built virtual library focusing on design. Libraries are important tools for designers, as reading is critical to expanding their thinking and acquiring new perspectives. Designers gain deep insights through reading and we practice making things to build our technical skills. Very often, they collect tools, materials, and books. These collections are their libraries and are a mirror of their processes and innovations. They experience many types of libraries that become a part of their tool kits: the public, private, personal, digital, and unconventional. These spaces of deep innovation are unique and play a vital role in shaping their practice. Libraries are transformative cultural resource centers, but they do not evolve with the community or serve a niche well. Open Format solves this problem by integrating elements of design spaces into a new type of social community. The "shelves" in the library are organized sets of resources recommended by a global peer-to-peer network of designers who use reading as a tool to enhance their practice. Here you will find a collection of books, films, magazines, and archives that offer you new insights into creative practice.